Who is Susanne Leist?

Susanne Leist - Author of The Dead Game is one of my favorite authors. The Dead Game has so many twists and turns and solid characters that I couldn't put it down. Aside from her novel she also has a golden personality and strives daily to improve her writing. 

Meet Susanne Leist

I was asked to contribute an article to this delightful blog. At first I panicked. I didn’t know what to write about. I’m a listener. I listen to other people’s stories. I’m a good listener. I don’t like speaking about myself. Therefore, I don’t like to write about myself. But now that I’m a writer, I have to move into the spotlight. 

I’ve done a few interviews on fellow authors’ blogs. Their questions helped to serve as guidelines. Now I have a blank page to deal with. Should I write about why I had decided to become a writer? I don’t think so. It has been done to death by writers. I believe I will write about what had inspired me to pursue my career in Finance. It wasn’t a ‘what’ but a ‘who;’ the person who I had looked up to and then had lost too early in life. This was my brother, Neil Leist.

Neil was the type of person who lit up a room when he entered it. He was 6’2”, but it wasn’t his height that drew others’ eyes. It was his dynamic personality and his intelligence. Those grey eyes mirrored his great intellect and capacity for greatness. He acted as my father when my father wasn’t home but working long days and nights driving a taxi. He took care of my blind mother until I was old enough to help out. He sheltered me as much as he could from life and responsibilities. He shouldered these burdens himself.

He did well in college but he flourished in the business world. He traded on the Commodity Exchange until he had enough money to take over a Fortune 500 company. With a majority share in its stock, he took over American Bakeries. Taystee Bread was never

going to be the same. He took me along on his ride to stardom. I worked for him on the Exchange and in his offices on Madison Ave. in Manhattan. I majored in Finance at New York University, preparing to join him. All was going well for once in my life and in my brother’s life. My parents were proud. He helped them out. All was perfect until that awful phone call in the middle of the night.

My lights went out. All the light in the world was gone for me. I was stuck in darkness as dark and deep as the one my mother lived in. My brother had been in a car accident in the Hamptons. His fancy, red Porsche had hydroplaned on the wet roads. Neil was a great driver with quick reflexes. He drove the car off the road and onto the grass. Luck wasn’t with him. A truck was parked in his path and the Porsche crashed beneath it.

Neil was in a coma for two years before he passed away. Meanwhile, his so-called friends at American Bakeries were undermining his position at the company causing the stock price to drastically plummet. We had to sell off his investment in one big chunk at a big loss. Most of his money was tied up with this company. I spent eight years dealing with all the vermin or finance people and lawyers before his estate could be settled. 

I lost my taste for high Finance. I did get an M.B.A. in Finance but it soon lost its appeal to me. I wasn’t cutthroat. I wasn’t a back stabber. I wanted an interesting job that was challenging. I did enjoy working at The Office of Management and Budget at City Hall. I wasn’t able to work the overtime hours on Saturdays because of my Sabbath, so I left.

I worked at different companies, such as: E.F. Hutton & Co., McCall Pattern Company, and at local brokerage firms on Long Island where I now live. None of these jobs appealed to me. I was married with two beautiful daughters. I devoted myself to them. I took on part-time jobs, but I was always available if they needed me.

The big 50 was approaching and I was beginning to feel that I had lost out on life. My brother and then both my parents had passed away. My daughters were beginning their own lives. I needed a focus, a reason for my life. I was helping my daughter write an essay for college. I read it over and was surprised that I had written it. It related to my mother being blind with dementia in a nursing home. I began to think about writing. 

My mid-life crisis book, The Dead Game, took me ten years to write. I hadn’t realized that writing was so hard. Characters have to move around and speak at the same time. They can’t sound the same. Through all the rewrites, the plot and story remained the same. Only the dialogue and grammar changed. I believe I could edit for the rest of my life and still not be satisfied. 

I found a self-publisher, who offered to print and edit the book for a set price. Anything else costs extra. If I made any changes to the book after it was published, it would cost hundreds of dollars for them to take care of it. They even charged to send the changes to Amazon and Nook, even though these companies don’t charge for this. 

