This East Coast author from North Carolina first met West Coast author Avis Adams in Tuscany. But we had an instant connection and immediately talked craft, family, travel secrets, and cappuccino. If you don’t already know her, you are in luck. I interviewed Avis about her new release, career, and more. Let’s dive in!
Avis M. Adams lives in Oregon and has four YA novels released by The Wild Rose Press: The Incident, The Disappearing Names, The Consequences, and The Disappearing Bloodline. She has a romance novella, The Christmas Wish Knotts. Quilcene, a chapbook of her poetry. She teaches English at a local community college, belongs to the Baker Street Writers Group, Flamingos Reborn, and is an active member of the Willamette Writers. She presents sessions on writing craft at local conferences and meetings. She lives in Portland, Oregon, where she writes, hikes, kayaks, gardens, and plays with her granddaughter.
Renee: Hello, Avis. Congratulations on your new novel, The Disappearing Bloodline, which releases today, 2/23/2026. What inspired you to write a time travel, and why did you choose the time frames and locations?
Avis: This book is the second in a three-book series, and I chose time-travel because of the first book. That one is based on The Seattle Underground, a real place that used to hold fun tours in the dusty cellars and shops in Pioneer Square, Seattle. The stories they told were so amazing and funny that it captured my imagination. When my daughter moved to Portland for graduate school we went on a Shanghai Tunnel tour in the tunnels under Portland. Again, historical tour, based half on fact, half on fiction, and it struck me that I could do something with it! Hence, The Disappearing Names was written and published, and on Monday, 2/23/26 The Disappearing Bloodline will release. I set book 2 in Covent Garden England in the 1920s because I’d traveled to London and did a bit of research which was fun, and much of my findings informed the final pages of my book. Not yet written will be the final book, The Disappearing Bones, set in Italy in a year that I haven’t nailed down, probably the late 1800s in Herculaneum, another city my sister and I explored in our 2024 travels. My goal in that book to finally snuff out my villain, Mr. Stickel, who will disappear, but in time-travel, you never know. Anyone could resurrect at any time.
Renee: Most authors I know discovered a love of books at an early age. What was your favorite book as a child?
Avis: I started reading very early and read a great deal at first, but I have to say, any book that had a horse in it was my favorite at the time. That was the criteria. I had a very short attention span in those early years, so no horse, no interest! LOL. I was so stubborn even then.
Renee: When did you know you wanted to be an author?
Avis: I was in the sixth grade when I wrote an essay and won the teacher’s attention. She called me her little writer. I thought I was hot stuff, but in seventh grade, my English teacher burst my bubble and told me my writing wasn’t realistic. Perhaps my paranormal take on the death of my grandparents and their sudden return using an elevator didn’t impress him. LOL. But that writing bug was always in the back of my mind, pushed further back by life, marriage, kids, work, etc. It wasn’t until I was in my thirties and started writing and submitting poetry that I learned to write for writing’s sake. I had many of my poems accepted for publication right away, and I’ve never looked back. It wasn’t until I was in my forties that I attempted to write a novel and fell in love with writing in a different genre altogether. It’s been the joy of my life, and I tell my students that I get cranky and develop flu-like symptoms when I haven’t written for a while. LOL
I learned to write for writing’s sake.–Avis Adams
Renee: What was your first novel?
Avis: It was a historical YA novel set in the Viking age called Nina’s Heste, which means Nina’s horse in Norwegian. As a horse lover, I wanted to capture that kind of illogical love that drives young girls to go against their parents’ wishes, in this case, Nina who finds an orphaned foal, who brings it to her parent’s working farm, a farm that cannot afford to feed goat’s milk to raise an animal that may not be a worker on the farm. It was fun to develop ideas of pre-Christian ideas in a culture that was under conversion, and to explore the tension between new believers, and believers in the Pagan rights. Very fun, never published! It’s probably four books in one, and I may get back to it someday. I hope so!
Renee: What was your first published novel?
Avis: The Incident, my first novel, is a climate fiction young adult, adventure/survival novel. I agonized over every word and worked on it for almost a decade before it was accepted for publication by The Wild Rose Press. I consider it my learning novel and workshopped it and presented it to agents at conferences year after year. It won a literary award but still wasn’t picked up for a couple more years. I was about to self-publish when Ally at TWRP took an interest, and I’ve been working with her ever since!
