Interview with Cynthia Sax, Author of Testing Truth

What can you tell us about your new release, Testing Truth?

Testing Truth is a steamy cyborg romance featuring a cyborg warrior, a human princess and a dangerous mission.
Testing Truth makes me laugh. It makes me cry. There are friendships and family, love, sexy times, some violence, a few battles, a grand adventure and it has that happy optimistic ending I expect from romance novels.

What or who inspired you to become an author?

I’ve always written. I was a daily diary writer since I could hold a crayon.  When I was in high school, a teacher approached me about writing an article for the region’s daily newspaper. That was the first time I realized people could earn money from writing.  Before that, I thought of writing as a hobby, not as a possible career. That shift in thinking changed my life.

What’s on your top 5 list for the best books you’ve ever read?

Loretta Chase’s Lord Of Scoundrels is my benchmark book. It is the book I re-read when I think my stories are ‘good enough’ and need motivation to step up my game. (grins) Lord Of Scoundrels has so many layers to it. Every time I re-read it, I notice different things in the story.

Laurann Dohner’s Burning Up Flint was my very first cyborg romance. Before reading that book, I loved cyborgs but I thought of them as villains. Burning Up Flint showed me cyborgs could be awesome heroes.

Eve Langlais’ C791 was another early cyborg romance favorite. It has that delightful conflict between machine and man, logic and emotion that I adore in cyborg romances.

Kit Rocha’s Beyond Shame was my first introduction to darker-toned romances. It was gritty and violent and so-very-sexy. My cyborg romances all have a darker tone and the Beyond series gave me the bravery to go there.

Ruby Dixon’s Ice Planet Barbarians is the first story in her Ice Planet Barbarians world. That series is a master class on how to build an ever-evolving world with its core long series and many spin-offs.

Say you’re the host of a literary talk show. Who would be your first guest? What would you want to ask

I’m camera-shy so I doubt I’ll ever be a host of a literary talk show. (grins)

But if I did have the honor of filling that role, I would invite Susan Stoker on the show. She is a New York Times Bestselling Author and has written a gazillion Navy Seal contemporary romances. She has the type of writing career I want to have. She has a tight niche and a large and extremely faithful family of readers.

The first questions I’d ask her are how she grew that family of readers, how she keeps that family tight even though it is quite large, how she keeps them excited about new releases.

What’s your favorite thing about writing?

I’m a pantser. I write by the seat of my pants, having no set plot before I start writing. One of my favorite moments is when I slip in a detail in the beginning of a story and toward the end of the story, I find out why that detail was so important. That is sheer magic.

What is a typical day like for you?

I tend to devote 9 to 9 as writing time. Yep. I’m a 12 hour a day type of writer. At least 5 of those hours are used for fresh writing or revisions. The rest of the time is chatting with reading buddies, doing promotion, and completing admin tasks.

What scene from Testing Truth was your favorite to write?

There were so many scenes I enjoyed writing in Testing Truth. Truth, the cyborg hero, is rarely serious and was an absolute blast to write. The first scene I found fun was, in Chapter One, when they are seeking to make one of their ships look in need of repairs and they’re just banging the nuts and bolts out of it, releasing all their frustrations while they’re doing that.

Do you have a motto, quote, or philosophy you live by?

“If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space.”

I like to take risks with my stories, try different things, and leave my emotions, nice or not-so-nice on the page. That’s scary—to show that part of me. But I think if I don’t feel the emotion while writing a scene, reading buddies won’t feel it.

 

Cynthia Sax is the author of the new book Testing Truth.

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