Author's Animal Antics is a regular blog feature here at Sarah's Book Reviews where I'm very excited to have some fantastic authors come and chat to us about their pets or share animal related stories. I'm thrilled to introduce the lovely Andrea Cremer as my guest today...
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The Horse Who Gave Me Nightshade by Andrea Cremer
When first asked to do this post, it was suggested that I might have a good animal story having to do with wolves. I wish I did. Sadly I have no wolfy tale to share. What I do have is a story about a horse – a horse who is responsible for Nightshade’s very existence.
Like many girls are, I was obsessed with horses when I was young and I worked on a horse ranch in the summers from age 10 – 18. I still love horses, but rarely have the time or opportunity to ride. In the summer of 2008, I had just finished my first year in my new job teaching history at Macalester College. This was after many years of post-graduate study where my entire existence consisted of reading history and researching in archives. I was determined to spend the break getting back to the things I loved but had neglected because of work and school. Horseback riding was the first thing on my list.
On a lovely June day I went out to ride a horse named Romulus and after I had him all tacked up and ready to head out things went very wrong. As I was leading him out of the barn another horse spooked him and he jumped. But he didn’t just jump up – he jumped toward me and I didn’t get out of the way. All his weight came down on my right foot, crushing it.
My horseback riding adventure that never happened left me with broken bones and the inability to walk for twelve weeks. Since I was stuck on my sofa I had to rethink the way I would spend my summer. That was when I decided to try something else that I’d always longed to do, but had been afraid to give a real chance: writing a novel.
Once I started writing, I couldn’t stop. It was as if a switch had been flipped on inside me and all I wanted to do was write. I knew my life had changed forever and that pursuing writing professionally was something I had to try.
Despite the misadventure of a skittish horse and broken bones, without these animal antics Nightshade might never have been. So thank you, Romulus, for stomping on my foot and changing the course of my life forever
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Thank you so much for visiting today Andrea, I have to say a big thank you to Romulus too because I loved Nightshade! Andrea Cremer is the author of Nightshade which has already been a huge success in the US and was released in the UK on the 28th of December. Nightshade is a fantastic start to a new young adult paranormal romance series and one I'd highly recommend reading. You can read my review of Nightshade here, and my review of Shadow Days (a free Nightshade prequel novella) here. I'll be posting a UK giveaway later today thanks to Atom. I think the wait for Wolfsbane - the second book in the series which releases in July 2011 - may just kill me!
For more information about the Author's Animal Antics feature click here
That horse story had me cringing at the thought of how utterly painful that must have been- but it had a happy ending! All's well that ends well.
ReplyDeleteI used to love horses when I was younger too. They were always about in a field beside the school and the fields we had to pass to my aunties house. Though I never rode one, I must have read hundreds of books with horses in. At least you got to ride a horse though maybe next time the horse could try being inspiring without causing you so much pain.
ReplyDelete@ Kulsuma - it must have been so painful I don't even like to think about it! It did work out for the best in the end though as we got to read Nightshade :o)
ReplyDelete@ Natalie - I used to love horse riding when I was younger but haven't been for years now. I love reading books about horses, probably one of the reasons I've always loved cowboys lol