USA Today best-selling author Loree Lough has more than 120 books in print now (and more than 10 million copies in circulation), including fiction and non-fiction for kids and adults. Seven of her novels have been optioned for movies, and additional releases will hit the shelves between now and 2021.

The following transcript is a shortened version of the original recording.

Tracy:   Hey there. Welcome to another episode of Buggy Talk. I'm your host, Tracy Fredrychowski, and each week I bring you the story behind the stories, along with the storytellers. For this week's episode, we have USA Today's Bestselling Author, Loree Lough, and she has more than 120 books in print and more than 10 million copies in circulation, including fiction and nonfiction for kids and adults. Seven of her novels have been optioned for movies and additional releases.

Loree, you've been busy, how are you today?

Loree: I'm doing great. How are you doing? I am doing wonderful.

Tracy: Thank you so much for joining us today. I have spent some time this past week doing my research, and I see you have two Christmas collections. You're working on Mistletoe and Murder and the Amish Christmas Miracles Collection. Plus, you have a third book in your Amish series, A Little Child Shall Lead Them.  Plus, you're doing a novella anthology with Shelly Shepard Gray and Rachel. Good. I'd say you are a super busy woman. 

Loree:  I don't like to let any grass grow under my feet, you know, but first, I want to thank you a lot for inviting me.

Tracy: First, I'm going to ask you a few questions that have to do with your writing career. The first being, when did you first consider yourself a writer?

Loree: Well, it was a dark and stormy night, you know, no, seriously. It was the mid-eighties. And I had been writing these fun little essays for free for the Sun section of the Baltimore Sun Paper when the editor asked me to write one. I don't even remember the topic, but she asked me to write one, and it wasn't a literal assignment. So she paid me. And after that one came out, I got some letters to the editor's response. She assigned another and another. And I think cashing the checks is made me feel like a real writer.

Tracy: Tell us what your rate, your writing space looks like.

Loree: Well, that's a little tricky because I write all over the place. This sounds like a Dr. Seuss story, right? In the family room. I write in the car right in the kitchen, right in the dining room, right. At our cabin, which is where I am right now. Long story short. I don't have an office anymore. So any place I lay my laptop down is my writing space.

Tracy:  Tell our listeners what a typical writing day looks like for you.

Loree: Well, I'm an early riser five, six o’clock. My body says, get up out of bed, lazy hog, and I make coffee. Of course. And then I checked my email, and I fool around on Facebook and Twitter, Pinterest. And then I pull up the outline for my work in progress and read what I wrote yesterday and edit it and make some notes about, you know, maybe I need to jazz this up or tone that down. Normally I'll work about four or five hours straight before taking a break

Tracy: What famous author do you wish you could, could mentor you? 

Loree: Wow. That, you know, I thought about this a lot. Um, and if I had to pick just one, because there are lots of, lots of good authors out there, and all of them have their unique talents that I would love to import into my stuff. I'd have to say; it'd be Dean Ko