“Past, future, and love all exist in the door through time.

Modern and independent seventeen year old Morgan Westbrook thought she had seen all there was to her home town of Scarlet, Georgia, but one day while walking in the woods behind her house she discovers a mysterious door masked behind the trees. After admiring the door’s timeless beauty she walks through its entrance to venture into more woods, but what she doesn’t know is that the door is a gateway through time that takes her back to the year 1863 during the days of the Civil War in Scarlet.

Without knowing that she had traveled back in time, she stumbles upon Danny Carson, an attractive young man who is appalled to see that Morgan is wearing skimpy modern clothes instead of a nineteenth century dress. Although they find each other completely different than anyone they’ve ever known, they cannot help but feel drawn to one another. After spending time in another century, she discovers that she’s time traveled back to the year 1863 and that the door took her there. For months she and Danny journey back and forth through the door to experience the joys of traveling to both of their centuries. When dilemmas of unwanted marriage, slavery, and war are thrown at them, they must face the perils that time travel has delivered them in both the future and the past.”

Please welcome Brooke Passmore, author of the upcoming Scarlet Woods Trilogy!

Alice in Readerland: What inspired you to start writing?

Brooke Passmore: When I was a kid I was always coming up with stories while playing with my Polly Pockets or whenever my friends would come over and we’d pretend to be mermaids in my pool. I started writing stories at a very young age, though none of them were well written at all since I was like nine.

Alice in Readerland: How did you come up with the idea of Scarlet Woods?

Brooke Passmore: I came up with the idea for the book partly because I have woods in my backyard. I always walked about the woods thinking of cool things that I wished would happen in the trees and so that was what got me into writing this book. I’m also a big fan of history and fantasy so putting both of those together into one story was very fun to write.

Alice in Readerland: In Scarlet Woods, your main character finds a mysterious door in the woods that transports her to the year 1863 during the days of the Civil War in Scarlet, Georgia. Did you have to do any research on the time period or what Georgia was like back then?

Brooke Passmore: Yes, I looked up many different things that I thought could maybe happen back in that time. Some ideas I had in mind had to be tweeked because when I was researching about the era I knew some of my ideas wouldn’t be plausible during that time so I had to change up some things. I researched mainly about the undergarments girls wore, relationships between men and women, and the way slaves were treated back during that time.

Alice in Readerland: What’s your writing process like?

Brooke Passmore: I love to write with music playing! It’s very hard to write when nothing is on in the background. I tend to play movie soundtracks by James Newton Howard, Thomas Newman, Phillip Glass, Alexandre Desplat, John Barry, and many other musicians who have made great movie soundtracks. I mainly write in my bed where I don’t have distractions from my family. I try to write a few chapters of a book and then if I get stuck on a certain part I’ll start reading everything I’ve written so I can edit the last chapters I just finished. Doing that gives me ideas for later on down the road in my book since I just refreshed my mind about what I had the characters do and it gives me ideas of what I could have them do next.

Alice in Readerland: What are some of your favorite characters from books or T.V.?

Brooke Passmore: Damon Salvatore from Vampire Diaries is a sexy stud in the books and on the show! Oh gosh I think he’s such a delicious treat! It’s funny because I have two big crushes on Barney Stinson from How I Met Your Mother and Blaine from Glee (it’s funny because in real life the guy who plays Barney is gay and Blaine from Glee is gay but is played by a guy who in real life is straight haha!).

Alice in Readerland: What advice would you give to anyone else trying to write a book?

Brooke Passmore: Reread your work constantly! I don’t know how many times I reread my book but it was needed. I always thought I had gotten all the errors out but nope there’s always more. Heck there’s probably a few errors in the finished version of Scarlet Woods that I didn’t catch, and if there are it’s not that many because I looked over that manuscript so much that my eyes were drowning in my words almost.

Alice in Readerland: If you could choose any time period to travel to, what would it be?

Brooke Passmore: I’d probably choose to travel to the Victorian age, the roaring 20’s, or the 1940’s. I think the Victorian age and the 1940’s were probably the most romantic eras in history and the 20’s would probably the most fun! Oh and I’d also would love to go to the late fifties so I could see the early stages of The Beatles starting to perform!

Thanks so much for the interview, Brooke! Scarlet Woods, the first book in the Scarlet Woods Trilogy, will be available on Kindle December 10th. Until then, you can visit Brooke’s blog and find Scarlet Woods on Goodreads.

Happy reading!