Armchair Interview With – Cora Carmack
About Cora
( Connect With Her: Website / Twitter / Facebook )
Cora Carmack is a twenty-something writer who likes to write about twenty-something characters. She’s done a multitude of things in her life– boring jobs (like working retail), Fun jobs (like working in a theatre), stressful jobs (like teaching), and dream jobs (like writing). She enjoys placing her characters in the most awkward situations possible, and then trying to help them get a boyfriend out of it. Awkward people need love, too. She is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Losing It series.
On your nightstand now: The Winner’s Crime by Marie Rutkoski (the first book in this series was fabulous, and I can’t wait to dive in for more).
Favorite book when you were a child: I was (/still am) a gigantic nerd, and I loved reading biographies and non-fiction books when I was a kid. I was great at Trivial Pursuit because I read so many random books about everyone from Magellan to Susan B. Anthony to Steven Spielberg. Now you couldn’t pay me to read nonfiction. Haha. It’s all about the romance.
Your top five authors: Only Five? J.K. Rowling, Jennifer L. Armentrout, Jennifer Donnelly, Libba Bray, Jessica Shirvington, and Samantha Young (Take six. I’m a cheater).
Book you’ve faked reading: Anna Karenina
Book you’re an evangelist for: Most recently, the Tairen Soul series by C.L. Wilson. I’ve pushed it on EVERYONE – friends, family, strangers on the Internet, my mail man, my hair stylist. It’s SO GOOOOOOOOOD. But also the Embrace series by Jessica Shirvington and Fire by Kristin Cashore. And a ton of others.
Book that changed your life: Well, besides Harry Potter which shaped my life in a thousand ways, I’d say The Awakening by Kate Chopin. I read it in high school and it kind of pushed me into my own awakening about who I was and what I wanted in my life.
Favorite line from a book: “Life’s all about the revolution, isn’t it? The one inside, I mean. You can’t change history. You can’t change the world. All you can ever change is yourself.” –Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly
OR…
Which character you most relate to: This is a hard question. I honestly don’t know. It seems like cheating to say my own characters. But they’re the only ones popping into my head. Maybe because when I read, I tend to gravitate toward characters who are different than me. But I remember identify with both Dash and Lily from Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares.
Book you most want to read again for the first time: I think maybe The Book Thief. That book just moved me and the writing was gorgeous. I’d love to discover that all over again. There are so many more too though. Basically I want to wipe my mind and read every book I’ve ever loved again for the first time.
Tell me about YOUR book: All Played Out is the third book in my Rusk University series, but it can be read as a stand-alone. I think it’s the lightest and funniest book I’ve written since Losing It, and gives All Broke Down a run for sexiest. Mateo Torres is that guy who is confident and hilarious and utterly shameless. The class clown and hot jock all rolled into one. Nell lives and breathes school, and as such she has had very few college experiences outside the classroom. When she makes a bucket list of normal college things to check off before she graduates, Torres is the perfect person to help push her outside her comfort zone. But somewhere between checking off list items like going skinny-dipping and doing a keg stand, it stops being about fun and games and becomes something much more serious.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
All Played Out
Publication Date: May 12, 2015
Add it to your Goodreads shelf / Amazon wishlist
Straight A’s? CHECK.
On track to graduate early? CHECK.
Social life? …..yeah, about that….
With just a few weeks until she graduates, Antonella DeLuca’s beginning to worry that maybe she hasn’t had the full college experience. (Okay… Scratch that. She knows she hasn’t had the full college experience). So Nell does what a smart, dedicated girl like herself does best. She makes a “to do” list of normal college activities.
Item #1? Hook up with a jock.
Rusk University wide receiver Mateo Torres practically wrote the playbook for normal college living. When he’s not on the field, he excels at partying, girls, and more partying. As long as he keeps things light and easy, it’s impossible to get hurt… again. But something about the quiet, shy, sexy-as-hell Nell gets under his skin, and when he learns about her list, he makes it his mission to help her complete it. Torres is the definition of confident (And sexy. And wild), and he opens up a side of Nell that she’s never known. But as they begin to check off each crazy, exciting, normal item, Nell finds that her frivolous list leads to something more serious than she bargained for. And while Torres is used to taking risks on the field, he has to decide if he’s willing to take the chance when it’s more than just a game. Together they will have to decide if what they have is just part of the experiment or a chance at something real.
