Straight Chatting from the Library: Becky Wicks

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Becky will be awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

READ THE INTERVIEW

Hi Becky, we want to know you. Can you tell us somethings about you?

Hi! Thanks so much for having me on the blog and for supporting my historical romance, The Day Of The Wave! I'm a freelance writer, in Vancouver right now, but when it rains I'll probably go back to Bali, where I lived on-and-off for the past couple years before this. I have three books published by HarperCollins but now I'm self-published as I love the freedom to control, connect and market for myself. It's an adventure, and hard work too, but lots of fun.

The Day Of The Wave is the name of your book. How did you come up with this name?

It's a story about events following the Boxing Day tsunami, which affected 15 countries on December 26th 2004. I needed a title that wasn't as obvious as 'Tsunami' but was still powerful and memorable. I think The Day Of The Wave might make you wonder what it's all about, and hopefully get you to start turning those pages.

You are an author. I'm assuming that you're reading books. How much do you read in a year?

I wish I had more time to read, honestly, but I try to read at least one book a month. I love all genres, especially autobiographies, books about spirituality and of course, romance novels!

What's your expectation about your book?

I really just want to reach as many people as possible with this story as I feel like it's the one I'm most proud of writing, and self publishing. I had to do a lot of research about the actual 2004 tsunami in order to get my facts straight and to make it believable. I hope I've done the deceased, and the survivors justice because it was really a passion project that I put my heart into. I hope people like it.

Are you hanging out in any social media? Which ones you're using mostly?

I'm kind of obsessed with Twitter (follow me on bex_wicks) and Instagram (beckywicks). Obviously I use Facebook - I live away from home so it's all a great means of communication with the people I love and miss.

What's your all-time Best/Worst Book?

I love The BFG. It stuck with me all these years and I know I'll read it to my kids too. I don't have a worst book, because all books are art and all have been created with passion and care. I think it's important to remember that. It takes a lot of work and bravery to write and publish a book! Authors put themselves out there and these days, that takes bravery!

I've been writing stories on my own since I was a child. Can you give advice to others like me?

It depends on your goals. If you want to be published, make your work as good as you possibly can and approach agents looking for work in your genre. Otherwise, do your research on how to write and sell for Kindle. It's what I did and I'm still enjoying the journey. Whatever happens though, don't stop writing. It's the most important thing a writer can do, at the end of the day, whether you want others to read your work or not!

Do you have/have you had another job besides being an author?

I do a lot of social media monitoring for clients all over the world. I also write freelance travel and lifestyle articles, but not as many as I did. I'm trying to concentrate on books now.

What do your family and friends think about your being an author?

I think they're proud, and I have friends who tell me they're inspired. Not everyone I know reads my work because of course, it doesn't appeal to everyone, but that's the way it goes. I know they're behind me anyway, which is just as great! I'm hugely appreciative of the support I've had for my writing over the years. It keeps me going.

It was so lovely to talking with you. Is there a something you want to add?

Thanks for having me on the blog. I'd just like to add that once you've read The Day Of The Wave, don't forget to email me your reviews to get the bonus chapter! I hope you love it as much as I loved writing it.

READ THE BLURB

Torn apart by the tragedy. Thrown back together ten years later by destiny... Isla and Ben were just sixteen when the Boxing Day tsunami ripped through their beach resort in Thailand. Just days after forming a life-changing bond, both were missing and presumed dead.

Based on real life events, The Day of the Wave is a story of healing, learning to let go, and figuring out when to hold on with everything you have left.

READ AN EXCERPT

'Isabella,' I said to the girl in braids behind the computer. She was frantic, tapping away a million miles an hour. A line of people were behind me. All of them were bedraggled and beside themselves, like the cast of a war movie. 'Isabella from England. Izzy. I left her on the beach. Can you look again?'

'We don't have any Isabella's yet, I'm sorry,' she said. I asked a hundred times about Toby, too, and Charlie and Van and Tee, but I always got the same answer.

