Life at Open Heart Publishing

Hello Readers!

Our featured author for this post is Germaine Shames.  Enjoy!

Where did you get your idea for writing “Counter-Indications of Trance on the Male Libido”?

As a sideline I occasionally practice clinical hypnotherapy, a vocation for which I am trained and certified.  Trance has a way of bringing suppressed longings to the surface.  The resemblance between a hypnotic induction and a romantic seduction is no coincidence: both disarm the rational mind, inviting mischief.

“Counter-Indications of Trance on the Male Libido” playfully explores what might happen if a workaday hack were to relax his boundaries and embrace his fantasies-beginning with his foxy hypnotherapist.

What made you want to become a writer?

Who wants to become a writer?  For better or worse I was born one.

Have you had other pieces of work published or is “Counter-Indications of Trance on the Male Libido” the first?

My publishing credits are too long to list but include three books and hundreds of articles, essays, art reviews and short stories.  Each opportunity to publish my work connects me to readers, whose intelligence and discernment command the utmost respect.  My best work is still ahead of me.

If you could be any character from any story, who would you be and why?

I prefer to remain my own heroine confronting a blank page each day and preserving to my last coherent utterance the illusion of having been the author of my life.

Do you believe in Santa Claus?

The questions is, does Santa Claus believe in me?

Have you ever contemplated committing a crime?

Daily.

Are there any skeletons in your closet that you think our readers may find fascinating?

Back in my teens I was the only female member of a Mexican motorcycle gang.  As an adult I jumped out of airplanes, rafted waterfalls and bungee-jumped.  I turned forty in Dracula’s Castle.

Germaine W. Shames has written from six continents—soon to add the seventh—on topics ranging from the struggle to save the Amazon to the plight of street children.

Holder of a Masters degree in Intercultural Studies and the Arizona Literary Fellowship in fiction, Shames has made a mission of seeking out personal stories of hope and heroism behind the headlines. Her articles appear in such periodicals as National Geographic Traveler, Hemispheres, More, Success and many others. Her essays and short fiction have been widely anthologized. As author of the novel Between Two Deserts (Macadam/Cage Publishing), Shames’ ability to dramatize complex events has earned high praise from Publishers Weekly, National Public Radio and Bloomsbury Review.

Recent writings have claimed awards from the state of Arizona, University of Arizona, and Spanish Ministry of Culture. Her first screenplay, The Degenerates, is currently in the running for the Motion Picture Academy’s Nicholl Fellowship.

Over-endowed with wanderlust, Shames hits the ground running on assignment and has worked in such diverse locations as the Australian outback, the Swiss Alps, the interior of Bulgaria, the coast of Colombia, the Fiji Islands, and the Gaza Strip. Her fiction writing reflects the breadth of her worldview and fascination with the interplay of cultures, often drawing on events and settings from her sojourns abroad.

She has been interviewed in print, on radio, and on both cable and network television. Her weekly radio spot, “From the Heart”, served a tri-state audience.

When Shames is not trying to save the world, she reviews art exhibitions, flogs her scripts around Hollywood, and dabbles in clinical hypnotherapy, a craft for which she has been trained and certified.

Wanna know more about Germaine Shames?  Visit http://sitekreator.com/germainewrites/index.html