Emma St. Clair - Sweet RomCom With Sassy Characters

Emma St. Clair is a rabid reader and writer of clean romance. She loves sassy heroines and love stories that aren't cheesy, served up with a side of wit. She lives in Katy, Texas with her hubby, five children, and Great Dane. As our Author of the Day, she tells us all about her book, Falling for Your Best Friend's Twin.

Please give us a short introduction to what Falling for Your Best Friend's Twin is about.

Falling for Your Best Friend's Twin is the start of a rom-com series following five friends in the Austin area, navigating their way through the dating scene while one of them writes about their dating misadventures in a popular advice column. In this first book, Abby falls for the totally wrong kind of guy for her, and not just because he's her BFF's twin brother.

What inspired you to write about someone who falls for their best friend's twin?

I love a good twin story. You get all the feels of books about falling for a friend's sibling, but with the added closeness of a twin. I've written about twins before in another series (Hometown Heartthrobs), but in this book, there aren't any of the sibling switcheroos since it's about fraternal twins, a brother, and sister.

Tell us more about Abby. What makes her tick?

Abby runs on caffeine, sugar, and computer coding. She's as fiercely independent as she is loyal, and despite her pink hair and quirky attire, she wants to be taken seriously for her mad skills. And if she could get past one date with a guy, that would be cool too.

Why romantic comedies? What drew you to the genre?

I love romantic comedies. From the novels that are witty banter to the ones that have you wiping tears from your eyes, it's such a joy. And during this time, I think we could all use a little more laughter.

Besides writing, what other secret skills do you have?

I played and coached roller derby, so I can totally take you out with a hip hit. My husband loves this skill. (Not really.) I also learned to resuscitate a fish, so if your beta happens to hop out of its container, give me a call.

Readers say your characters are realistic. How did you pull this off?

I hear my characters speaking in my head. It's almost like a movie reel is going in there once I get a handle on my characters. I know it's my subconscious, not some kind of weird magic or voodoo, but they have quite strong personalities inside my head. I try to get out of the way and let them breathe.

What did you have the most fun with while writing this book?

I really love dialogue. So whenever my characters are sniping back and forth at each other, I'm writing with a big smile on my face.

This is book one in a series. Can it be read as a standalone? How do the other books in the series tie in with this one?

Each book will focus on one couple. They're all interrelated, so the BEST experience will be in order, but if you pick up somewhere in the middle, it will just make you want to go back and meet the other characters. (I hope.) It's not usually a surprise which main characters end up together in romance, so it's not a massive spoiler if you read book tow and see that Abby and Zane got together. The blurb for book one essentially sets up who the couple is. This series will follow all five friends in this little group, ending with Sam, aka Dr. Love, who is putting together all the stories for her advice column.

Tell us more about the cover and how it came about.

I follow some amazing designers on Instagram, and had heard of Melody Jeffries (@melodyjeffriesdesign). She created Abby and Zane, and I created a template for the background that will work for ALL the covers. I'm working with Melody and another designer named Dylan (@simplydylandesigns) for the characters in this whole series.

When starting on a new book, what is the first thing you do?

I LOVE starting. I'm a serial starter. I have google docs full of started books. Maybe 10-12 books of various lengths? So when I get a story idea or, more often, start to hear the characters talking, I open up a doc and let loose.

Do any of your characters ever take off on their own tangent, refusing to do what you had planned for them?

All the time. Usually, if I get stuck writing, it's because I'm trying to force something that isn't as good as what the characters want to do. I love these kinds of surprises, and it makes it so that writing my book is in some ways like reading a book. I'm not totally sure what will happen until the end. Right now, I'm not even sure the order of the characters' stories for this series. We'll see who comes next!

Do you have any interesting writing habits? What is an average writing day like for you?

I tend to do my best writing on an elliptical machine, typing with my thumbs on my phone. I discovered this by accident, and now I have an elliptical in my home office. I start the day writing for an hour on it. I wish that also meant I could still wear the jeans I wore before having kids, but it does not.

What are you working on right now?

I'm working on book two in this series, Falling for Your Boss. I also had already started a royal romcom, Royally Rearranged, and I'm super pumped to get that one going. I have a few other series under the same pen name that are just sweet romance, not romcom, and I plan to finish those series out as well. I also write sweet paranormal romance under the pen name Sullivan Gray, and have a wolf shifter romance I plan to release next year. But my main focus right now is this current series.

Where can our readers discover more of your work or interact with you?

I've been doing more lately on Instagram, which has mostly behind the scenes of real-life, plus some author-y posts. (@kikimojo) I mostly hang out in my reader group on Facebook, Emma's Epic Readers (https://www.facebook.com/groups/emmastclair).