Dawn Temple surprises...herself

Dawn Temple didn’t realize she wanted to be a writer until after she became a wife and mother. Then her lifelong habit of making up stories in her head (starring herself in popular television shows) made itself known as a need to write fiction. Her first published book, TO HAVE AND TO HOLD, is published by Silhouette Special Edition.

Your creative muse came to life unexpectedly and you haven’t looked back since. How did it feel when that happened?

Shocking, actually. My family had been telling me for years that I had this talent, but it took years for me to find the confidence to go with talent. Unfortunately, confidence is a finicky trait. Some days you’ve got it, and some days you can’t coax it out from under the bed to save your life!

Have you read romances most of your life or were they a later discovery?

I’ve been a junkie since the early eighties. I discovered Silhouette Special Edition in its heyday – back when Nora Roberts, Janet Daily and Sandra Brown were just starting their careers. Funny how SSE is where I ended up, too.

Sounds like a match made in Heaven! So what book are you reading now?

This is a tough question for me because if I’m reading a book right now, I’m reading it RIGHT NOW. Once I crack a spine, I don’t do much of anything else until I reach “The End.” I’m horribly compulsive and I read four or five books a week. Yesterday’s book was TO BEGUILE A BEAST by Elizabeth Hoyt.

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?

Writing every day. (See the compulsive thing from above.) Hard to write while you’re reading!) I know that’s the biggest secret to creating a writing career, but I’m still struggling with imposing a daily schedule on myself.

In TO HAVE AND TO HOLD, what came first—characters or plot?

PLOT. The original premise actually stemmed from working through the emotional aftermath of a miscarriage. In the final version, the miscarriage played a very minor role, but in the end, both I and the characters came to terms with our losses.

Writing—and reading—can be great at working through emotional traumas. Please tell us a little about the story.

Thanks to an unusual stipulation in the heroine’s grandfather’s will, an estranged married couple is forced to spend a summer living together as “husband and wife” or the wife will lose her family farm and her dreams for the future. The husband, who blames himself for the collapse of his marriage, uses this time to convince his wife that they should give their happily-ever-after a second chance.

That does sound like an emotionally wonderful story. Is there anything of you in the characters you create?

Indeed! I don’t think an author can create characters without putting something of herself or others she loves into them.

Can you tell us what you’re working on now?

Well, my second release, MOONLIGHT & MISTLETOE, comes out this November, and I’ve just recently finished the final edits for that one.

My next project is a third story set in my fictitious Tennessee small town of Land’s Cross. This time, widowed father Danny Robertson meets a globe-trotting ex-Supermodel and must re-evaluate all he thinks he knows about what he wants from life.

What is the most important thing you’ve learned about being a writer?

Make sure all the thoughts in your head find their way to the paper. Too often, I’m sure I’ve included a valuable piece of information, only to find out that I completely forgot to write it down!

Do you have a message for your readers?

Never let old grudges or new misunderstandings get in the way of showing the people you love how much they mean to you. In real life, true romance is all about the little things.

Find out more about Dawn Temple at www.dawntemple.com