WELCOME, PATY JAGER!

Today I am delighted to welcome Paty Jager, award-winning author of historical and contemporary romance, who will also be branching out to include more mystery in her future books. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, let's find out more about Paty.

AUTHOR BIO
Wife, mother, grandmother, and the one who cleans pens and delivers the hay; award-winning author Paty Jager and her husband currently ranch 350 acres when not dashing around visiting their children and grandchildren. She not only writes the western lifestyle, she lives it. She is a member of RWA, EPIC, and COWG. She’s had eleven books and a short story published so far and is venturing into the new world of self-publishing ebooks. Her contemporary Western, Perfectly Good Nanny, won the 2008 Eppie for Best Contemporary Romance, and Spirit of the Mountain, a historical paranormal set among the Nez Perce, garnered 1st place in the paranormal category of the Lories Best Published Book Contest. Spirit of the Lake was a finalist in the Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence.

INTERVIEW
What is the name of your series of books? How many books are in the series?
That depends on which series we’re talking about. ;) I tend to like to write series. I have the Halsey Brother Series- a set of five books about, yep, the five Halsey brothers and the women they fall in love with.

But for this post I’m talking about the Spirit Series- actually a trilogy or set of three books about the Nez Perce band that lived in the Wallowa Valley of Oregon.

What's the genre/subgenre of your series? 
The Spirit Series is historical paranormal romance.

What is the premise of your series? What ties it together? Are the characters related, have the same career, live in the same town, etc.?
The premise of the Spirit Series has to do with three sibling Nez Perce spirits who were placed by the Creator to watch over the Lake Nimiipuu (Wallowa Valley Nez Perce).  Each book has a sibling becoming enmeshed with a mortal and falling in love. Each book also shows a period of time in the Nez Perce culture that had an impact on their future.

Why write a series? What are the pros and cons?
I kind of fell into writing series as a fluke. I wrote Marshal in Petticoats, the first book of the Halsey Series as a stand-alone book. But I’d introduced the other four brothers and readers wanted to know whose story was next so I had to write a book for each brother. The Spirit Series came to me as three books. Once the idea for the sibling spirits manifested, I knew the times I wanted to capture in the books.

Now, I prefer writing series. For me the pros are being able to use the research I do for one book to carry over into more books, having ready-made characters from previous books, and I’ve found that readers like series books. They like to be able to hang out with characters a bit longer than one book.

The con is I tend to come up with new ideas and characters for new books before I’ve finished with a series and then I can’t wait to move on. LOL

What's your next project? Is there another series in your writing future?
My next project is a series or trilogy. It’s about a young female doctor of anthropology and a DEA agent who meet in the first book, he tackles his nemesis in the second book, and she discovers her true roots in the third book. But these are action/adventure with some romantic elements so the first book takes place in Guatemala with artifact thieves, drug runners, and a deranged mentor who lures her to the jungle to use her for a sacrifice. The second book takes place in drug riddled Mexico City.  Here the hero is after the drug lord who killed his family and the heroine is trying to find missing artifacts. The third book is set in Arizona but they encounter a human trafficking ring.

Any contests or giveaways related to this blog post or that you are running?
I’ll give a $5 egift certificate to one lucky commenter of this post.


LEARN MORE ABOUT PATY
You can learn more about Paty at her blog: www.patyjager.blogspot.com, her website: http://www.patyjager.net, or on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/#!/paty.jager and twitter @patyjag.

EXCERPT FROM SPIRIT OF THE SKY
Wade peered into her half-closed eyes. “When this is over, say you’ll marry me.”

She hid her inner thoughts shuttered behind her pale lashes. Her body tensed in his arms once again. Why did asking her to marry him cool her ardor? Was she using him for folly to learn of the troops movements? The image of her worry when healing his wounds, her excitement when they met, said she cared for him. Yet, where was this brother she spoke of, and how did she always find him and remain unharmed through all of this when she clearly traveled through the middle of the skirmishes?

He grasped her arms and held her away from him to peer into her golden eyes in the growing moonlight. He blinked at the blinding light shimmering in their depths. Her skin heated under his hands.
Her soft lips opened to speak, and his randy body jerked to attention.

“I am not—” She licked her lips, her gaze dropped to below his face.

“You’re not what?” he asked it softly, willing her to look at him.

“I am not what you think.” Her eyes dimmed and her body slipped from his hands.

“What do I think?” He didn’t like the distance in her voice, her attitude, or the space she forced between them. Wade drew her back into his arms. The wholeness she built in him when he held her couldn’t be wrong.

“You believe me to be a Nimiipuu maiden.”

“No, you said you were a Nimiipuu, I believed you were a child captive.”

She pushed against his chest. The strength in her small arms surprised him. She shoved away and stood, her arms wrapped around her small frame.

He stood.

“You do not know me. I am not a captive. I am Nimiipuu. I will always be Nimiipuu.” Her fist pounded on her chest. “My heart belongs to my people. If I give it to anyone or thing other than The People I will no longer exist. I am here to serve only the Nimiipuu. Not my own desires.”

Wade stretched his hands toward her, but she remained out of reach. He rubbed a hand over his mustache, watching her. Why would someone so young carry such a strong conviction for her people? And ignore her own happiness?

“One of the great things about people is we have the capacity to love more than one thing at a time.”
Her head slowly lifted, her chin pointed his direction, and the flames in her eyes shifted his feet backwards.

“The Creator put me upon this earth to watch the Lake Nimiipuu. I have spent many seasons watching the people and helping them prosper. Now your people wish to kill the reason I exist. I cannot allow this. And I cannot allow my emotions for you to get in the way. I will not put my greed before my people. I will not be like my father.” Smoke engulfed her body and she vanished.

Wade stared at the empty spot. What the hell? He rubbed his eyes and walked to the spot, waving his arms. The growing darkness had to have played tricks with his vision. What had she done to make the smoke? He searched behind him. The only way out. How did she get past him without him seeing her? His logical mind worked to sort out what he’d witnessed. Somewhere in his heart, an ache began and whispered Sa-qan had disappeared from his life. And damn if that didn’t hurt like hell.

Buy Links
Wild Rose Press
Kindle