JO: What fun thing can you tell us about yourself that we don't know?

JO: Where do you write? Do you have a dedicated office or a corner or nook in a room?

BONNIE: My husband is a very gifted man and one of his many gifts is that he's a pretty good carpenter. He built me an office with a window where I can feel a cooling breeze and listen to it rustle tree boughs accompanied by bird song and the sweet sound of my beloved wind chimes. It's a perfect place to write stories.

JO: Can you use 3 words that describe you?

BONNIE: Principled, Passionate, Prayerful.

JO: Do you always know the title of your books before you write them?  

BONNIE: Almost never. I generally come up with a working title, knowing it will be changed, and then I search for the perfect title while I'm writing. Often my publishers come up with something else and we go with that. Titles are not one of my strengths.

JO: Please tell us about Joy Takes Flight, Book #3 of the Alaskan Skies series.

BONNIE: Joy Takes Flight is the final book in the Alaskan Skies series. In book one, Kate is haunted by the death of her best friend and is driven by a desire to prove herself to be a first rate pilot, so she chooses a career over marriage. She moves from Yakima, Washington to Alaska where she fights to build a reputation as one of the best bush pilots in the Alaskan wilderness, not an easy accomplishment for a woman, especially in the 1930s.

She manages to make a place for herself in Alaska and does build a reputation as a first class pilot. She thinks she has everything figured out until she falls in love with a bush doctor who has a secret. Her plans for a career are in jeopardy--how can she be a wife and mother and still fly the Alaskan wilderness?

BONNIE: The series contains more than one theme. But the one that speaks loudest to me is that we each have a path to walk, and our path doesn't look like anyone else's. God has an individual plan for each of us. If we want to live within His will we need to begin with Him. If we surrender our lives to God there is nothing we can't do. Life may be difficult but it will contain joy and adventure.

JO: Where did you get the idea for the Alaskan Skies series?

BONNIE: My mother grew up in Alaska. Many of those years, she lived on a remote homestead. She had numerous tales to tell and often they included the bush pilots who made sure her family received their mail and supplies and transportation on a rare occasion.  She always spoke highly of the pilots. To this day, she remembers them with admiration and fondness. They were oftentimes her family's only connection with the outside world.

One day, while reading one of several books my mother had given me about Alaskan bush pilots, I got to thinking about their stories. They were a special breed of people, courageous and even fool hardy. Many of them died from accidents while flying. There was a handful of women pilots, which was of special interest to me.  My mind went to the unique challenges a female pilot might face.  It was a natural for my type of book--adventure, conflict and romance. The next thing I knew, I was imagining Kate's story.

BONNIE: I've written several books that take place in Alaska, but the research never ends. There's always something more I need to know.

With the Alaskan Skies series the most difficult task was to plant readers inside the cockpit of Kate's plane. I didn't know how to fly. I read several personal accounts written by bush pilots and I was blessed to connect with a woman who has been flying the Alaskan bush for nearly fifty years. Gayle Ranney knows everything there is to know about flying in Alaska, and she guided me through all three books in the series. I couldn't have written them without her.

JO: How long have you been writing? When did you sell your first book?

BONNIE: I started writing seriously in 1992, after attending the writers' conference I mentioned above. I returned to the same conference the following year, 1993, and presented my first book to the editor for Thomas Nelson Publishing and she presented it to the company. That's the year I decided to be a real writer.

JO: What are you working on now?

BONNIE: I'm writing my first ever, true story about a woman who grew up in the Alaskan bush in the 1940s and 1950s. She lived a life that seems to fit more readily into the nineteenth century, under the thumb of a brutal father and a culture where Native Americans suffered because of who they were. Yet, she saw beauty in her world and experienced the love of a kind mother and an occasional friend. At the time she didn't know The Son, but she believed in a Great White God who watched out for her and saved her life on several occasions.

It is a story of a battered girl who grew up to love God. 

JO: What advice would you give to writers just starting out?

BONNIE: Be certain that you love writing and not just the idea of it. The writing world is not easy to negotiate. It requires a commitment to excellence and long hours. Be prepared to live with insecurity and disappointment. Persevere and you will reap many rewards--the wonder of story development, characters who come to life as you write and the joy of doing what you love.

JO: What encouragement could you give to writers who are playing the waiting game to get published?

BONNIE: The first thing that comes to mind is that it's not a bad place to be. I know it feels bad, but if a writer uses the waiting time to hone their craft and to grow as a writer it is time well spent and much needed. Trust the editors and agents and God who knows just the right time for a writer's debut. Writers want their first work to be sterling, not something they will later wish hadn't yet gone to print and is on a shelf as an introduction of your work to a new reader.

JO: Please tell our readers where they can get your book.

BONNIE: Joy Takes Flight is available on www.amazon.com, www.christianbook.comcand www.barnesandnoble.com, other online bookstores and in local bookstores.  Book one in the series, Touching the Clouds, is presently available for free as an ebook, but will be removed from that list sometime in October.

JO: Where can our readers find you?

BONNIE: I'm easy to find at www.bonnieleon.com or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/BonnieLeonAuthor.

JO: Bonnie, thanks for spending time with us today and for such an interesting interview. Readers, Bonnie has graciously given us a copy of Joy Takes Flight, which one of you will win in my blog drawing.

 Back to Top