Liebster Award - Thanks to Chrys Fey for nominating me :)

Thank you very much to Chrys Fey, who nominated me for the Liebster Ward :) It was a wonderful surprise.and I am honoured to accept.

The current rules for accepting this award are:

1.    List 11 random facts about myself.
2.    Answer 11 questions from the blogger who nominated me.
3.    Nominate 11 more blogs who have less than 200 followers and let them know they’ve been nominated.
4.    Post 11 new questions for those bloggers to answer (if they wish to accept the award—it’s completely optional).

So, let me see, 11 random facts about myself....

So, this is a stream of consciousness, you are getting the random facts that occur to me as I think I them. :)

1. My favourite colour is purple.
2. I got the initial idea for my novel, Death In The Family, after falling in love with The Lost Boys and their modern take on vampires.
3. I didn't learn to drive until I was 25.
4. My favourite artists are the Pre-Raphaelites
   
    
5. And yes, I'm a soppy romantic at heart :)
6. I'm an identical twin, and my sister, Tasha and I, do have our 'twin' moments - funnily, it is most obvious in our writing, where we have independently come up with the same story from time to time.
7. I have a phobia of swings (yes I mean the ones in parks or hanging from tree branches) - I had an accident on a swing as a child where I was thrown around when one came unfixed from the ground and now I can't even watch someone being pushed on a swing without getting jittery.
8. I'm a big fan of fanfiction - I've written it and read it and I think it is a great way for writers to learn their craft - feedback from readers certainly helped me.
9. When I started writing as a child, I had a little blue and white portable typewriter. I used to hit the keys so hard, eventually, I bent them :)
10. This is an odd one - I love stationary - I'd prefer to go shopping for that than clothes - surround me with differently covered notebooks and sparkly pens and I'm in hog heaven, which is odd really, considering my handwriting is atrocious! ;P
11. And, finally, a quick one, I hate daffodils, but I love snowdrops :)

My Answers to Chrys Fey's Questions

1.  If you were allowed to read books by only one author, who would it be and why?
You had to start with a toughie! Um, I think it would have to be Susan Cooper, because I can read her Dark Is Rising Sequence over and over again :).

2.  What is your favorite dessert?
Hmm - so many to choose from...Tiramisu, I'll plump for that, although then there's mint choc ice cream as well, or perhaps pancakes with maple syrup (but I like those for breakfast as well, so they're not always desert) ;P

3.  On a Friday night, what are you most likely to do?
Be cooking a fish and chip supper for my parents and my sister and her husband - Friday is a family get together night - we just sit round the table and catch up over plates of fried food :D

4.  If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be and why?
My ability to get stressed really easily - it's not nice for me, and I can be prickly with other people when I'm stressed, which I don't like being.

5.  Who is your favorite literary character? (You can pick one hero and one heroine.)
Miss Marple is one of my favourite characters, because she is a nosey, gossipy old lady with a mind like a meat cleaver. She also has a will of iron and a Victorian moral compass, which doesn't always sit well with our modern sensibilities, but I admire her conviction, even if I disagree with bits of her world view.

Will from Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising, is a childhood favourite of mine, so I'll pick him as my hero. He's clueless when he's swept up into the world of the Old Ones in, actually, the second book of the series, and very quickly has to get the hang of being a guardian of light against the darkness that is threatening what he thought was his ordinary life.

6.  What is your biggest dream?
This one is easy, to have people like my books.

7.  What song could you listen to over and over again?
Everything I Do, I Do It For You, Bryan Adams - no, it isn't a song with romantic connotations for me, I did not dance my first romantic dance with a boy to it, or anything like that, I just happen to love the song - I think it's lyrical and emotive and I can sing my heart out to it as well :D

8.  If your house were burning down, what would you take and why?
Assuming the humans were getting themselves out, I'd take the cat, the dog and my computer plus external hard drive, in that order. My reasoning - well, I have a friend whose house really did burn down and she said she had always thought she'd grab the technology, or her DVDs, or books, but she said all she cared about was getting her cats out safely, and I know I'd be the same, pets before technology every time :).

9.   Who is your inspiration, your hero?
I have several. As a writer, J K Rowling, because her success is an inspiration to us all. In how to live my life, my parents are my heroes - they've taught me to consider my actions, helped me understand tolerance and showed me life is better when it isn't all about myself.

10.  What advice would you give your teenage self?
Nothing is impossible.

11.  If you were not in your current line of work, what would you be doing instead?
I currently have two lines of work, Project Management and Writing. If I wasn't doing the project management, I'd be a full time writer, hands down, but until I sell a million on Amazon ;P I need to pay the bills.

My Nominations for the Liebster award - and this was hard to slim down to 11, but these are the folks I think deserve it (I'm guessing on the followers on some blogs, since there are multiple ways to follow, and there are some folks I wanted to list, but they have over 200 followers already, and then some of my fav bloggers have already been nominated):

1. Patricia Lynne, Independent YA Author, whose blog is well deserving of a visit.
2. Julia Matthews, Author of Adult and Paranormal Romance
3. Jolie du Pre at Precious Monsters
4. Zalka Csenge Virág over at The Multicolored Diary
5. Rebekah Loper - Fictions & Creations from Forgotten Worlds
6. Katie Doyle in her blog, Writing, Reading & Life
7. Charlotte Comley at Aiming for a Publishing Deal
8. Chris Votey, author extraordinaire
9. Angeline Trevena on Coffintree Hill provides a great resource for authors
10. Anna Tan shares some great fiction, her own and others on her blog
11. Kia Zi Shiru, author of YA and New Adult genre books 

My Questions for my nominees (hope you find them interesting) :)

1.  I ask this of everyone - declare yourself - cat or dog person?
2.  What's your favourite pastime?
3.  Describe yourself in one word.
4.  If you had to live on a dessert island, what two things would you take with you (and to make it easier on you, yes, this desert island can have electricity)?
5. If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you like to visit and why?
6.  Do you have any bad habits?
7.  If you could take tea with any literary figure, who would it be and why?
8.  Who's your favourite villain (can be TV, books, movies, video games, etc)?
9.   You're about to jump out of an aeroplane, what's the last thing that goes through your head before the leap?
10.  Do you have a favourite fairytale?
11.  If you could have one super power, what would it be and what would you do with it?