I can only think of one band where I know the band members first and last names. Can you guess which one it was? The Beatles. And while I was a much bigger Beach Boys’ fan than Beatles’ fan, don’t ask me to name the members of the Beach Boys.
I like music; I just don’t necessarily know the name of the band currently playing on the radio. As a teenager I never plastered rock star posters on my walls, nor did I squiggle hearts along with my favorite rock star’s name on my notebook.
Basically, I was clueless when it came to the who’s who in music.
I do remember attending a concert in junior high, and my girlfriend got me to stand up with her and scream, like they used to do for the Beatles. I lasted for about 30 seconds, and then sat back down, feeling like an idiot, while my friend continued to jump around playing the role of the star struck fan. Don’t ask me whose concert we were at; I don’t remember.
This bit of cluelessness on my part inspired the plot of While Snowbound. I wanted to write another standalone romance. I thought about a female character who was a little like me, one who didn’t read fan magazines or watch reality TV, and finding herself alone with the man voted the Most Sexiest Man of the Year. And when she is made aware of who he is—and listens to his music—she finds she doesn’t like it very much.
I had fun working on While Snowbound. I made the female protagonist an Indi writer, like myself. Her genre was strictly historical romance. I do remember one reviewer who got snarky about the fact this character wrote historical romance, claiming that genre was more a hobby for little old ladies. Actually, I chose historical romance writer because I wanted a character who knew more about history than current events. If she wrote something like YA, I would expect her to be less clueless about the rock star.
While Snowbound was the second book written in what became my Unlocked Hearts series, written under my Anna J. McIntyre pseudonym.