One day, the publisher informed me that my book was published. I thought that this meant it was printed. Not only was it printed, it was sitting on Amazon and Nook without a description or bio. It looked sad. I panicked. I had to learn how to use Google so I could ask it how to describe a book. I learned about the log line and synopsis. I bought books on grammar and editing. I opened blogs. I found Facebook and Twitter. Luckily, I found some nice authors who helped me with my countless questions. 

My book looked nice on the sites, but it didn’t have reviews. I soon learned that without reviews there are no sales. I joined Goodreads.com to find reviewers. I was placed in review groups, where the members randomly reviewed other members’ books but not each other’s books. Some authors gave nice reviews with constructive criticism. Others took apart my book, piece by piece, and in detail described what was wrong with it. They even used excerpts. These hurt, but I used the reviews to fix any weak spots in my book.  After a year of this, I put out a new edition of my book. I tried to address everyone’s concerns. But you just can’t please everyone. 

My book is now sitting comfortably in its sections: Vampire Suspense on Amazon and Paranormal Suspense on Nook. I will continue to promote it online while I begin to work on book 2 of The Dead Game series.

My life has taken many unexpected twists and turns. I wonder what the young me would have thought if she had heard that she was going to write vampire stories in the future. Would she have laughed? Would she have been surprised? Knowing me so well, I wouldn’t have laughed or wouldn’t have been surprised. And I might have even been happy. I don’t believe I was so happy with Finance, even in the beginning. I did it as more of a challenge. I wanted to do well in a male-dominated field—just to prove that I could do it. And now I have a new mission. I want to prove to myself that I could be a good author. And I believe I’m well on my way.

Thank you for listening,

Susanne Leist

Where to buy the Dead Game in ebook and paperback
Amazon 
Amazon.co.uk
Barnes and Noble

Susanne's Blogs
http://susanneleist.wordpress.com
http://susanneleist.blogspot.com

My Review of The Dead Game

Happy New Year from Cleo

Thank you Elle for giving me the opportunity to wish everyone a happy New Year. 

My life in New York has been exciting and I have found out so much. I can't wait to share it with everyone in Bite the Big Apple- Baby Girl Book 4, coming out in January.

 We only get the chance to live once and I've never been one who doesn't enjoy my surroundings- Paris, San Francisco- anywhereville. For New years I'm anxiously awaiting the chance to see the mega fireworks display and ball drop in person! 

As a child I had no idea the world I've come to know existed. My life was sheltered inside a dirty little cabin and then later spent running. I was deprived and starved of the beauty and richness that is life so when faced with new experiences I'm like a kid in a checkout lane at Walmart- I grab for everything!

Hope to see you in Times Square where we can countdown to the New Year together and drink to a toast with champagne!

Happy New Year!

Thrill Driven by Candi Silk

The title says it all about the insatiable women in this novella. It's hot, enjoyable, and difficult to put down. 

I was able to bring Candi on today with a guest post with a little Q and A about Thrill Driven. Enjoy her witty charm and wild imagination.


Thanks, Elle, for the invitation to stop by and visit with you and your readers.

Elle: Thrill Driven is your latest erotic escapade. Why would women readers be interested in the story?

Candi: Great question, Elle, and probably the same question all authors ask themselves as they are writing a story. In the case of Thrill Driven, I’ve developed and brought together three women that have deep/intimate questions about their individual sexuality. Two of the women, Marla and Sherrie, both mid-thirties, are divorced from disappointing marriages. They’re not bitter and they aren’t whining, but they are on a mission to experiment with some intimate sexual desires that have lingered from their early twenties. Unexpectedly they meet a third woman, Jan, ten years younger, while dance-clubbing. Jan has not had the best of experiences with men. To add tension to the dynamics, Marla and Sherrie have invited one of their favorite bed-mates, Ray, a well-endowed 28 year-old hunk, to be part of their weekend. With that varied mix of sexual undertones, what can possibly happen in a weekend to deliver an enjoyable erotic story for readers?
I believe women and men readers will be drawn to the story because it pulls from some of the real-life thoughts and fantasies that most of us have had from time to time. I write erotic escapades that portray consenting women and men enjoying mutual pleasure. And my writing is tilted toward women’s consideration and perspective. My erotica tends to lead to happy, or pleasant endings.
Another reason women would be interested in reading Thrill Driven is because the story centers on the broad, and sometimes, hazy meaning of sexuality. Currently, in our world, there is much discussion regarding women’s sexuality, and women are leading that conversation. Most of my writing focuses on a “what if” type question. In Lust Driven, which is the beginning of Marla’s story, I posed the question to myself, What would have to happen, and what emotions would be at play for an ordinary, married woman to “break-out” and become a “lust driven” woman in one night, and with two men who are not her husband? The dynamics are interesting.

