THE WRITE PATH with Mary Buckham

Mary Buckham

In this series, guest bloggers talk to us about their books. My guest today is author, teacher, head ninja and sometimes personal life coach Mary Buckham, who will be discussing Invisible Fears, part one of her Invisible Recruit series. You can find my review on her book here: Invisible Fears – Review

So let me hand over my mic. The next voice you’ll hear will be Mary’s.

1. What is your book about?

INVISIBLE FEARS is the fourth full-length novel in the Invisible Recruits Urban Fantasy series and the first in that series focusing on Kelly McAllister, a former kindergarten teacher turned covert agent to fight preternaturals. She also has an ability that has always set her apart—she can turn invisible. Which sounds fun, but is everything but, especially in this story.

Kelly’s the nice girl-next-door who always sees the glass half-full and she’s leading her first mission deep into the heart of equatorial Africa. She’s to find a rare item that is the key to understanding and stopping a dangerous threat to humans and preternaturals alike. She’s also looking for answers to how her beloved older sister died in this part of the world while doing relief work, a quest that opens up more questions than answers and puts her official mission at risk almost immediately. Danger is around every corner as Kelly struggles to complete her mission, protect innocent children under her care, and stay alive. Then there’s a hunky wolf Shifter who’s causing her all sorts of other complications.

2. What do you think attracts readers to your main characters?

Kelly is that kind, compassionate, genuinely good person we’d all like to be, or think of ourselves as being, pushed to the brink physically, mentally and emotionally. Some see her optimism as naïve and dangerous, especially in her role as a fighter against preternatural threats. Others see her in ways she’d never see herself. I think what attracts readers to her is her journey of self-discovery that’s as much a part of the story as surviving the external threats she faces.

3. What message do you hope the reader takes away from your book?

My book titles tend to reflect the themes of my stories. So in INVISIBLE FEARS Kelly must face a whole gamut of fears—external and internal. Attacks by a Smere goblin, a kidnapping by a sinister preternatural mercenary leader, slogging through the jungle, as well as learning the truth behind her sister’s death and her own hidden background. Facing the type of hurdles she has to face is not easy and doing so while struggling to remain true to who Kelly thinks she is, adds a whole other layer of complications for her.

4. What is it about your book that made you so determined it should be published?

Writing the first 3 novels and 2 novellas in the series focused on Alex Noziak, a witch/shaman with a wicked attitude and hell-for-leather approach to life. Writing about nice-girl Kelly was a 180% turn around to really get into her skin while seeing her through her fellow IR (Invisible Recruit) teammates and through her own world view. Just because she was a good girl did not mean she didn’t have issues and challenges, and it certainly made it interesting to put her into situations that would have stopped battle-hardened warriors, and see how she approached them. Because so many of my readers enjoyed Alex, switching to a new character, even one they recognized, was a huge risk for me as a writer and for the sake of the series. So far though the feedback has been very positive. Proving good girls don’t finish last!

5. Comparing the ideas you had before writing the book with the finished product, would you change anything if you could travel back in time?

This book was originally written for a major publisher as the 3rd book in a 5 book series they’d contracted with me for a few years back. But the month before it was due for release the publisher stopped publishing these kinds of stories so Kelly’s story was set aside. When I revitalized the series with a preternatural/paranormal element last year I took book 2 in the series and revealed elements of that character and her own challenges in 3 novels and 2 novellas. I’ll be doing the same with Kelly and each of the remaining primary Invisible Recruit characters. So 5 Invisible Recruit operatives, three novels each and as many novellas as I have time to write creates a huge story world and story arc to juggle.

In INVISIBLE FEARS, even though the core story concepts – Kelly, former kindergarten teacher turned operative and set in Africa – remained from the original finished draft, so much of the story was rewritten that it’d be hard to see what remains of that original story. As for traveling back in time I’m very, very glad now that these books were not published by the big NY publishing House because I’m having way too much fun writing and releasing them in a manner that allows readers to get them in their hands sooner rather than later. Which means the next novella about Kelly was released in July and the next novel—INVISIBLE SECRETS—will be in September.

 About Mary

 USA Today bestselling author Mary Buckham writes non-fiction; the Amazon best selling WRITING ACTIVE SETTING series (in e-format and now in book form); as well as fiction – Urban Fantasy w/attitude. Love romance, danger & kick-ass heroines? Find it in her Invisible Recruits series: www.MaryBuckham.com or www.InvisibleRecruits.com.

Intrigued? Grab your copy of INVISIBLE FEARS here:

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1l9LcHe
B&N: http://bit.ly/1lDNIbX
Kobo: http://bit.ly/SV8kkK