[The Dark Light blog tour] The road trip that led to The Dark Light by Sara Walsh + Giveaway!

Hi everyone!

Today is my stop on The Dark Light tour, and I am so excited to have Sara over and tell you all about that very eventful trip she had that led to the writing of her debut, The Dark Light!

From Lightning Bolt to Bookshelf: The road trip that led to The Dark Light

One question I’m often asked is how I got the idea for The Dark Light. It’s actually a pretty fun story, and one that centers on a two day road trip from Kansas City to the Teton National Park in Wyoming--a place I absolutely adore.

I love road trips, especially across the middle of the States where there’s miles and miles of gorgeous open country. So, as there’s also a huge road trip in The Dark Light, I thought it would be fun to recreate the trip that led to the story and offer some top tips for surviving all those hours on the road!

Music
When you’re traveling across the middle of America, there often isn’t that much to see, so we listened to a lot of music! One thing we quickly noticed is that the radio stations love a little classic rock. Whatever your taste in music, you simply have to get on board with this. Luckily, we were an appreciative audience. Def Leppard will feature heavily. As will Journey, Boston, and that song by the guy who wants to be stroked. You will hear the Winds of Change by the Scorpions at least once an hour, every hour, and if you’re really lucky, you’ll get a burst of Rock you Like a Hurricane and the car will erupt into a scene from Wayne’s World!

Food
As a grown up, obligatory road trip food basically consists of everything your parents would never let you eat as a kid, and we definitely embraced that on the trip. High on the list comes anything that turns your fingers orange; Chicken in a Biskit--the ultimate in road trip goodness; and questionable meat products from truck stops, usually served on sticks. It is illegal to drink anything but Mountain Dew.

Roadside Attractions
This was a long trip, so all opportunities for entertainment were gratefully received. In the States, that means roadside attractions. Roadside attractions are simply genius, and I’m definitely a person who could take an entire vacation just to tour such bizarre side shows as the world’s largest prairie dog and the world’s largest ball of twine! My favorite roadside attraction on this trip was definitely Wall Drug on I-90 in South Dakota. This place has quite the build-up--we saw advertisements for at least 200 miles!

Chat
I love the bizarre topics of conversation that come up on road trips, like “Which is better? Eggplant or zucchini?” Seriously! But there was one conversation on this trip that I’ll never forget. We were crossing South Dakota when the conversation turned to a news event about a boy who’d reappeared almost ten years after mysteriously vanishing. We were in the middle of nowhere, and the story got me thinking about all the places a person could disappear, especially as we were surrounded by the plains where there’s literally nothing to see for miles around. What might really be out there?

A couple of hours passed and we talked and sang and chugged Mountain Dew, but the idea of this boy disappearing wouldn’t leave me. A world started to unfold in my mind--an invisible world that was separate, yet connected, to our own. What might happen is somebody was taken to that place? What if it was a young boy, like the boy who’d disappeared all those years ago? How could somebody who cared for that boy get him back? And that was how I got the idea for The Dark Light.

I didn’t start to write the story until several months after the trip, but I will never forget the moment when the idea came to me and how, at the time, I’d had no idea that one tiny conversation would lead me to my first published novel!

About the author:

Sara Walsh is British, but happily lives in Annapolis, Maryland. She graduated college with a degree in psychology, but soon decided that telling stories was much more fun. When not writing, Sara is usually reading, drowning in tea, or frolicking around town with the world's cutest St. Bernard. The Dark Light is her first novel.

Follow Sara: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads | Amazon

About the book:

The Dark Light by Sara Walsh
August 28th 2012 by Simon Pulse

Mysterious lights have flickered above Crownsville for as long as Mia can remember. And as far as she's concerned, that's about the only interesting thing to happen in her small town.

That is, until Sol arrives. Mia's not one to fall for just any guy, but she can't get Sol--or the brilliant tattoo on his back--out of her mind.

Then Mia's brother goes missing, and Mia's convinced that Sol knows more than he's sharing. But getting closer to Sol means reevaluating everything Mia once believed to be true. Because Sol's not who Mia thought he was--and neither is she.

The next stop in the tour is with Danny at Bewitched Bookworms where she interviews Mia! Check out the full tour schedule here!

GIVEAWAY TIME!

WIN A SIGNED COPY OF THE DARK LIGHT BY SARA WALSH!

Rules:
Open Internationally
Ends September 5
Must be at least 13 years old to enter

a Rafflecopter giveaway