This week I’m hosting Leanna Ellis with Plain Fear: Forsaken, Julie Lessman with A Heart Revealed, Miralee Ferrell with Love Finds You in Sundance, Wyoming, and Sarah Sundin withBlue Skies Tomorrow. If you want to enter the drawings, please leave a comment on one of the post during the week with your email address. I will not enter you without an email address (my way to contact you if you win). If you don’t want to leave an email address, another way you can enter is to email me at margaretdaley@gmail.com. The drawings end Sunday (August 21st) evening.
Interview with the heroine from A Heart Revealed: Emma Malloy
1. Emma, tell me the most interesting thing about you.
Something interesting about me? Goodness, I’m afraid I’m rather boring next to my best friend, Charity O’Connor, who’s so colorful and full of life and love and fun. But I actually like it that way—safe and secure behind the scenes, you know? I suppose I’m just not all that comfortable in the limelight, at least not since I’ve had these scars on my face. But … I do have a fascinating job! I am the manager of Dennehy’s Department Store in downtown Boston, second to Filene’s in size, but first in customer satisfaction, I’ll have you know! So if I shine at all, that’s where it would be—dickering with salesmen over surcharges on a foreign shipment, battling a shipping agent over late delivery, or soothing a disgruntled customer. But the best? Working shoulder-to-shoulder with some of the dearest, albeit grumpiest, employees I’ve met. No, not employees—more like family!
2. What do you do for fun?
Well, I love to paint and knit and, oh yes—play dominoes with my landlord Mrs. Peep and my young neighbor, Casey Herringshaw. We have so much fun every Sunday evening, giggling and chatting like three teenage girls, even though Mrs. Peep is in her seventies and I’m in my thirties. And then, Charity and I love to go shopping together, mostly for her, of course, because as a widow of sorts—my estranged husband is still back in Dublin, you know—I really have no need to dress up, even though Charity insists that I do. I have to smile because she’s constantly playing with my makeup and my hair, which I have to admit, I do enjoy. I guess it makes me feel pretty and feminine again, like I used to so long ago. But I would have to say the thing I miss the most is dancing! I was quite the dancer in my day back in Ireland, you know, before I married Rory. So you can imagine the fun I had teaching Charity’s brother, Sean, how to dance. The poor man is a confirmed bachelor who’s been invited to a wedding, and I coaxed him into learning the Lindy Hop and the Foxtrot. My, but we had a grand time!
3. What do you put off doing because you dread it?
Talking about my past. Life with Rory was difficult, to say the least, and I’d much rather forget about that and focus on my life now, drawing closer to God, running the store, loving and enjoying my friends—especially the O’Connors, who have made me feel like one of their own.
4. What are you afraid of most in life?
People with tempers and my past.
5. What do you want out of life?
Deep faith, good friends, and a heart free of guilt.
6. What is the most important thing to you?
God, first and foremost, and then my friends.
7. Do you read? If so, what is your favorite type of book to read?
Sad to say, I don’t have a lot of time for pleasure reading, as I spend long hours at the store with my assistant manager, Sean O’Connor, and the rest of my time is devoted to friends, tutoring and mentoring neighbors, or spending time at the O’Connors sewing, chatting or just playing games like Pinochle and Whist. When I do read, it’s usually the Bible, which gives me great peace.
8. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
I would eradicate my scars, both those on the outside from when my husband threw hot grease in my face, and then those on my soul.
9. Do you have a pet? If so, what is it and why that pet?
Oh, yes, a bored red tabby named Lancelot with orange stripes the color of marmalade on fresh cream and Guinevere—a fluffy white Persian who I rescued as a kitten from a cruel boy who abused her with a stick. She’s missing an eye, and somehow I’ve always felt a kinship with this helpless, little creature with whom I share a bond.
10. If you could travel back in time, where would you go and why?
I would go back to Dublin, Ireland when I was a little girl, and I would work so much harder to love my parents and to obey them before it was too late. And, God help me, if given the chance, I would make different choices than I had, sparing me a lifetime of pain and guilt. But I wouldn’t change a thing about my life with Charity—working at Shaw’s Emporium together, or traveling to Boston to open a store and meeting her family. Especially her brother Sean, a man who showed me that, yes, true love is possible.
