The One Apart: Justin Avery

Please welcome Justine Avery author of The One Apart.

Justine Avery author of The One Apart will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

The One Apart

by Justine Avery

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GENRE: Paranormal

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INTERVIEW:

• What or who inspired you to start writing?

A love for reading inspired me to write. I think it’s natural for all of us who love to read to be drawn to the idea of creating our own stories, developing our own ideas, and giving readers that sense of surprise or happiness that we enjoy when we read a great story.

• How did you come up with ideas for your books?

The initial little ideas just pop into mind: maybe from a dream, something someone says, something that happens, or while reading or watching a story someone else wrote. They can be really tiny ideas, like a type of character or a strange predicament, or a spooky element. When I’m ready to write, I choose a tiny idea, start writing, and the story unfolds.

• What expertise did you bring to your writing?

There’s the technical side of writing, but that doesn’t make a great story. My own unique storytelling style and story ideas come from my fascination with everything under the sun—and beyond it. I’m curious about everything. I’ve traveled the world since I was a small child, and I’ve always been interested in all the differences between all of us, our cultures, and our environments. A certain person with certain life experiences, beliefs, and traits, placed into a specific situation will act completely differently from another. My awareness of the variety in the world helps embellish the realism, details, and strange situations in my stories.

• What would you want your readers to know about you that might not be in your bio?

Anything they’re curious about that I didn’t have room to write in! Just ask. J

• As far as your writing goes, what are your future plans?

To keep writing, keep telling stories, and never stop. Each of us has such a different take on the world and all the possibilities, that if we don’t write the stories within us, no one else can.

• Do you belong to a critique group? If so how does this help or hinder your writing?

The experience of forced group criticism in college creative writing wasn’t a positive one. And I’ve since learned that a story is a very delicate thing until it’s actually finished, until the author feels they’ve done all they can with it. If you talk about the story, its premise, your excitement or your struggles, you’re burning creative energy that could be fueling the next sentences; you’re losing some of the enthusiasm that compelled you to write that story to begin with. I think story is hurt by outside criticism during its development. The opinions of others are most useful when the story is “complete” in a good finished draft, and even then, readers need to be carefully chosen for their honesty, appreciation of and respect for story itself, and even their ability to recognize what you’re capable of as an author. A story is like a child that deserves very careful nurturing. J

• When did you first decide to submit your work? Please tell us what or who encouraged you to take this big step?

It was a very natural step for me. If you don’t “put it out there,” no one’s ever going to read it or enjoy your unique perspective. Art that has no audience is wasted… unless it’s “practice,” just for the artist, and the next creation is going to be shared.

• What is the best and worst advice you ever received? (regarding writing or publishing)

Worst: “Write what you know.” (delivered by an editor who didn’t believe the character in one of my stories really exists as a personality in the world, only showing how much they didn’t know themselves!)

Best: “Keep writing.” It’s just about the only advice a writer needs and the one thing we have to always keep in mind. We’re not sharing with others, getting better at what we do, writing toward our very best work, etc. if we’re not physically sitting down and writing.

• Do you outline your books or just start writing?

I just start writing! J My process is very simple: start with a tiny story idea, the simpler and less-detailed, the better. Then, I start writing the story from the beginning. I never know how my stories are going to end up—and for me, that’s the whole fun of it. That’s why I write! Every story’s an adventure, a mystery, an experience waiting to unfold. That’s the whole appeal for me. If I’m not having fun writing a story, I imagine no one else is going to enjoy reading it. No outlines exist for my stories. My stories aren’t planned; they’re dreamed. At most, I may get flooded with ideas for a story while writing it, then have to keep up by jotting them all down and maybe needing to put them in chronological order to refer to them later. But I’ve found I’m not happiest with even “fun ideas” in a little list to write into the story; that’s when creative writing turns into academic writing, for me, with a pre-determined end goal, and all the fun is sucked out of it.

10. Do you have an all time favorite book?

I could never cite just one best book. I follow my reading nose, my in-the-moment interests, wherever they take me. Every book offers something new, something to discover.  So does every author.  When I’m asked what my favorite book or author is, I can’t help but think of all those I haven’t even read—or discovered—yet.

