I met Jeff Adams at an author event a few years back, and I was so impressed with him and his books, that I asked him for an interview. I was particularly intrigued by his novel SOMEWHERE ON MACKINAC, and its connections to the movie classic, Somewhere in Time.
Now that he’s single, Chicago businessman Jordan Monroe can finally take his long-desired trip to Mackinac Island for the Somewhere In Time fan celebration weekend. On the first day, Jordan finds himself attracted to Miles Colter, a handsome local stable owner who is giving horseback tours of film locations.
Jordan is surprised and charmed that Miles pursues him. When Jordan learns the stable is in trouble, he wants to help despite Miles’s resistance. As their relationship grows personally and professionally, Jordan dreads the issues that face them—an ex who won’t let him go, the complications of a long-distance relationship, and a secret he knows he shouldn’t be keeping.
Can Jordan and Miles find a way to forge a love as timeless as the romance in their favorite film?
According to your website bio, you’ve been writing since middle school. What drew you to writing in the first place?
I suspect it’s because I was reading from a young age. My mom read to me for as long as I remember, and I was reading on my own earlier than most (or so I’m told). By the time I got to fifth and sixth grade when we started doing essays and term papers, I gravitated to those. English and literature classes became my favorites, and when we had to write short stories, I loved that. From there it kept going, doing creative writing assignments as well as non-fiction with the school newspaper. That all went on into to college.
After college, a close friend and I even started a magazine based on the idea that all the stories in each issue started with a first sentence that we provided. After a few years, I left the publication to work on longer form stories. I’ve got to give a shout out to David who has continued with The First Line all these years later. You can check out the awesomeness that he’s doing at TheFirstLine.com.
What a wonderful magazine, and a great way to tap into creativity by way of first lines! I also love the narrative voice in your book, Somewhere on Mackinac. In what ways are you able to get to know your characters as you write them, and do you find it’s more difficult to tap into some characters than others?
I’m so glad you enjoyed Somewhere on Mackinac. That’s a book near to my heart because Mackinac Island, Michigan, was a place I went to as a child and I loved it so much. The Victorian-style setting, that the main mode of transportation was horse and buggy, and some amazing homemade fudge. I’m also a big fan of the 1980 movie Somewhere in Time with Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour, which was filmed on the island. So, when I had a chance to write a story set in Michigan, despite my love of Detroit Red Wings hockey and writing primarily hockey romances, I did a story set on Mackinac centered around a fan of the film.
To the question of getting to know the characters, since I write mostly low angst material, sorting out the characters isn’t usually difficult for me. I sort out before I write a lot about who they are, and what they want, and then integrate more stuff as I go. It’s gotten easier over time, especially with some books I’ve read and courses I’ve taken on creating characters. Basically, it’s a lot of fun sorting out who the characters are and what I need them to do in the story to make it interesting for me to write and hopefully for the reader to read.
When I write more angsty, intense material though it gets more difficult. I’ve got a young adult thriller series called Codename: Winger. Writing the bad guys in that series stretched me to figure out who they were and what their motivations were. And for the main character Theo, who is 16 and 17 in this series, finding the right tone for him as a teenager who is in the extraordinary position of being a computer genius working for a covert agency was fun but also daunting. He had to go from playing hockey with his friends and having a boyfriend to being out in the field. The stakes for Theo also ratcheted up across the four books. I loved how it all turned out, and it wouldn’t have been possible without an amazing developmental editor to work out some of the more difficult character stuff.
That’s definitely a series I’ll have to read as well! Together, you and your husband Will co-host the Big Gay Fiction Podcast, a show devoted to queer romance as well as pop culture. How did this podcast originally come to be?
Will and I started Big Gay Fiction Podcast in 2015 with the simple premise that we were writing and reading queer romance and talking about it all the time between ourselves and on our social media channels. There was also no other podcast at the time that was focusing on queer romance. So, we created the show to focus on the books and authors that we loved. At the end of December 2024, we released the final episode because after a little over nine years and some 500 episodes, it was time. Nine years is a long time to do anything. In that time, we’d interviewed hundreds of authors and creatives, and recommend hundreds of books, and it was time to move in other creative directions. All the episodes are still available for anyone who wants to have a listen and maybe discover a new to them author or book. You can find the show at its website, BigGayFictionPodcast.com and anywhere you listen to podcasts.
Excellent! What are some of your current projects?
In March I’m going to release a friends-to-lovers queer romance about a pro hockey player and a ballet dancer. Dixon and Oscar knew each other as kids and when they reconnect 20 years later they discover there’s more than just a renewed friendship happening. I would tell you the name of the book, but I honestly haven’t figured that out yet. This book also brings together my Hockey Hearts series of romances featuring hockey players with my On Stage series of books featuring people who work in the performing arts.
I’m currently writing a enemies-to-lovers, small town romance that will come out in the summer that I can’t talk too much about yet because it’s part of a shared universe. I’m having a blast with it though. It features a hockey player who ends up falling for someone he didn’t get along with in high school.
If I keep to the plan, there’ll also be a holiday story coming out before Thanksgiving.
On top of all that, I’ll be continuing to educate creatives on how to create accessible content for their websites, newsletters, and social media posts. Digital accessibility is my day job working with companies around the world so they become more accessible. In 2023, I co-wrote Content for Everyone to help creatives understand the importance of accessibility so their content is available to their entire audience. I did a lot of speaking on this in 2024, and I’m making plans to put a lot more educational content out as well.
If you want updates on what I’m working on, you can visit my website at JeffAdamsWrites.com and signup for my newsletter.
Leave a Reply
Want to join the discussion?Feel free to contribute!