Renee: Do you have a favorite author? If so, who and why?
Avis: I don’t; however, Kate Chopin comes to mind. Her writing was so liberating when I discovered it, and I couldn’t believe she was writing at the turn of the 19th to the 20th century! I love James Baldwin, but it’s his essays that I prefer. I really love Samuel Clemmons for his amazing satirical pieces. I’ve fallen in love with Molly Gloss’s work. As an Oregonian writer who also loves horses, she had me at my favorite animal in Hearts of Horses! Much of her work takes place in the settlement days of the state and showcase strong women struggling against nature and society. Too many great authors to choose just one.
Renee: If you could give other writers one piece of advice, what would it be?
Avis: Write. Write. Write. Take a course. Write when you are tired or don’t feel inspired. Share your writing. Put yourself out there and submit. See what happens, but most of all, write because you love the written word and have to capture your ideas on the page.
Renee: When you’re not writing, what is your favorite activity?
Avis: I love to hike and ramble. I love to cross-country ski and snowshoe. I love to swim, garden, and bike. I love the great outdoors, travel, and spending time with family and friends, and even though I don’t have a horse now, and have not ridden in years, I’d love to spend more time with those magnificent creatures.
“…write because you love the written word and have to capture your ideas on the page.”–Avis Adams
Renee: If you could spend one hour with anyone, living or deceased, who would it be and why?
Avis: It would be my grandmother on my father’s side. We were soul mates, and we shared such a natural connection until the day she died, I still miss her every day, and I know if I could have one more hour, I’d be a better human being for it.
Renee: Use the links below to connect with Avis!
Author’s page Facebook Goodreads Instagram
She could be brave, but to save her best friend she needed to be fearless.
Sixteen-year-old Samantha Stewart must overcome her fear of the family legacy, or curse, as she sometimes calls it. But as the next Guardian of the Artifacts, she has a lot to learn before that can happen. When her best friend Nicole receives a mysterious letter from 1929, London, Nicole begs Sam for help. Sam hesitates out of fear, but once she decides to help, Nicole has already transported, but where? London?
Sam’s anxiety of all things artifacts stops her cold, especially the Roman bricks that create the portal for time-travel, but when she returns to Aunt Eli’s vault in the Throne Room and finds the bricks glowing, she must act. Did Nicole open a portal and use it without her? But how, and did this have something to do with the letter she received from London?
A whiff of lavender used in all time-travel spells confirms her fear, and in a panic, she runs to Archie, the magical cat and Protector of the artifacts. Only he can help her prepare a time-travel portal to save Nicole and unravel this mystery, but can she trust him? And will she arrive in time to save Nicole?
Buy links:
Excerpt:
The call of “fresh scones, and “get your fresh cucumbers” rang through the market as Sam reached Floral Street. She turned right onto James Street and found a wooden door to the left unlocked. Whatever was pulling her here wanted her to go underground. The door creaked as she pulled it open, and she followed the stairs into the dim light of the tunnel.
Why here? Did this have something to do with Archie? If not, was it the letter? Why else would she be drawn to this underground tunnel? A white sign with red and black lettering appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
Royal Mail Rail
Covent Garden Market.
Something was wrong. She scanned the shadows where the wall met the floor. Was that a pile of rags, or—”
With her heart in her throat, she raced the distance down the tunnel on winged feet. It was as she feared, an orange tabby.
Archie.
She gasped as she knelt over him. Blood ran from his nostrils and a long gash on his forehead.
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Renee: Thank you, Avis, and congratulations. This novel sounds amazing!
Renee Canter Johnson was born in North Carolina, where she still resides. She has a BS in Business Management from Gardner Webb University. Johnson studied Creative Writing in France and Italy, was awarded two terms at Noepe Center for Literary Arts on Martha’s Vineyard, and completed a Novel Intensive Study at the University of Iowa. Johnson loves spending time with her family and fur babies, and when she is not with them, you will find her reading or writing.
Join her at reneejohnsonwrites.com for insights on travel destinations, books, authors, and living a creative life.
Published author with The Wild Rose Press, blogger, and lifelong voracious reader, with the belief that novels conquered the world of virtual reality long before technology made it possible. The next adventure is just a click away!
Renee Johnson Writes 