Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold Interview, Review & Giveaway

Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold is the thrilling first installment in a new young adult series of adventure mystery stories by Iain Reading. This first book of the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency Series introduces Kitty Hawk, an intrepid teenage pilot with her own De Havilland Beaver seaplane and a nose for mystery and intrigue. A cross between Amelia Earhart, Nancy Drew and Pippi Longstocking, Kitty is a quirky young heroine with boundless curiosity and a knack for getting herself into all kinds of precarious situations. 

After leaving her home in the western Canadian fishing village of Tofino to spend the summer in Alaska studying humpback whales, Kitty finds herself caught up in an unforgettable adventure involving stolen gold, devious criminals, ghostly shipwrecks, and bone-chilling curses. Kitty's adventure begins with the lingering mystery of a sunken ship called the Clara Nevada. As the plot continues to unfold, this spirited story will have readers anxiously following every twist and turn as they are swept along through the history of the Klondike Gold Rush to a suspenseful final climatic chase across the rugged terrain of Canada's Yukon.

Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold is a perfect book to fire the imagination of readers of all ages. Filled with fascinating and highly Google-able locations and history this book will inspire anyone to learn and experience more for themselves. 

There are currently five books in the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency Series: Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold (book 1), Kitty Hawk and the Hunt for Hemingway's Ghost (book 2), Kitty Hawk and the Icelandic Intrigue (book 3), and Kitty Hawk and the Tragedy of the RMS Titanic (book 4), and Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces (book 5). Each book can be read as a standalone.

“In the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency Series the heroine finds herself in a new geographic location in each book. The series will eventually have a total of 13 books in it (maybe more) and her flight around the world will be completed in the end,” says Iain. “The books are sequential but one could definitely read any of the later ones before reading the earlier ones.”

For more information, go to http://www.kittyhawkworld.com/

About the Author:

Iain Reading is passionate about Root Beer, music, and writing. He is Canadian, but currently resides in the Netherlands working for the United Nations.

Iain is the author of the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency Series, The Wizards of Waterfire Series, and the dragon of the month club. To learn more, go to http://www.amazon.com/Iain-Reading/e/B00B0NGI6Q/

Connect with Iain on Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads.

Interview:

1. When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer?

I suppose it was when I first realized that I had a story that I wanted to tell and a character to share with the world.  Kitty Hawk was my inspiration to try and write a real book.  An actual honest-to-goodness real book.

2. How long does it take you to write a book?

Once I get the idea in my head and its grabbed hold of my imagination it only takes a few weeks for me to actually get the words down onto paper and written out.  It goes so fast that I can hardly wait to back to writing again just so I can be in the book world again for a little while longer.  But before I know it, it's over and then the real work begins of getting the book edited and published.

3. What is your work schedule like when you're writing?

Usually an hour or two in the morning or in the evening.  Or both.  And a lot of the time in-between spent dreaming up ideas and writing the next chapters in my head.

4. What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

One thing that I do to help myself concentrate while writing a book is to listen to the same song over and over again.  I think of it like a mantra - something akin to background noise.  Whatever song it is changes from one book to the next.  For example, the most recent book I finished (The Dragon of the Month Club) I wrote while listening to Coldplay's A Sky Full Of Stars over and over and over again. 

5. How do books get published?

As a self-published author the process of publishing a book (for me) consists first of writing the book, which is surprisingly the easiest part, followed by getting the book edited and cover artwork done, followed by finalizing the edits and straightening everything out in the story, then formatting the book for publication (both in paper and eBook) and finally clicking on "publish" and getting the book out there.

6. Where do you get your information or ideas for your books?

They come from somewhere out there in the ether.  If you just close your eyes and open yourself to endless possibilities, maybe, if your lucky enough, an idea will find you.  I think that has to be how it works...  that you have to let the ideas find you.

7. When did you write your first book?

I wrote my first real published book about two and a half years.  This was the first book of the Kitty Hawk series – Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold.  Before that I once tried to write a book that turned out very terribly that will never see the light of day.

