Author Interview & Giveaway: Cora Carmack

Posted by Reading Lark June 17, 2013

Author Interview & Giveaway: Cora Carmack

We are excited to welcome author, Cora Carmack, to the nest today. She's here to discuss her novel, Faking It. The Larks are HUGE fans of Cora. Be sure to check out the giveaway details at the end of the post for your chance to win a SIGNED copy of Faking It.

Read Jen's review of Losing It

Read Jen's review of Faking It

Jen @ Reading Lark: How hard was it to move from viewing Cade as a friend type of character in Losing It to writing him as a drop dead gorgeous romantic hero in Faking It?

Cora: It was pretty difficult at the start. I mean, I loved Cade. The guy wasn’t even in my original plan for LOSING IT. I just thought Bliss needed a more prominent guy friend, and then he ended up inserting himself into the story completely because I looooved him. But the challenge was how to make the readers love him. I just had to remember that it’s all about perspective. He was a friend in Bliss’s eyes, but everyone’s tastes are different. I knew if Max saw him as desirable, the readers would, too.

Jen @ Reading Lark: I love how your characters all have a slice of awkward about them; I think that quality makes people love the characters more because they are fallible... did you dig into personal experience for source material or is it all fictional?

Cora: The occurrences of the book are fictional, but many of the emotions they feel—their hopes and insecurities—are all too familiar to me. That’s the trick to writing for me. I find an in that allows me to identify and understand the character, and then they just take shape from there. And as for the awkwardness, even the most confident person has insecurities or oddities. And since I write in first person, I feel like it’s my duty to reveal that dichotomy between the outer life and inner life.

Jen @ Reading Lark: Have you ever faked anything to save yourself from a bind, and can you give us an example?

Cora: God, who hasn’t faked something? Growing up, I’m pretty sure the first day of school was a lesson in faking for just about everyone. We all fake being cooler, smarter, or more confident than we are. But I don’t remember any significant faking to get myself out of a mind. Mostly my faking got me into binds. Like when you’re sixteen, and you think it’s a good idea to pretend like you’re twenty-one.

*sigh*

Jen @ Reading Lark: So far your heroines, Bliss and Max, have had an affinity for the arts... can you tell us a little more about Kelsey, the heroine of Finding It (due out this October), and how she feels about the arts now that she has graduated and left acting school?

Cora: Yeah… I have a thing for the creative arts. Pretty much everything I’ve ever been interested in doing with my life is creative in nature. Kelsey is a little bit different though. She’s been an actor and she likes that well enough, but her real issue is that she doesn’t know what she wants.

In fact, the best way I can describe Kelsey’s desires is that she desperately wants to want something. She’s adrift, and she sees all her friends grasping their dreams, and she doesn’t quite know what she should reach for. I think we’ve all been there, and my hope is to really capture what it feels like to be lost despite all your best efforts.

Jen @ Reading Lark: Your first book, Losing It, was really successful and no doubt the wait for Faking It’s release has been torture. How do you try and keep on top of the little voice in the back of your mind that doubts your talent?

Cora: HAHAHA. Oh boy… I do a really poor job of it (though the song Die, Vampire, Die from the musical [Title of Show] does help to quiet those thoughts). I’m a perfectionist. And I’m constantly setting up expectations for myself or comparing myself to others. Maybe I need to write a book about that kind of character to learn how to deal with those issues. *Note to self* :)

About the Author

Cora Carmack is a twenty-something writer who likes to write about twenty-something characters. She's done a multitude of things in her life-- boring jobs (like working retail), Fun jobs (like working in a theatre), stressful jobs (like teaching), and dream jobs (like writing). She enjoys placing her characters in the most awkward situations possible, and then trying to help them get a boyfriend out of it. Awkward people need love, too. Her first book, LOSING IT, is a New York Times and USA Today bestseller.

About the Novel

Mackenzie “Max” Miller has a problem. Her parents have arrived in town for a surprise visit, and if they see her dyed hair, tattoos, and piercings, they just might disown her. Even worse, they’re expecting to meet a nice, wholesome boyfriend, not a guy named Mace who has a neck tattoo and plays in a band. All her lies are about to come crashing down around her, but then she meets Cade.

Cade moved to Philadelphia to act and to leave his problems behind in Texas. So far though, he’s kept the problems and had very little opportunity to take the stage. When Max approaches him in a coffee shop with a crazy request to pretend to be her boyfriend, he agrees to play the part. But when Cade plays the role a little too well, they’re forced to keep the ruse going. And the more they fake the relationship, the more real it begins to feel.

We have ONE SIGNED copy of Faking It up for grabs. Jen was lucky enough to meet Cora at a recent event in London and she snagged this copy for our readers.