Out of Sight Out of Mind

About Evonne Wareham

Evonne Wareham was born in South Wales and spent her childhood there. After university she migrated to London, where she worked in local government, scribbled novels in her spare time and went to the theatre a lot. Now she’s back in Wales, living by the sea, writing and studying a PHD in history. She still loves the theatre, likes staying in hotels and enjoys the company of other authors through her membership of the Romantic Novelists’ Association.

She’s been a finalist twice in the American Title competition, run by RT Book Reviews Magazine and Dorchester Publishing of New York, one for Never Coming Home. She has also recently been long listed for the Harry Bowling and at Winchester for a ‘cosy crime’ novel.

Winning the 2012 Joan Hessayon New Writer’s award was a magical moment for Choc Lit author Evonne Wareham. March 2013 sees the eagerly-awaited release of her next novel, Out of Sight Out of Mind, a paranormal thriller. Below is a Q&A, with Evonne about both the novel and about herself.

How did you choose to write suspense novels?
I’ve been a writer for a very long time. An unpublished writer, for most of it.  It took me a while to decide what sort of books I wanted to write -- I experimented with a variety of genres.  They were always romance, but I began to notice that they always had crime in them too.  I started to read the great American romantic suspense authors like Nora Roberts and Linda Howard, and it gradually occurred to me that I might write romantic thrillers, but set them in Europe.  I’d finally found my niche!  I love mixing crime and romance -- it's a challenge to keep both sides of the plot balanced and equally exciting, and to ensure that the romance grows out of the story – it can’t just be something simply grafted on.  Lovers who are under an extreme threat are exciting to write about and I hope that comes over in my books. Writing romantic suspense gives me the latitude to explore more unusual themes -- the latest one is about mind reading.  The emotions are real, but the crime element can be as complicated and unusual as I can make it.  It's entertaining, escapist and glamorous – least, I hope it is.

What would be a one-sentence synopsis of your new novel, Out of Sight Out of Mind?
Mind reading scientist meets vagrant - then the fun begins.

What inspired your novel Out of Sight Out of Mind?
I don't really know. I had an idea, wrote large parts of the story, and then put it away.  I got it out again in order to enter an American competition that was calling for paranormal entries.  It's a romantic thriller with a paranormal twist – but not one involving unusual beings, like vampires and werewolves, but humans who have the gift, or maybe the curse, of mind reading.  I was interested in the mind reading element as an extreme challenge that my hero and heroine have to manage on a day-to-day basis.  The suspense element in the book comes first from the struggle to discover the hero’s true identity - when the book opens he has no memory of who he is and has been sleeping rough for three months. Then there is a cat and mouse game with the baddies who want to control the mind reading power. The mind readers are the ones who are threatened, and have to get themselves out safely – they are not the ones doing the threatening.  No innocent bystanders have their minds read in the course of the book.:)

What is your own favourite novel, and are there any particular novelists who have inspired you?
I have too many favourites to count - but my inspiration has to be the great American romantic suspense names - Nora Roberts, Karen Rose, Lisa Gardner, Tami Hoag and a host of others.