Elle: How do you respond to the criticism that erotica has no plot, therefore it has no point?

Candi: Take all of the plots that exist, and most authorities and references agree at most there are only about 20. Boil all of them down and you end up with one universal plot that is goal-centered: Someone wants something, and tries to get it. That applies to a 500-page Civil War novel, as well as a short erotica story, or novel. In one case someone is trying to win a major skirmish, and of course there are lots of sub-plots running through a Civil War epic.
In the erotica example, someone wants sex and tries to get it. A war

can linger for years, even decades. Sexual interactions can be as emotionally explosive as a war, and those intimacies can also be impulsive, the chemistry happening very quickly, or extended over a longer period of time. Most often, the common thread in erotica is sex, the physical interactions between and among the characters, so the story centers more on the physical aspects of the relationship, rather than hundreds of pages of garden strolls, hand-holding, porch swings and emotional introspection. If a preponderance of those elements are added to the story the writer will probably classify the book as romance, or maybe erotic romance, depending upon the amount and descriptive sexual content.
Sex is serious. Sex is how we all got here on this planet. Sex sounds like a pretty serious plot for a short erotica story, or a long erotica novel. Consistently erotica runs neck-and-neck with romantic suspense, and contemporary romance in women’s preferences for reading. Women represent 84 percent of buyers of the romance genre (which includes erotica), and men make up only 16 percent. Women readers fuel the romance genres.
The “point” of erotica relates back to the reader’s preference. What is the reader in the mood for? What type story would bring the most reading pleasure for the night? If I’m in the mood for a pulse-quickening erotica, I might turn to a Kirsten McCurran title. However, if I’m in the mood for a human interest, family drama, I’ll turn to a title of Elle Klass, a favorite author of mine. Very different books, with different intents, but equally enjoyable for me. For me that’s the joy of reading from different genres.

Elle: Where do your stories come from?

Candi: First of all, I do not write about my life, or any people I’ve known in the past, or currently. Often, I’ll get an idea from a news article. Sometimes a story begins when I think of an imaginary character. That was true for Lust Driven, and Thrill Driven. Other times I think of a situation, predicament, or set of circumstances, and begin wondering what character A, B, and C will do with that. But Elle, there is so much drama in real-life families, the work environment, the fitness center, the coffee shop, or any other place where people congregate, that there should be no shortage of stories to harvest.

Always exciting and always a pleasure. Candi, you have a way of bringing out those everyday drama's and turning them into something kinky and fun! Thank you Candi!


It has been my pleasure to visit The Troubled Oyster. I’ve read and noticed that interesting things take place here. I want you to know I’ve read your work; you’re a very talented writer. Keep writing your unique books!

My Review:

Thrill Driven by Candi Silk is an exciting, entertaining erotic read. Marla meets Sherrie and their mutual sexual desires for one another build eventually giving way to an evening full of naughty adventures. Marla’s two scorching hot male friends, Ben and Ray, have a connection to Sherrie as well and the women tell all in their meeting, not leaving out any juicy parts. As the novella heats up the women go out on the town and kick up some dirt and inflate others passions with their dirty dancing. They catch the eye of another woman Jan who is spending the evening with a boring male friend and soon the three women heat up the pages of the book with their lustful encounters.

The pages in this story flashed by with lightning speed as the character’s actions pulled me in. These women are naughty and no how to let loose and have fun. They teach each other how to enjoy. I loved how the women connected not only on a steamy level but through their life experiences and mutual female understanding. Candi did an excellent job with the dialogue between the women. It was open and hysterical as well as true!

A fascinating,light and sizzling read!

Where to find Thrill Driven and Candi's other sizzling books:
Candi Silk Amazon
Amazon.CO.UK
Barnes and Noble
Facebook
A Taste of Candi Blog
Candi at Wordpress
Google+
Goodreads
Twitter