They'd brought in experts from everywhere - Austria, the Netherlands, Australia, Germany, and all of them I realized quickly were carrying out the gruesome tasks it took to identify the dead. Most of it wasn't even happening behind closed doors. There weren't enough doors.

After a while, no one was bringing the injured in anymore. It was just more bodies and still none of them were Toby. Still none of them were Charlie or Izzy... at least, I didn't think they were. There were panels of photos of the bodies as they were brought in, on the walls. But they were all so horribly deformed. You can't even imagine what water does. People go black, their eyes bulge out of their sockets. The only way to recognize somebody at first is by their jewelry.

They were fingerprinting the corpses, I discovered. They gave them full dental examinations and took X-rays, then they sent the DNA samples away for analysis. It was when I learned they were matching them to a missing-person's list in Phuket that I begged to be taken there, to the International Hospital. I knew more bodies were there. Maybe I'd find Toby there.

I found my mom instead. She'd just flown in and been allowed a transfer. 'My baby,' she cried when she found me, pulling me against her and sobbing. I was sixteen but her words hit hard. I felt like a baby; a useless, helpless, broken baby. Glenn stood solid like a tree behind her. He hugged me too. It was the first and last time he ever did.

We moved to a hotel, where we stayed for two weeks and I made it my job to look out for Sonthi. He was going through the same thing, only he was still searching for twenty people he loved. We played guitar at night. We knew the same Beatles song so we sang together outside, taught ourselves the harmonies to take our minds off all the tragedies. Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away, Now it looks as though they're here to stay, Oh I believe in yesterday.

Even though Sonthi didn't know the meaning of the words, I think they helped us both somehow. The yesterdays we missed were haunting everyone but at least we escaped with our lives.

I went with mom to the councilor, too, but she cried all the way through, and she cried so much at the hotel that I didn't sleep for days. I was a shell. I had no tears left. 'They're gone, they're never coming back,' mom yowled.

'We don't know that!' I yelled at her, but she yowled even more into the walls and the floor and the pillow, while a thousand other people doing the same made even the hotel feel like a funeral parlor.

We got told that DNA breaks down once bodies decompose. The longer we had to wait, the less chance we had of identifying anyone. Eventually I had to say goodbye to Sonthi and everyone at the hospital I'd gotten to know. Our flight was booked; my brother and uncle and Izzy were officially missing, assumed dead. My mom was a pale-faced Martian I didn't know anymore and she hadn't really spoken to me in days. 'Toby, my baby, Toby!,' she wailed into Glenn's expensive shirt as he helped her outside and into the taxi.

I was just about to leave for the airport when the girl in braids came to grab me. 'Ben,' she said, leaning down, putting a hand to my shoulder. I could tell by her face she had bad news. 'We found Isabella, from the UK,' she said as the tears careened down her face. 'There's only one on the list. I'm so sorry.'

It was raining when I got outside. It was a real tropical downfall; the kind of rain that lashes and hurts. I turned my face up to it and let it hit me as the wind howled. I wanted to feel the physical crash of everything that had been breaking my heart. The only thing I felt was how it wasn't rain at all. It felt like my brother and Izzy and Charlie and two hundred thousand other souls were crying.

MEET THE AUTHOR

Becky Wicks is mostly powered by coffee. She had three travel memoirs published by HarperCollins before going the indie route. Her first book in the Starstruck Series, 'Before He Was Famous' recently reached #1 in Amazon's Coming of Age and New Adult & College categories. The second in the series, 'Before He Was Gone', and the third, 'Before He Was A Secret' are both out now along with 'The Day Of The Wave' - a romance based around the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami.

Becky blogs most days at beckywicks.com and always welcomes distractions on Twitter: @bex_wicks (especially if you have cat photos)

Buy the book at Amazon
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25040673-the-day-of-the-wave
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Becky-Wicks-Author/242645109127479?ref=hl
Blog: http://www.beckywicks.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/bex_wicks

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