Aloha to Joanne Kennedy and COWBOY CRAZY

Each week, I get together with two military spouses (who are published authors) to catch up on pop culture.   We recently dished that cowboys are creeping back into popularity with A&E's LONGMIRE and TNT's DALLAS.   Today's guest, Joanne Kennedy, might counter that cowboys have never gone out of style .... from her bio,


Joanne Kennedy is the author of four contemporary Western romances for Sourcebooks: Cowboy Trouble, One Fine Cowboy, Cowboy Fever, and Tall, Dark and Cowboy. She brings a wide variety of experience, ranging from chicken farming to horse training, to her sexy, spicy cowboy stories. She is a 2011 finalist in the prestigious Romance Writers of American RITA© Awards, for One Fine Cowboy. Joanne lives in Cheyenne, Wyoming, where she is working on her next book, Cowboy Tough.  For more information, please visit joannekennedybooks.com. To purchase Joanne’s latest release, Cowboy Crazy, please visit this link.

Kim:  Welcome back to SOS Aloha! You wrote in your bio, “A transplanted Easterner” .... “was delighted to discover that cowboys still walk the streets of Cheyenne.” You remind me of my MIL - a transplanted Easterner military spouse, who found a moose walking down her street in Laramie. Then again, that was the early '60s. What advice would you give a City Slicker moving to the Wild West?

Joanne:  The only advice I can give is for newly-minted Westerners to open their minds and their hearts and their eyes and enjoy it! Your MIL’s moose is a good example of how quirky things are out here. We don’t have moose in Cheyenne, but we have lots of pronghorn antelope. A couple months ago I stepped out my front door (I live in town) and there were two of them strolling casually down the sidewalk, like a nice old couple out for a walk. They also hang around the golf course here, watching you with their buggy eyes while you tee off. Come to think of it, maybe this is where antelope go when they retire. I wonder if they go to bingo night at church?!? 

moblog.net

Kim:  I am curious about a job you mentioned in your bio as well, the “bridezilla wrangling at a department store wedding registry.” I thought Westerners were friendly folk?!?! How do you develop your quirky characters lovable but not clichés?

Joanne:  Oh, the bridezillas! They actually taught me a lot about romance. It was a high-end department store, and these poor girls were so caught up in the drama of choosing china patterns and bed linens that it seemed like they’d forgotten that weddings are about being with the person you love—not furnishing your house!As a result, my own wedding was small and simple, with no gifts allowed.

As for my quirky characters, they develop themselves. I’m a fairly instinctive writer and don’t do a lot of planning or character worksheets. I usually have a very strong idea of how a character looks and their voices come to me as they react to situations. Characters like Crazy Mike in Cowboy Trouble, Doris in One Fine Cowboy, Troy in Cowboy Fever, and Fletcher Galt in Tall, Dark and Cowboy are as real to me as you are. And yes, I know that’s crazy. 

Preview

Kim:  Tell us about COWBOY CRAZY!

Joanne:  Speaking of crazy…oh, I love this book. I love the hero, rodeo cowboy Lane Carrigan. I love the heroine, Ivy League graduate Sarah Landon. I love them because they’re so tough on the outside, but inside they’re just as mixed-up as the rest of us, with pasts that haunt the present and doubts that jeopardize their futures.

Lane is from an old Wyoming family that started out in ranching and is now involved in the oil business. Sarah is a small-town girl who’s trying to kick the country dust off her boots and become a part of the privileged world Lane takes for granted. He’s on his way back to his roots and she’s leaving hers behind. They meet in the middle in a head-on collision, and the sparks really fly.

I love the supporting cast in this novel, too. Sarah’s sister Kelsey is struggling to raise a daughter despite the collapse of her marriage. While she isn’t as accomplished as Sarah, she has a lot to teach her sister about love. In fact, I learned a lot from Kelsey about loving without reservations—loving someone “all the way.” That’s really what this book is about. 

Kim:  What's next for Joanne Kennedy?

Joanne:  My next book is Cowboy Tough, which will be coming out in January 2013. It’s about a rodeo cowboy who saves the family ranch into a dude ranch, and winds up wrangling a posse of watercolor painters through the backcountry and falls smack-dab in love with an artist. I was an artist before I was a writer, so I’ve been wanting to write about that collision for a long time!

Thanks for inviting me aboard the SOS Aloha for this little chat. I’d love to hear from readers in the comments about wildlife adventures, bridezilla encounters, and anything else they’d like to discuss! I’ll be stopping by all day to see what stories we reel in. 

Mahalo, Joanne, for moseying over!   Check out my review of COWBOY CRAZY on Amazon at this link and Goodreads at this link.  SOURCEBOOKS is giving away a print copy of COWBOY CRAZY – IN STORES JUNE 2012:

Sparks fly when sexy cowboys collide with determined heroines in a West filled with quirky characters and sizzling romance. Acclaimed for delivering “a fresh take on the traditional contemporary Western“ Joanne Kennedy’s books might just be your next great discovery!

From stable to boardroom…

Sarah Landon’s Ivy League scholarship transforms her from a wide-eyed country girl into a poised professional. Until she’s assigned to do damage control with the boss’s rebellious brother Lane, who’s the burr in everybody’s saddle. He’s determined to save his community from oil drilling, and she’s not going back to the ranch she left forever. Spurs will shine in this saucy romp about ranchers and roots, redemption and second chances. 

To enter the giveaway, leave a comment for Joanne regarding your wildlife adventures, bridezilla encounters, or anything else you'd like to share with her!   This giveaway is open to residents in the US and Canada.   I'll giveaway a Hawaiian Paniolo (cowboy) souvenir to one international reader.  Comments are open through Saturday, June 16, 10 pm in Hawaii.  I'll post the winner on Sunday, June 17.

Mahalo,

Kim in Hawaii

We have paniolos on HAWAII FIVE O.