Please Welcome Zanna Mackenzie

I'm so pleased to have Zanna Mackenzie here today. Zanna is a fellow Astraea Press author, and she is one of the fifteen authors whose stories are included in the Valentine Anthology Love and Diamonds which released last week. We'll celebrate that project in a blog hop beginning tomorrow. But today, she's brought two of her characters from her new release If You Only Knew. Let's see what they have to say about their story. First up is Zane, one of the new owners of the Carrdale Adventure Sports Centre.

Zane, If you could rewrite anything in your book, what would it be?

That’s an easy one. First, I’d make it so that I owned the Carrdale Adventure Sports Centre on my own instead of jointly with my business partner Matt. Second, I’d make sure Matt stayed out in Austria where he couldn’t cause trouble, instead of him coming back to Derbyshire to run Carrdale with me. If he’d stayed in Austria he’d never have met Faith again and wouldn’t have started making problems for Faith and I and our relationship.

Hmm. Yes, I suppose getting rid of Matt would have made things much easier for you. What is your least favorite characteristic your writer has attributed to you?

I’m an extreme sports instructor. I think nothing of hanging off a piece of rope half way up a cliff face; it holds no fear for me at all. What does hold fear for me though is getting involved in a relationship with a woman who makes me laugh, makes me want to kiss her, makes me want to fall in love her. Relationships terrify me and soon after meeting Faith I knew I was in way out of my depth, in terms of emotions. So, if I could change something about myself it would be that I had found a way to cope with all the stuff that’s happened in my past and move on from it, meaning being involved with Faith wouldn’t hold quite so many fears for me anymore.

That's quite introspective. What do you think your greatest weakness is?

I would say my greatest weakness is Faith. She brings me out of myself, makes me feel emotions I vowed I’d never let myself experience again. For Faith, I’m contemplating getting my head around things I never thought I would do or say again - and the whole thing has taken me far outside my comfort zone!

Let's give Faith Sutton a turn. Faith, Who was your first boyfriend and what do you like most about him?

My first real boyfriend was called Aaron. We were just kids, teenagers, we knew each other at school. I couldn’t believe Aaron was actually interested in me. He was one of the most popular boys in school, all the girls fancied him and all the guys wanted to be like him. One day the strap on my school bag broke and books and pens went everywhere. Aaron was walking past and he stopped to help me pick everything up. We got talking. After that, over the next couple of days, he came to sit with me in the cafeteria at lunch and he sat next to me on the bus home. We started dating. We were together for quite a while. We even chose to go to the same university, though on different courses. I did business studies and he did recreation management. Aaron was something of a daredevil; I loved that about him, though it also worried me. He was into extreme sports – climbing cliffs, abseiling, stuff like that. He always knew exactly what he wanted; he was going to run his own extreme sports centre one day. You could say that most of the momentous moments in my life relationship-wise happened with Aaron.

Interesting. What do you think is your strongest attribute?

I would probably say it’s my determination. I know my own mind. I know what I want. I know what I don’t want. At least, I thought I did. Until I met Zane. After what had happened with Aaron I swore I wasn’t going to get involved with another guy who was an extreme sports aficionado – it’s too dangerous. Though within days of Zane arriving in town he’d somehow managed to persuade me to change my mind on that front. I can’t help thinking there’s something going on with Zane though; something in his past he’s not sharing with me. I’m determined to find out what it is.

What’s your favorite thing to do on a rainy Sunday?

I don’t get much time off on the weekends as it’s the busiest time at the coffee shop I run; we’re usually swamped with hikers, climbers and mountain bikers wanting cakes and coffee on a Saturday and Sunday. When I do get some time off I love to pack a rucksack and head for the hills for a few hours of walking and escapism.

If You Only Knew is available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, and other ebook outlets.

Zanna Mackenzie can be found at her website, on Facebook, and on Twitter.