{Guest Post} Deep Blue Secret by Christie Anderson

Deep Blue Secret by Christie Anderson

About the Book: California teen, Sadie James, thinks her life couldn’t get any better. She has great friends, an energetic mother she adores, and the beach practically in her own backyard. But her carefree life is turned upside down when she’s rescued by a mysterious and strangely familiar boy who won’t even tell her his name. Each time the boy appears, Sadie’s unexplainable attraction to him deepens along with her need to unravel his secrets. The boy is there to protect her. But as wonderful and exciting as it might be to have an irresistible boy with crystal green eyes protecting her every move, every minute of the day...why does Sadie need one? As Sadie finds answers, she realizes her life isn’t as perfect as she thought. Not only is she caught in a world of dangerous secret agents she never knew existed, but it turns out her true identity may be the greatest secret of all.

Book Trailer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNODYfM7lvo&feature=related


About the Author:Christie Anderson has gone from a BA degree in Latin American studies at Brigham Young University, to pizza delivery driver, flight attendant, office manager, and real estate investor, to finally finding her true passion in writing. Deep Blue Secret is her debut novel and the first book in The Water Keepers series. Christie grew up in Southern California and goes back to visit every year. She currently lives in Utah with her husband.

Visit her Web site at www.christieanderson.org
Purchase at Amazon http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005EOTJRC and Barnes & Noble http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Deep-Blue-Secret/Christie-Anderson/e/2940013180314
Find updates at Facebook http://www.facebook.com/pages/Deep-Blue-Secret-Fan-Page/248461658520765

Guest Post by Christie Anderson:
Living. Breathing. Characters.People often ask if an author based his or her characters on real life people or on true events. For me, and I’m guessing many other writers, the answer is definitely yes…and of course, no.

I don’t think I would ever take the characteristics of one single person and mimic them one hundred percent, probably not even eighty percent. No one enjoys a crazy ex-boyfriend running around the media, or even your hometown, shouting, “She’s purposely slandering my name out of bitter, woman vengeance!” And even worse, you could run the risk of offending someone you actually like and care about. Plus, it’s much more fun to create a new and exciting personality than it is to copy someone.

It may be difficult to completely avoid your friends and family wondering in the back of their minds, “Was that person or part of the story based on me? There was that one time when I slipped while holding a goldfish and accidentally swallowed it…” I think it’s okay to let them wonder a little bit though. Writing can be tough work. We need to dig up the bits of humor and fun wherever we can find them. However, making up a completely new person out of thin air would be impossible, at least for me. When I write, I feel it. I feel emotions and excitement and frustration. Every single character has a piece of me inside them, whether it’s obvious or not. I love to live inside their heads and really get a sense of what is driving them forward.

In Deep Blue Secret, the first book of my Water Keepers series, Sadie James is basically the lovable girl next door. I’d like to think of myself as somewhat lovable too; at least I hope we have that in common. We both love music, tacos, and the ocean. But she’s a social butterfly with an outgoing, charming personality that everyone adores. I’ve tried to embrace that hidden side of me over the years, but this definitely was not my strong point at her age, and it’s probably still not. I was incredibly shy as a teenager. The outgoing part of Sadie comes from my two older sisters, my best friend, and all of the other beautiful, smart, talented girls I grew up with in California that I always wished I could be more like. I put some of this jealous, insecure side of me in Heather, Sadie’s best friend. Although, she’s not even a little bit shy.

Even the “villain” in my story, Voss, holds pieces of my own life inside him. I may not be so cold and convoluted that I would threaten to shoot another human being like he would, but I’ve experienced pain, betrayal and anger during the rough patches in my life, just as he has.

There is pain in life. Without it, I wouldn’t be who I am today. I wouldn’t have felt the aching drive to create stories and fill them with characters I can look up to, that give me hope; like Rayne, Sadie’s protector, who would choose his own suffering rather than let the slightest harm come upon her, or Sadie’s mother, Leena, who always wears a smile to cheer up those around her and make them feel welcomed. Every one of my characters has some of the good, and of course the bad (because nobody’s perfect), from all of the joy and learning and amazing people that I’ve met in my life. This is what makes my characters real. This is what gives me the drive to live with them inside my head each day. And when they all come together to experience it all in one big, intriguing, fictional world…well that’s when you know you have a story worth sharing.

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