Author Spotlight: Shelly Crane

Welcome to the Author Spotlight, Shelly Crane!

Nicknames: Shell Station , Shelly Belly (I hate these name)

Where do you live: Hot as Hades, Florida

Your favorite dessert: Cheesecake and honey buns

Your favorite TV series: Vampire Diaries

Last book you read: Love and Skate by Lila Felix (Uber good!!)

Last movie you watched: Breaking Dawn 2

Last song (or album) you bought: Cider Sky

A book/series you could read over and over again: I frequently go back and reread my favorite parts to Vampire Academy, Mortal Instruments and Callum & Harper

Coke or pepsi? PEPSI!!!!!! (Pepsi Max, best invention ever)

Day or night? Day. I hate to drive at night.

Pen or pencil? pen

Summer or winter? Winter. I’m a hot person and if I could find a place that was 70 degrees year round I swear I’d move there.

Cat or dog? Dog. I have 2: Scrappy and Biff.

Tea or coffee? Eeeeeeee….. hard. I drink both all day long J But if I had to choose only one, I’d say….coffee.

Plotter or pantser? Pantser!!!!!! I’ve never plotted a day in my life! Well…not for a book.

 When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer? Fall 2010 is when I got the idea for Collide when I had a dream that resembled the Matrix. But when I actually sat down and wrote out the story, it just started writing itself and wound up being absolutely nothing like the Matrix.

What are you working on now? Finishing up the Significance series with Independence, and then I’ll do wide Awake. It’s hard because both of the stories all eating away at my brain. I want to work on both, but I’m trying to get Independence done.

If you decided not to be a writer, what would your other dream job be? Why? Well, I was already doing my dream job. I was a stay at home mom. That’s what I always wanted to do. I never wanted to be a writer or ever even thought about it. It just fell in my lap one day and now, I can’t imagine not being one.

What is the scariest thing you’ve ever done in your life? Bring my first son home from the hospital. I was so scared that I was going to break him. Or something was going to happen and it was going to be my fault because I didn’t know what to do. But he’s 9 years old now. Still alive so I did something right

Who is the one person that has singlehandedly inspired you the most in your life? Sadly, I didn’t have many role models. I was told that I shouldn’t be writing. So……No comment. 

What is one talent that you’re hopeless at, but you wish you had? There’s a long list!! Public speaking, sewing, cooking (like real cooking), and math.

What is one trait or physical characteristic that you are proud of/love about yourself? My curls, I guess. I’ve had old ladies at the grocery store curse me for saying that I didn’t like my curls. So apparently, it’s something to be proud of.

Do you have any suggestions for aspiring writers? 

• Edit, edit, edit. Then edit some more.
• Talk to your fans. A lot. They are the reason you can write books.
• Have fun with it. Write what you want to write about. Don’t copy or be influenced by other’s writing. Readers want to read something they’ve never read before.
• Do read other author’s books and tell your fans about it if your loved it.
• Posting your book stuff on other authors Facebook pages is a big No-No. So is messaging authors and asking them to review or endorse your book. So is tweeting your book every five minutes. No, no, no, no, no.
• No arguing or commenting when someone doesn’t like your book or gives you a bad review. Not everyone is going to like your book, and that’s OK. Go look up your favorite popular book and read all the bad reviews. A bad review doesn’t mean it’s a bad book. Never, ever, ever rebut on anything.

Author Bio: Bestselling YA author from a small town in Georgia and loves everything about the south. She is wife to a fantastical husband and stay at home mom to two boisterous and mischievous boys who keep her on her toes. They currently reside in everywhere USA as they happily travel all over with her husband’s job. She loves to spend time with her family, binge on candy corn, go out to eat at new restaurants, buy paperbacks at little bookstores, site see in the new areas they travel to, listen to music everywhere and also LOVES to read.
Her own books happen by accident and she revels in the writing and imagination process. She doesn’t go anywhere without her notepad for fear of an idea creeping up and not being able to write it down immediately, even in the middle of the night, where her best ideas are born.

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Significance – Significance #01

Maggie is a seventeen year old girl who’s had a bad year. She was smart and on track, but then her mom left, her dad is depressed, she’s graduating – barely – and her boyfriend of almost three years dumped her for a college football scholarship. Lately she thinks life is all about hanging on by a thread and is gripping tight with everything she has.

Then she saves the life of Caleb and instantly knows there’s something about him that’s intriguing. But things change when they touch, sparks ignite. Literally.

They imprint with each other and she sees their future life together flash before her eyes. She learns that not only is she his soul mate, and can feel his heartbeat in her chest, but there is a whole other world of people with gifts and abilities that she never knew existed. She herself is experiencing supernatural changes unlike anything she’s ever felt before and she needs the touch of his skin to survive.

Now, not only has her dad come out of his depression to be a father again, and a pain as well, but Caleb’s enemies know he’s imprinted and are after Maggie to stop them both from gaining their abilities and take her from him.

Can Caleb save her or will they be forced to live without each other after just finding one another?

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes&Nobles

Devour – Devour #01

Clara has it all. A wrestling star boyfriend, popular friends, all the right school activities…pretty much a perfect life…up until her parents died. Now she lives with the Pastor and his family and though they take good care of her, she feels alone. Then her boyfriend, Tate, starts to show signs of trouble when a new guy, Eli, comes to town. Clara is fascinated with him but hides it until something happens. Eli confesses to her that she gives him something he’s never had before…something he needs. Everything is about to change for this normal pretty popular girl in a supernatural way.

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes&Nobles

Collide – Collide #01

Sherry has always known there was something out there. She’s eighteen, works for a tabloid newspaper in Chicago and has a brother, Danny who is a lazy mooch. They live a pretty normal dull life with hippie parents and a normal existence. Then the moon dissapears and people start to go missing only to reappear later, but different. Sherry has an abusive ex-boyfriend who shows up and claims to be one of these beings that have been showing up around the world. He’s no longer the same person in that body. He tells her he has come to protect her and her brother and takes her underground, against her will to save her, where they meet others like them. She begins to unravel the truth about Merrick, about what he’s really doing here, about the way he looks at her, about the crazy dangerous world they live in. Can he convince her that he’s here to help? Will she like what she finds when she opens up to the truth? Will he be the one to love her when everyone else has failed her? Will he be able to protect her?

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Cheers,