Today I have something special for you!  Fellow Beyond the Veil author Cheryel Hutton and I have traded interviews.  We each came up with five questions and together, answered all ten of them for each other.  We figured it’s a fun way to share a little about ourselves and to bring you the exciting news of our new releases.  Cheryel’s guest post is below, and my post is at Chez Cheryel.  Enjoy!

Q: How did you pick your pen name?

A: Actually, my parents picked it. I use my legal name. I did use a pen name for a short time, but finally decided I liked seeing my real name in print.

Q: Why is the sky blue?

Because it would look really funny if it was purple.

A: Where do you most like to sing?

In front of an audience. The problem is all those rotten vegetables they throw at me when I do. Rude people.

Q: What are your five favorite ways to research for a book?

A:
1 Internet
2 library
3 asking questions via email (I’m not a phone person).
4 road trip!
5 workshops, classes, and documentaries

Q: When you have a day off, what’s your ideal way to spend it?

A: I enjoy being curled up with a long novel and/or watching a movie (or two). But my absolute favorite way to spend a day off is with my grandkids—after which I need another day off.

Q: Have you named your muse or picture her/him in some way?

A: My muse usually chooses to take the form of a dragon, and she tells me her name is Quill. As you would expect, what she says usually goes.

Q: Have you ever been caught acting out a scene from one of your books?

A: Oh yes. My husband thinks I’m quite amusing. Who needs TV when you can watch your wife talk to herself and gesture wildly.

Q: Have you ever seen a cryptid? Would you like to?

A: Well, there is that bigfoot tribe…But I’m not supposed to talk about that.

Q: Is there something you have always wanted to do, but haven’t? Tell us about it.

A: I love to travel, and I’ve always wanted to explore the western part of the U.S. There is some beautiful country out there, and I’d like to see it for myself. I’ve never had the financial resources, though. Maybe I’ll make enough money from my books to be able to do that. You never know!

Check out Cheryel’s newest release, THE UGLY TRUTH, available from Amazon.

Cheryel Hutton talks to dragons. Thing is, they talk to her too, telling her stories of other dragons, of witches, werewolves, bigfoot creatures, fairies, leprechauns, and vampires—and people, of course. Some of the stories are light and funny, but some are darker and scary. Then there are the stories of evil humans—and they are the scariest stories of all. The dragon’s stories all have one theme: Love can overcome everything. Like Cheryel, dragons are romantics at heart, and believe in happy endings.

Her husband and grown children sometimes wonder about Cheryel. That maybe she spends too much time whispering to dragons and writing down the stories the dragons tell her. But the dragons make her happy, so they’re not overly worried. The grandchildren are young enough to talk to dragons too, so they understand.

Cheryel writes full time, putting her passion for stories, characters, critters, and words into a form she can share with others. She writes every morning, six and sometimes seven days a week. She loves writing, but she also sees it as a job, a career, and she treats it accordingly.

When she isn’t writing, she loves spending time with her family, playing with her dogs, watching movies (especially old movies), doing crochet and other crafts, and reading a wide variety of books.

Cheryel, her family, and her two dachshunds, all of whom have their own stories, live in Tennessee, but there are places in the far corners of the South where the impossible tends to come to life. Cheryel loves to visit them.