Hi, Aadi here. Today I’m chatting with Sachiko about Hearts Over Mind by Karina Fabian.

[Aadi] Please introduce yourself.

[Sachiko] Hi, I’m Sachiko Luchese Larson. I’m 30-something, human female. I’m almost finished with my neurosurgery internship.

[Aadi] What part do you play in the story?

[Sachiko] The book takes place a few days before Joshua’s and my wedding. I get into an argument with Josh, almost lose a patient in surgery and have to deal with his being in a permanent vegetative state. No sooner am I out of surgery than I have to do an interview because my husband-to- be is a big pop star.

Later, my stupid cousins get my fiancé drunk and he nearly drowns in the stupidest bachelor party stunt ever – I’m still mad! If that weren’t bad enough, I have to deal with the star-struck nurse caring for my fiancé just as my patient takes a turn for the worse. Oh, and I have to decide what to do with the awful, psych-ward pink kimono my grandmother carted all the way from Japan for me.

[Aadi] How would you describe your book?

[Sachiko] Romcom? I’ll probably laugh about most of this later.

[Aadi] Tell me about where you live? Who do you live with?

[Sachiko] I live in an apartment on the mainland of Rhode Island, not far from the hospital where I work. Really, as an intern, I live at the hospital as much as at my place. I have lots of family on the East Coast. My parents have a restaurant In Newport Beach, on Acquidneck Island, where family on both sides work, so it’s always a good place to go for food or companionship or comfort. Josh is in New York right now, when he’s not on tour. I don’t see him nearly enough.

[Aadi] What do you like or dislike about the other characters from your book?

[Sachiko] Let’s start with Nurse Selfie! I caught the unprofessional little trollop taking selfies of herself with my unconscious husband, which she intended to sell to an online paparazzi site. My man had almost drowned, was on oxygen, and she thought it was cute to let her hair down and make duck faces beside him!

Oh, and the HR Lady, who confronted me because I took Nurse Selfie’s phone. I was giving it back after I deleted the photos and spoke to her supervisor, but that didn’t matter. I was the one who had issues. I’d have liked to have smacked her with one of her stiletto heels. Come to think of it, they were psych-ward pink, too. Figures.

[Aadi] In your opinion, what is your best feature?

[Sachiko] I have excellent skin, which is good, because I’m already 10 years older than my celebrity fiancé. I do not want to get confused for his mother, ever.

Josh says the first thing that drew him were my exotic eyes. (Thank you, Japanese genes!) Then after that, my humor and my intelligence. And my hands. He has a thing for hands, and it thrills him that mine save lives. Josh has amazing hands, himself.

[Aadi] What’s the worst thing someone ever did to you?

[Sachiko] I had a manipulative boyfriend who convinced me to have an abortion, then abandoned me at the clinic.

After I got past the depression and started thinking revenge, I hocked the tennis bracelet he gave me to get a tattoo and paint my hawg. Later, I got engaged to the upstart intern he hated. I didn’t plan that part, but I do love the poetry of it.

[Aadi] What’s the worst thing you’ve done to someone?

[Sachiko] I killed my own child. It took me a long time to get over that. I never completely will.

[Aadi] Okay, last question. If you could change anything in your book, what would it be and why?

[Sachiko] I would not have been such a stress pup about the wedding. I was beginning a new life with my best friend and one of the most talented, loving and incredible men of all time. It should not have mattered what color my wedding kimono was.

Thanks for stopping by Sachiko.