Tammy L. Boehm: Bethany's Crossing

Is Bethany’s Crossing by Tammy L. Boehm better than Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight? Now that I have your attention; you will need to read both books to answer that question. Allow me to introduce to you our latest guest to visit The Writer Interview. Tammy L. Boehm is a Young Adult Christian author from New Mexico, which is where her book, Bethany’s Crossing takes place. Don’t let the word Christian be a stumbling block to reading Tammy’s book. One website I found, while researching for this interview, had an atheist comment recommending this book as a good mystery, which is not religious to the point of turning off a reader. Remarkable! At http://www.amazon.com/ I viewed a few pages of Bethany’s Crossing and found the beginning pages held my interest and led me to want to read more. Do not hesitate to check out Tammy L. Boehm’s website: http://tlboehm.webs.com/ You will find poetry, short stories, and her Blog at her website.

Welcome Tammy. At what age did you begin to write stories and poetry?

Thank you. I actually started writing lyric poetry in 1982. I was in High School at the time, and was trying to start up a band. I knew I didn’t play an instrument well enough to add to a band, so I immersed myself in writing lyrics. The band fizzled but I continued to branch out into other forms of poetry. Although I started writing short stories in the late 1980’s, I never thought I had a “novel” in me. I didn’t get the idea for Bethany’s Crossing until October of 2004. I was taking a correspondence course in novel writing and was six months into the course before the novel began to develop. After the course work was complete, I tabled the project until 2006.

What led you to wish to become a professional author?

While I always enjoyed writing poetry, I never considered attempting to publish my work. It wasn’t until I was writing Bethany’s Crossing that I realized how much I loved creating characters, plot lines and developing something that would both entertain and give the reader a lift. I am passionate about writing and also passionate about writers. Eventually, I would like to have my own small publishing company to help other writers get a start in the business of becoming authors. I believe that by working through those processes myself, I will be able to better help others achieve their goals of publication.

Can you tell us about the challenges of being a Young Adult Christian author? To me, you not only have to write an interesting tale people wish to read, but you have the challenge of incorporating the Christian faith, without offending or off-putting potential readers. That sounds like a very hard task to me.

One of the first lessons I learned about writing was that the best work comes when a writer writes what he or she knows. Readers are intelligent. They can spot a flat character, contrived plots, and sermons disguised as storylines. When I developed my characters, I wanted them to be believable to the reader. By writing characters whose core values are Christian allowed me to build a story around them without “preaching.” The characters show their faith by their actions. I also simply wanted to write a clean, fun story. I have always adhered to the concept that while the book does contain Christian themes, it is not a conversion tool. It was written to entertain readers.

Bethany’s Crossing has been out since late 2008. Your publisher is Eloquent Books, a part of AEG Publishing Group, Inc. Tell us about promotion for Bethany’s Crossing. Are you doing bookstore signings, church promotions, interviews, those kinds of things? Who is your contact person for these events, if you have one?

Eloquent Books has done a great job by placing the book on internet sites like Amazon, Barnes and Noble and similar sites in other countries. They also offer the book for direct purchase from their site. My personal marketing for the book has been slow due to several personal issues including the Graduation of my oldest child and the passing of my father, but I have been able to place the book in my local church, a local bookstore, and over the Labor Day weekend I had my first book signing at a bookstore called Under Charlies Covers (www.undercharliescovers.com) in Bernalillo New Mexico. I am currently exploring some options for other book signings and book placements in Albuquerque. I can always be contacted personally through my website. The primary contact for media inquiries, appearances and other publicity is Ellen Green at Eloquent Publishers. PressManager@aegpublishingroup.com

Will you please give us some insight on what makes Bethany’s Crossing, a Young Adult book, readers should add to their reading list? Tammy will only be allowed to tell us a little about what makes her book compelling and interesting to buy and read. I won’t let her give the whole story away.

Bethany’s Crossing is not your average piece of “Christian Fluff Fiction.” There are strong characters, intriguing dialogue, and a subplot of angels and demons for added suspense. The book also is rich in local New Mexico flavor.

Tammy, Bethany’s Crossing is a cross cultural book. Did you have to do a lot of research to write the book or has living in New Mexico enabled you to naturally absorb the cultures and customs that appear in your book?

One of my most important objectives while fleshing out the characters for Bethany’s Crossing was that I did not want them to be stereotypical. I am fortunate to live in a town that is sandwiched between two pueblos and I work in Albuquerque which is ethnically diverse. I did do some research on the locations for the scenes in order to make sure I was representing them appropriately.

Before I forget, who are Tammy L. Boehm’s favorite authors? Past, present, or both.

As a child I was a voracious reader and especially loved Marguerite Henry and L. Frank Baum. I also enjoy Silvia Plath, Ray Bradbury, Algernon Blackwood, James Herriott, and Frank Peretti.

In looking at your website, you have written a lot of poetry. Do you hope to one day publish a book of poetry?

Publishing poetry is even more difficult than publishing Christian Fiction. I would love to publish a book of poetry at some point and have tried to group some of my work on the site in order to draw from it at a later time.

Is there anything about Bethany’s Crossing or other matters we have not touched upon that you would like to share with my readers?

I am hopeful that Bethany’s Crossing is the first of several novels that I will be able to write. I have started on a sequel to Bethany’s Crossing but am also working on a Christian Science Fantasy trilogy as well as another adult fiction novel.

One last question, Tammy; who did the wonderful cover art on Bethany’s Crossing?

The book actually has two covers. The blue cover was designed using graphics that originally appeared on a personal website I no longer have. At the webmaster’s request we designed a completely different brown cover. Both of the designs however were done through a contact from AEG: I worked with Jamie Runyan at design@reese-winslow.com. I was very pleased with both covers.

We have been blessed today to have as our guest Tammy L. Boehm, author of Bethany’s Crossing, a Young Adult Christian book, which is worthy of a wide audience; Christian and non-Christian alike, for the conflict it contains and how that conflict is resolved. Tammy L. Boehm’s website is http://tlboehm.webs.com/ and I urge you to visit her website. Tammy’s website is warm, friendly, and leaves the feeling a fellow human being resides there. Is her book a worthy challenger to Stephenie Meyer's, Twilight? Readers will be the judge of that. So grab a copy of Bethany’s Crossing and let me know what you think. If you like Bethany’s Crossing, then pass the word to others, so they can travel the road to the last page of Bethany’s Crossing too.