Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Hi, my name is Lisa Fleming, and I am the author behind the Fantasy Romance series Olympian Hearts.
I have a longing for a fat, fluffy cat or a wee Chipin puppy to replace my lost love Ouija, may he rest in peace. But I would settle for a stuffed Tribble – one of the rumbly ones that purr.
My greatest aspiration is to buy an RV and use it to spend a summer moving my family cross-country to Washington State, preferably Whidbey Island, but I’m not picky. Anywhere near the Olympic National Park would do.
Wife to one husband, mother to four humans (or so they claim, one can never be sure), I enjoy Disney movies, happy endings, romance and fantasy novels, magick, mythology and Marvel comics.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The name of my latest book is Feathers In Her Hands, Olympian Hearts: Volume I
I decided I wanted to give writing one more try before growing up and getting a real job that I’d probably hate but would help pay the bills. The problem was I didn’t have any ideas. None. Zip.
I knew I needed to write something or I would regret it for the rest of my life, so I told myself, “Fine, just pick a story, a myth a fairy tale, something and write a retelling set in modern times.”
I asked myself what I loved the most as a kid, but fairy tale retellings are a dime a dozen. I needed something other people weren’t doing. Then I reread Ovid’s Metamorphoses and was struck by the story of Cupid and Psyche.
I realized as I read it, that the idea of one beautiful woman being worshipped by her community wasn’t all that outlandish, not in this age of viral videos and mega movie stars, but I decided I didn’t want to just do a retelling, I wanted something unique.
So, I wrote Feathers In Her Hands, not just as a modern retelling of a classic story, but as a complete reimagining of what the couple might go through in modern times. I followed the basic story to a point but omitted some things, then added in others which were completely original and had nothing to do with Ovid’s classic. I switched from the Roman pantheon of Ovid’s Cupid and Psyche to the Greek pantheon because I like and know those gods better and went for it.
The story you’ll read in Feathers In Her Hands isn’t even the story I started out writing. To be completely honest, my first Eros was a complete putz and Zephyr was so ashamed of his friend he tried to take over the story and save the girl.
I had to promise Zephyr his own leading role in a subsequent novel to get him to calm down and then completely rewrite the story to turn Eros into a man worth fighting for.
I didn’t set out to write a twelve-book series, but as the idea for Feathers In Her Hands grew, so too did Olympian Hearts. So what started as one small idea for a last-ditch effort to write a novel turned into something unique that amazed even me.
Feathers In Her Hands is the first novel in my 12-book Fantasy Romance Series Olympian Hearts where:
The gods are alive and well, living in the Olympic National Park. Humans, magickal creatures and immortal Olympians live side by side in a tiny town at the base of Mount Storm King, where curses hamper true love and no one is what they seem.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Unusual. Who really defines unusual? Is it unusual that I spend several hours creating digital artwork representing my characters and settings, most of which the public will never see, just to have a basis for my descriptions? Is it unusual that I pick out theme songs for each book and create playlists to listen to while I’m writing to ensure I’m setting an appropriate mood? Is it unusual that I tend to write in 18 – 30 hour bursts and then sleep for 12 hours? Yeah, that last one’s probably unusual.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
The one author who has had the biggest influence on me as a writer is Diane Setterfield, and her novel The Thirteenth Tale. The story was excellent and kept me constantly guessing, but the plot wasn’t what drew me in. No, what grabbed me by the throat and said, “Listen to this, I got something to say!” was the way she wrote. Diane Setterfield is a wordsmith. The way she links words together to form images is beautiful. Every word in a sentence has meaning and purpose and importance and no other word would suffice to carry the same message, to create the same image in your mind. At one point I actually had a copy of her book that was so full of highlighter and margin notes commenting on her uses of imagery it was barely legible. To me reading The Thirteenth Tale was like reading poetry.
Just read the back blurb on her book, The Thirteenth Tale. It is a quote from her character Vida Winter: “My gripe is not with lovers of the truth but with truth herself. What succor, what consolation is there in truth, compared to a story? What good is truth at midnight, in the dark, when the wind is roaring like a bear in the chimney? What you need are the plump comforts of a story. The soothing, rocking safety of a lie.”
It just gives me chills. Her words resonate with you, they stay with you, long after you’ve put down her book. That’s the kind of author I strive to be. I want my words to resonate with the reader, long after they’ve read the words The End and set my book aside.
What are you working on now?
I am excited to be in the planning stages of the second book in my 12-book fantasy romance series Olympian Hearts. It is the, as yet untitled, love story of Triton & Delphine. Here’s the teaser blurb:
An attempted murder, a rescued victim, a grieving widower and a chance at love. Can the leagues of grief, trauma and heartbreak separating Triton and Delphine be overcome by a love deeper than the ocean is wide?
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Currently I’m using my personal website https://olympianhearts.wordpress.com as well as Facebook, and Twitter. I’m new at book promotion, so I’m not in a position to say yet which is best.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Don’t give up. When it’s hard, when you cry, when you feel like a failure and think you’ll never get it done, keep going. Keep trying. Most of all, keep writing or start writing if you haven’t yet. You can’t be a writer if you don’t put words to paper, so pick up your pen and start. Even if you don’t think you have an idea worthy of a novel, write it down. Just write!
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
I don’t know if you’d call it advice, it’s more of a mantra. It’s a Greek phrase: Ḕ tā̀n ḕ epì tâs.
It means: Either with it (your shield) or on it. Meaning you either win the battle, or you die trying and are carried home on your shield.
In ancient times, the Hoplites carried huge shields and the only way to escape the battlefield was to toss it aside. So “losing one’s shield” meant you had deserted the battle, you’d given up and ran away. It’s a phrase Spartan mothers told their sons before they left for battle. It was supposed to remind them of their capacity for bravery, as well as their duty to Greece, to Sparta.
It reminds me to never give up, to keep going, because even if you die trying…at least you tried. The only way to fail is to stop trying or never try at all.
What are you reading now?
I just finished A Harvest of Bones by Yasmine Galenorn, and I’d like to go back and read the whole series from the beginning, the story was really entertaining.
In my Kindle right now, waiting to be read are Midnight Magic by Jo-Ann Carson, The Fireproof Girl by Loretta Lost and An Uncollected Death (The Charlotte Anthony Mysteries Book 1) by Meg Wolfe, among others. I haven’t started any of them yet, I’ve been so busy finishing up my book and getting it published, but as soon as I can take a breather, the ones I mentioned by name will be first on my list.
What’s next for you as a writer?
I’m currently working on the second novel in my Olympian Hearts series. I’m continuing to develop the characters of the magickal town of Elysium and have plans for two companion series set in the same world once I’ve completed the twelve books of Olympian Hearts.
In the next series I’ll be delving deeper into the Elysium Wildwoods. I also have plans for a Young Adult series based in Elysium revolving around the adventures of students attending Elysium Academy, as well as two standalone novels set in the world of Olympian Hearts, but those are a highly classified secret for now.
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
1. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
2. Anthem by Ayn Rand
3. Possessing The Secret of Joy by Alice Walker
4. The Collected Works of Langston Hughes
You probably won’t find the last three on a list of my favorite books, but you didn’t ask what my favorite books were. You asked what I would take if I was stranded on a desert island. A favorite book is something you love to read, it’s fun, it’s relaxing. But a book you’d chose to take to a desert island should be something you couldn’t live without, something you couldn’t imagine yourself never reading again.
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