This week, I have another author for you to meet. This is actually an author I have worked with in my local critique group. She is just the sweetest lady ever and I couldn’t be more excited to introduce you to her debut novel!
Welcome to the blog, Chris! I’m so glad to have you here. First, I’d love to know about your inspiration for your debut novel, Liaison in Lyudinovo?
My family’s military duty stations inspire my novels. My Dad was in the Army, stationed at Fort Carson, Colorado. My love for Carson provided the setting for this novel. They many unique soldiers that I’ve gotten to know in my life inspired the characters.
Dad also travelled to Russia when I was a kid. His stories from his trip, along with the mysterious lore of Russia, made me want to write about it.
I love it. Did you always want to be a writer? If not, what did you want to be when you were a child?
I wanted to be a psychiatrist starting around age eight. I partially credit the TV show ‘House’ to my obsession with medicine.
I loved reading, especially about all things military, and I wrote adventure stories ‘for fun’ in middle school. However, being a writer was not in my line of sight until much later in life. I’d prepared myself for Medical School and thought of no other career until the Lord changed my path in the middle of organic chemistry lab, junior year of college.
Goggles on, Bunson burners blazing, test tubes bubbling, he spoke. Call it divine intervention or an epiphany, but I felt a complete shift in my universe and knew with absolute certainty that I had to change course. It was difficult for me because I’d spent my whole education focusing on science, statistical analysis, and all things Med School. However, when the Lord moves you it is for a greater purpose.
So, I became a history teacher and rekindled a love of writing. There’s a whole novel in that story. One day, I’ll have to write it!
What a story! You should write it into a novel…I’d love to read it.
Do you have any current projects you’re working on? Care to share?
My next novel is about a psychiatrist who finds a diary that changes American history to its core! I’m currently working on the sequel to her story, where she links up with the heroin in Liaison. Fun stuff for sure!
Sounds fascinating! Thank you so much, Chris, for being on the blog and for sharing about your novel. I know my readers are likely eager to get a better peek at the book for themselves, so I won’t keep them…
Liaison in Lyudinovo
Liaison in Lyudinovo is about a single mom who’s spent the last ten years working overseas for the CIA. She’s romantically jaded, ready to go home, and on the last mission of her career. The last mission just happens to pair her with an attractive soldier who needs her help more than she knows. It’s a military novel about friends, faith, and finding love in the most unexpected places. I also threw in some espionage, guns, and intrigue!
Enjoy an Excerpt
About a mile from the cabin, Jackson pulled off onto a side road.
“What are you doing?” Sam asked, pushing the cuticles back on her fingernails.
He smiled. “Samantha Browning, have you ever driven a stick shift?”
Sam hesitated and looked away from him at the sky like a spaceship could land at any second. “Why?”
“Because the only reason you didn’t drive today is the car is a manual.”
She continued her fake search of the skies for anything to keep her eyes off him. “How do you know—”
“Come on now, Officer Browning,” he said to her as if he were trying to get a kid to fess up to a lie. “Your V8 Mustang is an automatic. You obviously like power, but you don’t know how to handle it.”
Well, that got her fired up. “Listen, Jackson Lee, I can handle power just fine. My Daddy tried to teach me once, but I just… I just…” She clenched her fists.
“You want to know a secret?”
“O…kay?” She shrugged.
“You know that you can try again, right? Some humans do that when they fail at something. Don’t let the secret out, though.”
She rolled her eyes. “Now? You want me to try now?”
“Now,” he repeated as he glared at her. “Do you and the guys have some sort of quilting contest going on back at the cabin, or do you want to learn?”
“Jackson Lee, we are not in a country where we can be distracted from the mission, shooting off on back roads for the enemy to find us. This is not the place to—”
“Do you trust me?” Jackson interrupted her.
She eyed him and shrugged. “This has nothing to do with—”
“Do you trust me?” he asked again, more firmly this time.
She hesitated but nodded. She didn’t like not knowing how to drive a stick shift, but she got frustrated easily with this particular skill.
“Did the Agency not require that you know how?” Jackson asked her.
Sam hem hawed around at the question. “Well, yes-ish. I took the test.”
Jackson stared into her eyes, waiting on the rest of the story.
“I didn’t really pass the test, but to be fair, I tried. And, I’ve never had trouble since. And, I’m very thankful for that. And, I know it could have gone pretty bad in some situations, but…”
Jackson’s eyes were narrowing in question. “Do I even want to know how any of that went down, the not passing and yet surviving in foreign lands with foreign vehicles?”
Sam rubbed her forehead. “Eh?”
“Fine. Another day,” Jackson said, “but today, you’re learning.”
Buy Link
More About the Author
Chris Ann Yim is a historian and author of the new novel Liaison in Lyudinovo. As the wife of an Army veteran, she holds an appreciation for the relationships between military service members and their families. With a background in the social sciences, she has spent the majority of her life researching military leadership, the psychology of war, and the development of culture in societal groups.
Chris is a cat mom who enjoys Blues Rock and Big Band music, drag racing, and photography. She lives and works out of her home on the outskirts of Nashville, Tennessee, and spends her vacations eating good food and travelling the globe with her husband.
Her claim to fame was once being chosen as a contestant on the Price is Right, and in the future she aspires to go an entire week without tripping over her own feet or spilling a glass of sweet tea down her shirt.
Connect with Chris and her creativity
Author Website: www.chrisannyim.weebly.com
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