Blog Tour-Ron Estrada

Please tell us about your most Recent Book
I recently completed my Cherry Hill Series, a Young Adult urban fantasy series. It didn’t start out that way. Book one, Now I Knew You, was supposed to be a stand-alone novel about a teen boy who has a near-death experience and talks to his aborted daughter (unknown to him) in heaven. I enjoyed the fictional town of Cherry Hill and my characters so much that I decided to continue on with additional books. Book 2, Angel ‘n Me, is by far my favorite. My readers seem to agree. Books 3 and 4 wrap up the series. Cassandra’s Crossing and Lydia’s Way take a bigger step into the paranormal, with some time travel and shape-shifting tossed into the mix. I even spun off a character into a serial novel called Cat’s Out. That, I suppose, would be my most recent, the latest installment of Cat’s Out, where the shape-shifting continues with Darla Velasquez, a 15-year-old girl battling demonic forces in Detroit. Darla has an attitude (what else would you expect from a cat?) and my readers, both on Wattpad and Amazon, love the character. At least one boy has expressed a crush, despite Darla’s always present baseball bat and ability to grow claws (I am fighting hard to restrain my sexist comments here).

Why do you write what you do?
I’ve tried many a genre, as most writers do. But I was drawn to Young Adult and then Middle Grade because of the freedom it gives me. A young protagonist can say and do anything and still be believable. Really, they say and do the things we’d really like to say and do as adults, but society frowns on a 50-year-old man starting food fights in the cafeteria or calling his co-worker a cotton-headed ninnymuggins (okay, I have). I also want to connect with the kids who are like most of us. We all felt like outcasts at some point in our childhood. We believed there was something wrong with us, that no one could possibly be like us. But, of course, all kids go through these times of doubt, feeling very much alone. I want to show them that they aren’t alone, but that they are also unique, and they should embrace that which makes them different. They are God’s design, and He never makes mistakes.

What are you currently working on?
I am in the process of the final edit of Scorpion Summer, my first middle-grade historical. It is set in 1968 Norfolk, Virginia. My protagonist is an eleven-year-old navy brat who loses his father aboard the USS Scorpion, the last Navy sub lost at sea. Scorpion Summer is the first of my Navy Brat series. I’ve also begun the second book, Pearl Mornings, set in 1972 Pearl City, Hawaii. I’ll continue moving through the 70s and 80s, from port to port, basically revisiting all the places I lived as a navy brat.

How does your work differ from other work in its genre?
There’s no hovercraft or amazing archery skills. Okay, seriously, I like to tackle issues like teenage pregnancy and abortion (Now I Knew You) without preaching. By the time my reader gets through the book, she’ll see that her choices have consequences and her actions affect many more people than she realizes. I never come out and say what is right and wrong, and never invoke my Christian faith, but my readers will know that the simple answers the world provides are never quite that simple. For my middle-grade historicals, I’m one of the few who visit places like Hawaii without it being a paradise. Military kids see a duty station as just another duty station, whether it has palm trees or two feet of snow. I like to pull up little-known facts in history, like the loss of the Scorpion, to educate my reader as well as provide an intriguing story about a kid who overcomes the obstacles thrown into his previously worry-free existence.
How does your writing process work?
It’s evolving. I was once a panster. Then I became a plotter. Now I’m joining a larger crowd that’s somewhere in the middle. I like to start with my protagonist and build her backstory, as well as her parent’s (a middle-grade character’s background is heavily influenced by her parent’s background). I’ll write several scenes that will never make it into the novel. All backstory, but necessary to understand my character. Most importantly is the “dark moment,” where my character’s beliefs changed and altered her course forever. After that, give me an interesting incident and place, and my character can run with it. That’s not entirely true (I have my doubts about characters who just walk into a scene and take over), I do have a good idea where the story is going and still write down my major plot points and beats, including the ending. Things may change along the way, but I believe in having at least a general road map. Naturally, with historicals, research is important. I’ll research what is necessary to move the story forward, then check the details after the first draft. My wife just told me that normal folk weren’t using Pampers disposable diapers in 1968, so I may have to change that detail in Scorpion Summer, but things like that don’t change the overall story. You gotta check ‘em, though. The armchair historians will crush you on Amazon.

Ron Estrada writes Young Adult and Middle-Grade fiction. He is a regular contributor to Novel Rocket and My Book Therapy, as well as Women2Women Michigan, a local print magazine, where he writes a regular humor column. He lives in Oxford, Michigan, with his beautiful wife, Kelly. His two children are in college and (mostly) out of the house. You can find out what he’s up to by visiting RonEstradaBooks.com.