Saving Casey blog tour: excerpt, interview & giveaway

On this Monday morning we welcome you to our stop on the Saving Casey Blog Tour hosted by Goddess Fish Promotions. Author Liza O'Connor answered our questions and clarified our misunderstanding (thank you), there's an excerpt and a giveaway.

Saving Casey by Liza O'Connor

YA contemporary*ebook*

Trailer*Abridged My Crappy New Life series

Published November 16th 2012 by Bono Books, a div. of Decadent Publishing

Purchase: Amazon | Barnes&Noble | Bonobookstore

**Saving Casey will be reduced from $5.99 to $2.99 for the duration of the tour (March 5th-April 11th) at Amazon, B&N, DP/Bono, ARe, Coffee Time Romance, BookStrand and Smashwords.**

Eighty-year-old Cass wakes up in the body of a troubled seventeen-year-old girl named Casey, which all believe has survived a suicide attempt. Cass intends to turn the girl’s life around, only it’s harder than she expects. All Casey’s troubles have now become Cass’s and someone wants her dead.

EXCERPT:

(Cass discovers her father’s bad health from the butler-parent)

Thornton entered with a tall glass of green tea and bowl of nuts and dried fruit. “Thought you might want some nutrients after your work out.” He set down the tray. “And for future references, there are extra slippers in the bathroom closet where you found the robe.”

“Okay, now you’re creeping me out. Do you have a camera in the bathroom?”

“Of course not! However, I do monitor the gym. Your father put a camera in after his first heart attack.”

She had been about to take a sip of the tea when his words slammed her like a two ton truck.

The next moment Thornton knelt at her feet, scolding her for her lack of shoes, all the while picking up shards of glass.

“When did that happen?” Tears swelled in her eyes. She couldn’t lose her dad. Despite the terrible thing he did to Old Casey, he’d been nothing but wonderful to her. She needed him…damn it, she loved him. “Is he okay now? Is there something he should be doing but isn’t?”

Her butler-parent checked her feet to insure she hadn’t been hurt.

“Thornton, talk to me!”

He sighed heavily. “It’s not my place to discuss this. Nor should I have said anything. Most remiss of me.”

“I’ll keep your remissive moment a secret. Just tell me if he’s okay now.”

Thornton sighed heavily and looked up, meeting her worried gaze. “Turning your life around is the best thing you can do for your parents and yourself, and that is all I’m saying on the matter.”

“All right. If I ask Dad, I won’t mention this conversation. I have to look out for my butler-parent, too.”

He actually smiled before standing up. “I’ll bring you another green tea.”

“How about a diet Dr. Pepper in a can—since I’ve proven unreliable with glassware.”

Another smile. What a great day!

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said and left the walk-in closet.

Why choose an eighty year old to body switch with a seventeen year old?
Let me clear that misunderstanding right away. This is NOT a body-switching story. Original Casey really dies. She’s not hanging out in Cass’s cancer ridden body waiting to switch back.

That gives me the creeps to even think about it.

So what is the premise of your story?
80-year-old Cass Davidson has incurable brain cancer. To ensure a fast painless death, she takes her life. Instead of coming back as a newborn, she wakes in the body of a troubled teen.

Why did Cass’ soul enter Casey’s body instead of going the *normal procedure? (* Normal defined as whatever you believe)
In my story, God gets the blame/credit. But since this is a novel, it’s really my doing. I wanted to know if 80 years of life experience could make a material improvement in a teen’s life, or if the experience of an old person is so outdated that it doesn’t help at all.

So I had Cass enter the body of seventeen-year-old teen. To make it even more challenging, I made her a troubled teen. Then to take her out of her element, I made them horribly rich so her middle-class ethics wouldn’t be much help.

Why would you even conceive such a premise?
Okay, time for a true story. And if you don’t believe it, I won’t be insulted, because the only reason I believe it is because it happened to me.

When I was sixteen, one morning while lying in bed, I felt my conscious-self leave my body, go through the window, and hover outside. Crows began squawking nearby and they terrified me. I knew with inexplicable certainty they could capture my soul if I didn’t return to safety. I flew back to my body in a panic and never tried to leave it again.

Did that really happen? Or was it my creative imagination in my pre-waking moments? I don’t know. However, ever since that day, I have firmly believed the body and the soul are separable and when I die, my soul will leave my body and unless God sends an angel to protect my travel, then I must take the frightening journey past the crows to find a new host.

How does a soul choose what body it will enter?
If you believe in God, then He probably wants a say in who goes where.

My character Cass constantly wavers between thinking God loves her and is pissed off at her for cutting out early in her prior life to avoid a painful death.

Why does Cass have her own memories instead of Caseys?
Old Casey took her memories with her when her soul left. Due to my personal experiences, I am convinced our bodies are merely vessels. Our consciousness and our memories go with our soul.

So why don’t we remember our past lives?
My presumption is that when the soul enters a body of barely formed brain, like that of a soon to be born fetus, almost all memories of the past are lost, or stored in a matter that they remain irretrievable. However, when the soul enters the *mostly formed brain of a teen, then memories are retained. *(I say mostly formed because the human brain is not fully formed until we reach 25 years.)

Do you cover all this in your book?
Not at all. It’s just the premise of my fictional book. I have no desire to convince anyone souls are real and separable from the body. Our scientific understanding of quantum physics has not progressed sufficiently to prove or disprove this unknown material.

My book focuses entirely on discovering what caused the former Casey to become so self-destructive, how Cass is going to survive and turn her life around, and who can she trust.

You’ll laugh, cry, and yell a lot, but if I’ve done my job, you won’t spend any time pondering the nature of your soul and whether it can leave your body. You’ll just accept Cass’ did and read on.

And for one lucky commenter who leaves the message I WANT MY PICTURE TATTOOED and your email address, you can have a picture of yourself modified with tattoos just like Casey’s.

About the author:

Liza O'Connor

Blog and Website | Facebook | Twitter

I live in Denville, NJ with my dog, Jess. We hike in fabulous woods every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow. Having an adventurous nature, I learned to fly small cessnas in NJ, hang-glide in New Zealand, kayak in Pennsylvania, ski in New York, scuba dive with great white sharks in Australia, dig up dinosaur bones in Montana, sky dive in Indiana, and raft a class four river in Tasmania. I’m an avid gardener, amateur photographer, and dabbler in watercolors and graphic arts. Yet through my entire life, my first love has and always will be writing novels. I love to create interesting characters, set them loose, and scribe what happens. 

Giveaway:

Liza will award a $25 Amazon GC to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour. Other random commenters at blog stops will receive: $5 Amazon GCs, tattoos like Casey’s, or offer to place tattoos like Casey’s on a jpg picture supplied by winner (the author will individually select the daily prize disbursement, and it will be indicated on her completed interview or blog post).