8. What do you like to do when you're not writing?

Travel is always something I enjoy doing.  And I recently discovered (while traveling in Eastern North America and down to the Bahamas) that writing AND traveling are a pretty good combination too.  Some people like to sit by the pool and reading a book, but have you ever tried sitting by the pool and WRITING a book?  It works pretty good.  Very relaxing.

9. What does your family think of your writing?

They are fairly supportive of it, although they are never quite as excited about the stories as I am.

10. What was one of the most surprising things you learned in creating your books?

In the course of putting together my various books for final edits and publication I was quite surprised to learn that three unexpected skills from my non-writing life came surprisingly in handy: first off, I was already pretty good at formatting and track-changes review thanks to all those legal filings I had worked on at my day job; second, my playing around with graphic design and desktop publishing came in handy when putting together my book covers; and lastly (and most unexpectedly) the experience of coding websites in HTML came in handy when I had to format eBooks.

11. How many books have you written? Which is your favorite?

At the moment I've written eight books (five Kitty Hawk www.kittyhawkworld.com, one Wizards of Waterfire www.wizardsofwaterfire.com, one Dragon of the Month Club www.dragonofthemonthclub.com, and one called Where The Earth Wears Thin which will never be published, but if you want to read it, send me an email...  we'll talk).  My favourite book right now is definitely The Dragon of the Month Club.  I am sooooooo excited about this book.  Seriously.  It tells the story of two friends who find a magical book and become members of a very special and exclusive club, and this leads them on adventures in the world of books that they never could have imagined possible.

12. Do you have any suggestions to help me become a better writer? If so, what are they?

I think the best advice I could ever give to anyone writing a book is to write the book you are capable of writing and don't try to write something that you can't.  I would personally love to be able to write something like Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter or The Magicians or Game of Thrones or whatever, but I can't do it.  But what I CAN do is write the books that I do write. 

13. Do you hear from your readers much? What kinds of things do they say?

I think the thing I have heard the most from the readers of my books has to do with a character from the Kitty Hawk series named Charlie.  A lot of people really like Charlie and hope to see more of him in the Kitty Hawk books.  And good news!  He's back in book #5 that was just released last week!

14. Do you like to create books for adults?

I think that as long as a story is good and the book is written well enough that just about any book is great for adults.  I think that the more people who can enjoy a book, the better.  Right?

15. What do you think makes a good story?

I think a good story combines a lot of different elements that all work together to draw you in.  Like a beautiful wonderful world to explore through the pages of the book.  Mysterious elements, action and cliff-hangers.  Unexpected twists.  And characters that you can relate to.  Anything that allows you to dive into another world and live in it for a little while is perfect.

16. As a child, what did you want to do when you grew up?

I always wanted to be a musician, actually.  But somehow that never seemed to work out.

17. What Would you like my readers to know?

Right now I am really really really excited about my new book, The Dragon of the Month Club, and I would definitely like your readers to know that becoming a member of this special club is as easy as conjuring your very own dragon and entering it for a chance to be featured as the official Dragon Of The Month.

Draw a picture! Write a story! Take a photograph! Bake some cookies! Mold a dragon out of clay! Knit one out of yarn! Make one out of LEGO! Whatever you want! Just let your imagination run wild because anything goes - the more creative the better! Send your dragon in and then on the 13th day of every month one entry will be chosen at random and featured on the official Dragon Of The Month Club website. In addition, each month's lucky winner will also receive a FREE one-of-a-kind personalised hard-cover edition of The Dragon Of The Month Club book featuring their winning artwork (or other creative content) on the cover or inside the book itself! 

Check out www.dragonofthemonthclub.com for more details!

My review;
 Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold is a new chapter series that is great for young adults who like adventure. Kitty has just left home to learn about whales. This is her first adventure and I really recommend this to readers who love strong young woman solving mysteries and saving people. She is even her own pilot and has her own seaplane. I cannot wait to read other books in this series. I give this book a 4/5. I was given this book for a review and these are my opinions.

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