11. Have you started your next project? If so, can you share a little bit about your book?

My next book will likely be a collection of shorter stories, all sharing a common element: the story of those big moments in life when everything changes, when everything turns in a new direction. I have a few unpublished stories that happen to have that idea in common, and I’m eager to write more and create a collection full of interesting characters and predicaments and surprising moments.

12. Anything else you might want to add?

I write to explore ideas and satiate my own curiosity. I publish to share the story with others for your own enjoyment. When it’s in your hands, it belongs to you. There’s no intended lesson or meaning or ulterior motive; The One Apart is for you to interpret, for you to explore and discover. So, I hope you enjoy the heck out of the adventure of reading it!

BLURB:

Only one obstacle stands in his way of enjoying a normal life. He remembers—every life he’s lived before.

Tres is about to be born… with the biggest burden any has ever had to bear. He is beginning again—as an ageless adult trapped in an infant body.

He and his teenage mother face life filled with extraordinary challenges as they strive to protect, nurture, and hide how truly different he is. But Tres alone must solve the greatest mystery of all: who is he? The answer is linked to the one question he’s too afraid to ask: why am I?

In his quest, Tres discovers that all is considerably more interconnected and dynamic than he could ever imagine—and fraught with far more danger. He cannot hide from the unseen threat stalking him since his birth.

Life as he knows it—as all know it—is in peril. And Tres is the only one aware.

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EXCERPT:

Tres felt his body abruptly drop around him with overbearing weight, encapsulating him once again.

The mental images, the overpowering memories, finally faded. Only an ominous stillness remained.

Every cell within him began to twitch, infusing with energy—even as he felt immobile. Every joint, tendon, and bone ached under the pressure of being alive.

A deep sadness engulfed him. He pondered possible rea

sons. And, just as quickly, he was distracted by the presence of his own simple thoughts.

Thoughts. He realized his own thinking.

This mind—certain of its own newness—desired to explore, feel, do, be. Tres opened his eyes—tried to open his eyes. He found his eyelids fused shut.

He opened his mouth. Thick, warm syrup seeped inside his swallow. Intense fear washed over him, even as he knew exactly where—and how—he was.

Oh, no.

Tres was aware, more aware than any had ever been. In this moment, he knew everything—and yet, nothing.

He was beginning again.

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Justine Avery is an award-winning author of stories large and small for all. Born in the American Midwest and raised all over the world, she is inherently an explorer, duly fascinated by everything around her and excitedly noting the stories that abound all around. As an avid reader of all genres, she weaves her own stories among them all. She has a predilection for writing speculative fiction and story twists and surprises she can’t even predict herself.

Avery has either lived in or explored all 50 states of the union, over 36 countries, and all but one continent; she lost count after moving 30-some times before the age of 20. She’s intentionally jumped out of airplanes and off the highest bungee jump in New Zealand, scuba dived unintentionally with sharks, designed websites, intranets, and technical manuals, bartered with indigenous Panamanians, welded automobile frames, observed at the Bujinkan Hombu Dojo in Noba, Japan, and masterminded prosperous internet businesses—to name a few adventures. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree that life has never required, and at age 28, she sold everything she owned and quit corporate life—and her final “job”—to freelance and travel the world as she always dreamed of. And she’s never looked back.

Aside from her native English, Avery speaks a bit of Japanese and a bit more Spanish, her accent is an ever-evolving mixture of Midwestern American with notes of the Deep South and indiscriminate British vocabulary and rhythm, and she says “eh”—like the Kiwis, not the Canadians. She currently lives near Los Angeles with her husband, British film director Devon Avery, and their three adopted children: Becks, Sam, and Lia. She writes from wherever her curiosity takes her.

Avery loves to connect with fellow readers and creatives, explorers and imaginers, and cordially invites you to say “hello”—or konnichiwa.

www.JustineAvery.com

Twitter: @Justine_Avery

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/JustineAvery

Book buy link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076B7RDWY

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION and RAFFLECOPTER CODE

Justine Avery will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/28e4345f2505