Danita Minnis

 

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Author Interview: Yeats

If you could apologize to someone in your past, who would it be?

I would apologize to the three people in the rented tent at Curry village in Yosemite National Park who I woke up at 4.30am on the day I went off to hike Half Dome. I did not think my alarm clock would be quite that loud or that it would not stop ringing after I threw it across the tent.

If you could keep a mythical/ paranormal creature as a pet, what would you have?

The obvious choice, a fire-breathing dragon. I like to imagine the look on my neighbors face when he comes over to ask for his lawn mower back and I could say to him, ‘Sure take it, it is in the garage right beside the cage where I keep my fire-breathing dragon.’ No one on the HOA would give me any grief about parking my car in the driveway. Everyone would be well behaved at any of my backyard BBQ’s. Any kids that my children invited over to the house would learn how to respect their elders in a hurry if they didn’t already know.

How do you keep your writing different from all the others that write in this particular genre?

I write Memoirs. Unless I have a doppleganger out there who lives in a parallel universe where the events are all the same, then I can guarantee that no one has ever written similar stories about things that have gone on in life like I have. I have read four memoirs from different writers about buying a house in Spain and then fixing it up. While I have written a story about nearly set fire to the Sierra Mountain Range after sneaking off to do a number 2 in the bushes. See the difference? I am the only writer to find a way to get the words Mafia, diarrhea, capsized sailboat, and testicular shrinkage seamlessly into one travel book series.

What are the best and worst pieces of writing advice you ever received?

Best piece of advice is to be honest to who I want to be with my writing. The worst piece of advice was, don’t worry, Word’s spellcheck will catch all your typos.

Are the experiences in this book based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

My books are all based on my events from my own life. I had the run ins with the Mafia, I caught the shocking case of diarrhea in Nepal, I was on the sailboat that almost capsized off the coast of LA, and the testicular shrinkage was mine. (Although I did quote from a mate of mine who had a similar case of testicular shrinkage jumping into a frozen lake in Finland after a sauna)

LESSER KNOWN TRAVEL TIPS SERIES

Simon Yeats

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GENRE:  Humor/Memoir

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BLURB:

The Lesser Known Travel Tips memoirs are a hilarious series of travel misadventures and dubious personal introspection by Australian author Simon Yeats, who from an early age learned that the best way to approach the misfortunes of this world is to laugh about them.

Simon shares his comedic insights into the unusual and uproarious elements of living life as an Aussie ex-pat and having a sense of Wanderlust as pervasive as the Spanish Flu in 1918 or hordes of Mongols in 12th Century.

From how to keep yourself entertained when unwittingly forced to watch 11 hours of live sumo wrestling in Japan, to surviving heartbreak in India at the hands of a French flight attendant, to 48 hours spent in Nepal that qualify as the funniest most gut wrenching travel experience since Captain Bligh was set adrift in the Pacific, to his unsuccessful attempts at avoiding going to a brothel in Thailand. From what to do when several people converge to rob you after midnight on a deserted Copacabana Beach, to how to save the Sierra Mountain Range from a wildfire outbreak due to a lack of quality toilet paper, to where not to go in Tijuana when trying to locate the origins to stories of the city’s mythical adult entertainment, to how to save yourself from drowning when caught in a storm while sailing off the California coast. From how to outwit the Italian police while trying to find parking in downtown Genoa, to how to negotiate exploring the Roman ruins of Plovdiv, Bulgaria while on crutches, to how to impress the German Mafia with 80s dance moves, to how to leave a lasting impression on a crowded bar in Gothenburg, Sweden after combining alcohol and antibiotics.

Simon Yeats has gone into the world and experienced all the out of the ordinary moments for you to sit back and enjoy the experience without the need to break a leg, contract Dengue fever, or rupture a pancreas.

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Excerpt from How to Start a Riot in a Brothel in Thailand by Ordering a Beer and Other Lesser Known Travel Tips

My family’s most cherished vacation when we were all kids was a trip we took to the South Island of New Zealand in the southern hemisphere Autumn of 1980. All our relatives live on the north island where my mum and dad both grew up on dairy farms. So, we had already made a trip or two to Auckland in my young life. My parents had emigrated to live in the tropical heat and brutal humidity of the northeast of Australia before any of us kids were born and given a choice in the matter.

There are four of us in my family. An elder brother, an older sister, me, and a younger sister. Each of us is quite different in our personality and our interests. My older sister is the athlete. My younger sister is the diplomat. My brother is the brainiac. Me? Well, I tend to just sit back and let my siblings be in the limelight.

You can imagine me as being the little kid running around in the playground under a mop of red hair being extra polite with all the other kids and no one teasing me at all for having red hair. Something close to that.

But among me and my siblings, none of us ever stole a car and took off for a joy ride. None of us have ever been arrested by undercover police for trying to sell them synthetic crack cocaine we had cooked up in the basement. None of us ever got in trouble for mislabeling someone by using the wrong pronoun. I mean, sure, I once got in trouble for calling my headmaster the C-word, but, other than that small blemish on my record, I considered myself an exemplary student. Our mum and dad were amazing parents to raise us all so well.

We were a very content family growing up in the 70’s and 80’s while living in the sweltering pizza oven, otherwise known as North Queensland. What about central air conditioning? Oh, how entitled and twenty-first century of you to ask. Rubbing an ice cube across the forehead and asking my younger sister to blow against it. Does that count? Central air conditioning? No. There was none. Just like there was extraordinarily little to do in my hometown. Watching paint dry as a kid living in Townsville brought out the same level of unbridled fascination that I now see with adults viewing porn.

The reasoning behind there being nothing to do is obvious. It is not safe to do anything where I lived. Australian country towns are just holding pens for human beings surrounded by a natural species menagerie of death.

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Simon Yeats has lived nine lives, and by all estimations, is fast running out of the number he has left. His life of globetrotting the globe was not the one he expected to lead. He grew up a quiet, shy boy teased by other kids on the playgrounds for his red hair. But he developed a keen wit and sense of humor to always see the funnier side of life.

With an overwhelming love of travel, a propensity to find trouble where there was none, and being a passionate advocate of mental health, Simon’s stories will leave a reader either rolling on the floor in tears of laughter, or breathing deeply that the adventures he has led were survived.

No author has laughed longer or cried with less restraint at the travails of life.

 

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0CBNQLSPW/about

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@authoryeats

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authoryeats/?hl=en

Book One:  https://www.amazon.com/Brothel-Thailand-Ordering-Lesser-Travel-ebook/dp/B0CLDBSXGX/ref=sr_1_3

Book Two: https://www.amazon.com/Getting-Mugged-Janeiro-Singing-Police-ebook/dp/B0CPCBMD1N/ref=sr_1_4

Book Three: https://www.amazon.com/Survive-Yourself-Dancing-Bavarian-Nightclub-ebook/dp/B0CR6GDDXR/ref=sr_1_2

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