Samantha Wilde has a recipe to ease the mind, body and soul... plus a giveaway!

***Giveaway is now closed***

Introduction and interview by Tracey Meyers

I have to admit when I first learned that Samantha Wilde is an ordained minister that teaches yoga I was a bit confused.  However, once I got past my initial reaction, and the stereotype of an ordained minister, I totally got it. 

In addition to these two things,  in 2009 she added writer to her credits, as well with the publication of her first novel, This Little Mommy Stayed Home.   Her latest novel, I'll Take What She Has, was published last week!

This Massachusetts native, currently resides in the western part of the state with her three children and husband. Her interests are "eclectic" including one of our favorites here at CLC - eating chocolate!  (Good thing she's visiting during food month!)

So, please join me in welcoming to Chick Lit Central, Samantha Wilde!

Samantha can be found on her website and blog, Facebook, and Twitter.

A huge thank you to Samantha for stopping by CLC to visit with us!

Thanks to Ballantine Bantam Dell, we have FIVE copies of I'll Take What She Has for some lucky readers in the US.

You are an ordained minister, a yoga instructor and writer. To most people these would appear to be three totally unrelated things; how do they compliment and enhance one another for you?
I love that question! I’ve asked myself that question a few times, usually when I’m pulled in eight different directions. What I really am and do right now in my life is mother. I stay at home with my three young children and consider this my “real work.” Mothering, however, as many know, is its own kind of yoga practice; just try breathing deeply through a temper tantrum! Before children, I taught yoga full-time, about eighteen classes a week, and worked in various ways as a minister. To me, teaching yoga is ministry. I also consider, if you look at it broadly, that my books are a kind of ministry, particularly to mothers—a ministry of laughter. I love to make people laugh, and I think laughter heals. Stories heal, too, and the escape of even the lightest of novels can make a space in someone’s day that allows them to endure a rough patch. In truth, I don’t know how not to do these different pieces; they come out of me whether I want them to or not!

What do you want readers to get from your works?
Pleasure. Hours of enjoyment and a return to a sense of the goodness in their own lives. With my first novel, This Little Mommy Stayed Home, I hoped that mothers would take comfort and encouragement from the book and that the laughter would ease some of the stress of new motherhood. In I’ll Take What She Has, I’d love readers to rediscover their own green grass.

When you sit down to write a novel, do you know how the story is going to end or is that something you decide as you go along?
It always seems to me that the characters write their own story. I might have a few general ideas about the ending. For example, it’s important to me that my novels have an uplifting ending. “Don’t kill the mother,” is one of my rules. A happily-ever-after finish has such a bad reputation these days as if all well written books need to depress the reader. But even Shakespeare tied up his comedies with a neat, buoyant send-off. I feel like I want my characters to end up somewhere better than they began; I am open to how they get there and discover it while I write.

Who has been the greatest influence on your writing?
Although I am the daughter of a novelist (I talk about her below), and have been strongly influenced having a writer for a mother, getting the support of a few outside teachers of writing has made an enormous difference in my sense of myself as a good writer. In high school, two women, at two separate schools, believed in me. It’s funny to write that because it sounds like a cliché—too simple, too silly, almost. I think if a child can have one person (not a parent) recognize, really see, acknowledge, and expect her gifts, it makes all the difference in the world. Years ago I tutored a teenager in reading. He read at the third grade level and all his teachers had already given up on him. I did one significant thing with him: I truly, deeply, believed that he could read. And you know what? He did.

What comfort food do you associate with your childhood and why?
Oh, dear, this could be an embarrassing answer! I have a few comfort foods, chocolate chip cookie dough for one, which I clearly remember eating straight out of the plastic wrapped log you get from the grocery store. On more than one occasion. Without utensils. Where cookie dough is concerned, does anyone need to ask why? I also used to eat Cheez-Its at my father’s house. He allowed us few treats making the consumption of junk crackers a wonderful indulgence.

What food or ingredient represents your personality and why?
Believe it or not, this question stumped me. How about seltzer? Raspberry seltzer—fruity and fizzy.

Does your family have a recipe that has been pass along through the generations? If so, what is it for?
 My mother taught me how to make bread as she learned from her mother. I recall her lessons in kneading the dough, and still use a few of her recipes for good brown bread (molasses, oatmeal). The real generational gift I got is actually reading and writing. My mother, Nancy Thayer, has always spent more time writing than doing anything else (including cooking in the kitchen) which explains her twenty-three novels published to date. She gave me the recipe for writing.

The one junk food item that should be considered a staple in everyone's diet is:
No junk food should be a staple in someone’s diet (says the mother in me)! Chocolate, though, should. But chocolate, as the French know, is not a junk food, but a health food, and considering that I might well be the healthiest woman on earth.

Thanks again to Samantha for tantalizing our taste buds and Random House for sharing the book with our readers.

How to win I'll Take What She Has: 
Please comment below with your e-mail address. (Please note: Entries without an e-mail address will NOT be counted. You can use AT and DOT to avoid spam. Or provide a link to your facebook page or blog if you can receive messages there.) 

Bonus entries (can be listed all in one post):
1. Please tell us: What is the one junk food item you think should be considered a staple in everyone's diet?
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US only. Giveaway ends March 10th at midnight EST.