Friday, July 1, 2016

Celebrate Canada Day - Aloha to Kaylea Cross


Today is Canada Day ... and our grand finale of Celebrate Canada Week with Kaylea Cross!  From her bio,

New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author Kaylea Cross writes edge-of-your-seat military romantic suspense. Her work has won many awards and has been nominated for both the Daphne du Maurier and the National Readers’ Choice Awards. A Registered Massage Therapist by trade, Kaylea is also an avid gardener, artist, Civil War buff, Special Ops aficionado, belly dance enthusiast and former nationally-carded softball pitcher. She lives in Vancouver, BC with her husband and sons.

Learn more about Kaylea and her books at kayleacross.com.


Kim:  What is your favorite sight, sound, or smell of your corner of Canada?

Kaylea: My favorite sight is the ocean. I dream one day of living in a house with an ocean view. My favorite sound is a tie between rain on the roof (good thing, since it rains so much here!), a distant train’s whistle, and the sweet, trilling song of a robin early in the spring. My favorite smell is the scent of the woods. One breath and it takes me right back to my childhood days when I would roam the woods behind our house.

Kim: Do you have a favorite Canadian saying?

Kaylea: It’s no joke that we really do say “eh” up here. My mom’s side of the family especially. Her mom was from England, so I wonder if that’s how it originated. At any rate, we use it all the time. “Nice day, eh?”

Kim: What would you recommend a reader to see, eat, or drink to enhance their travel experience to Canada?

Kaylea: Oh boy! Of course Canada is HUGE, the second biggest landmass on earth, so there’s a lot to see. My favorite recommendations about something to see would be the gorgeous and rugged coastline or the Okanagan lake region here in BC, the magnificence that is Quebec City, and the ocean paradise of Nova Scotia, which is way out east in the maritimes. As for eating, of course we love our seafood out here on the West Coast, and our Canadian beef is pretty well known too. We’re not so much into maple here on the West Coast as in other parts of the country—it’s more of an eastern thing. To drink, we have plenty of Canadian beer and world famous wines. I don’t drink alcohol, but I’m told they’re excellent :).

File:Late Winter Reflections on Lake Okanagan.JPG
Late Winter Reflections on Lake Okanagan
Creative Commons (link)

Kaylea celebrated her 10th novel in the Hostage Rescue Team series, RECLAIMED:

Sometimes love isn’t enough.

Summer Blackwell has endured her own private hell and fought her way through to the other side. She’s lost so much and her marriage has crumbled, but she refuses to give up hope. Just as she thinks there might be a chance to reconcile with her husband, things go terribly wrong during a job in Jordan when she and her team are captured by the enemy. Now, with every passing hour she’s one step closer to a horrific death at the hands of the radical terror group she was working to destroy. Escape is impossible. Unless her husband’s team finds her before the deadline hits, it will be too late…

And sometimes, it’s everything.

Special Agent Adam Blackwell is going to win his wife back, no matter what it takes. In spite of everything they’ve gone through, he’s never stopped loving her, and can’t imagine his life without her. He’s been on personal leave to mount a desperate campaign to save their broken marriage, but agrees to join his team for a one-off protective detail assignment in Amman. When the unthinkable happens and Summer is taken hostage by the most ruthless terrorist organization in the region, Adam and his teammates will stop at nothing to save her. But every day without a solid lead means the hope of rescuing her is dwindling, and now it’s a race to find her before the clock runs out.

26826723

I am giving away a book choice from my convention stash to one randomly selected commenter. To enter the giveaway,

1. Leave a comment about Canada - what do you know about our Northern neighbor?  What have you learned this week?  What do you love about the Maple Leaf country?

2. Comments are open through Saturday, July 2, 10 pm in Baltimore.

3. I'll post the winner on Sunday, July 3.

Mahalo,

Kim in Baltimore
Aloha Spirit in Charm City

Cheakamus Lake at dawn, in Garibaldi Provincial Park, BC
Public Domain (link

19 comments:

  1. Maple syrup :D Great with pancakes, my favorite.

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  2. My friend who lives in Canad sent me a box of maple leaf cookies. They were so good. I sent him a box of Windmill cookies which are my favorites. I love how so many places there is so green with foliage. I just don't have that here in Vegas.

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  3. they have maple syrup

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  4. My Great-Uncle Sam lived in Canada - I was confused when I learned about the US Uncle Sam - apparently I said 'then why does he live in Canada?"

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  5. Love canada
    Famiy live there
    Kimh

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  6. Been to Montreal and Quebec. Lovely country. We visited Celion Dion's restaurant when we were in Montreal. Our son went to Med school in Montreal.
    ladbookfan

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  7. I grew up on the border with Canada where it meets NE NY. That of course is Quebec which most of the time doesn't consider itself part of the rest of Canada. Both my mother's and father's families came to the US via Canada. We have ancestors that were among the first settlers along the ST. Lawrence. We have visited Several provinces and loved Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton Island. We did go to Vancouver for the World's Fair. It was a taste of the area, but we want to go back when it isn't so crowded.
    I did a research project for college in Canada. I was looking into the French-English relations and how the civil government was set up. Had some very interesting conversations with an English Canadian teacher and with a few of my mother's French Canadian relatives. My father's French-Canadian relatives were the earliest ones to arrive and settled near Quebec City. The Irish side of the family came over during the Potato Famine and settled in Quebec eventually crossing to Plattsburgh, NY. There are still "cousins" in the area, but they don't speak english. The generation that kept in touch with them, my grandparents and uncles, is now gone and I never met them. It is too bad. We passed through the town where they live on our way home from Quebec City.
    We hope to take the Trans-Canadian highway to the West Coast and travel to Alaska through Canada. Some day we hope to make it out to Newfoundland and Labrador.

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  8. I have a nephew living in Canada. It always looks so beautiful.

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  9. Love to visit again

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  10. My parents took us to Canada to camp for several summers and we went to the 1967 Expo. I loved visiting! And they have Hockey!!!!

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  11. I would love to visit there. I know there are some very awesome authors that live there. And I know it gets cold and they're are bears and hockey. I may need to study up :)

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  12. I haven't been there since I was a teenager, but we used to go there for a month on fishing vacations. It's a beautiful country with very friendly people.

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  13. Lovely country; visted one time. They have a high sales tax.
    Karen T.

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  14. Canada is a diverse country with beautiful scenic areas and lovely cities. I would love to visit Toronto and Montreal.

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  15. There's a lot of diversity in the topography, flora, and fauna in Canada. It sounds like a gorgeous place to live or visit!

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  16. I would love to vistit Canada one day :)

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  17. We have visited the gorgeous national parks in Alberta. I love how we saw that they had built some crossings over the highways specifically for animals like elk and bears to cross over safely.

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