'Winter Sparrow' author Estevan Vega: Love is …

I love this line from Winter Sparrow author Estevan Vega's author bio: "He loves superheroes, rock music, mint chocolate chip ice cream, and you! Yes, you right there. Spread the fire!" That made me smile. And this post will make you smile, too. It's tough to frown when confronted with such enthusiasm about what makes the world go round.

Estevan: Love is poetry. Love is a magnet. Love is fire. Love is faithful. Love is passion. Love is chaotic. Love is desire. Love is war. Love is joy. Love is redemption. Love is treasure. Love is sorrow. Love is the future, the past, the present. Love is hope. Love is life.

If none of those definitions apply to you, you might not actually be human. You might not actually be alive. Check your pulse, robot, and your heart beat, just to make sure you're not a cyborg. As you can see, I am a little obsessed with love. The idea, the very notion of this cosmic connection that is so beyond ourselves. Where does it come from? Where is it going? Scholars, philosophers, writers, religious icons, poets, artists, all of them have searched for it, some have found it. It is the most beautiful thing in all of existence. I really believe that. Without love, life could not exist.

I think my obsession with this four-letter word started somewhere around the age of 4. I developed my first crush. And that crush stuck around for a few years. I couldn't really explain it at the time; I just knew that I liked her. My parents are in the hair industry, and I remember walking into a salon supply store (must have been in kindergarten or something) and chatting with the girls behind the counter, gritting my teeth every time they called me cute. I was so sure of myself at that age, so sure of my passions. I would tell them these lofty, grandiose ideas of how I'd be married by 20 and be popping out kids left and right and my wife would be this mega-hottie and wouldn't have to work because I'd be rakin' in the paper. My proclamations were always met with a little bit of laughter. Not like they were making fun of me, but more like I was in for an apocalyptic wake-up call.

Well, fast-forward a few years. I'm still this hopeless, helpless, on-his-knees romantic, still searching for my Juliet. High school. That was fun, at least that's what you're supposed to say, though I think that only applies to uberpopular kids. High school was spent writing poems and working on books and attempting sophistication, all while managing to be ever so efficient at getting rejected. But it didn't matter, I still believed in love. I still believe in love.

I was on a trip through Europe with a group of kids the summer of my junior year. We visited so many romantic landscapes. One location stuck out, a garden, I believe. It was beautiful. As we were walking through it with the group, I made some comment. It must have been a romantic one, because it was followed by a girl saying that I was so into love, like, maybe too into it. My reply was simple: I love LOVE. (Read that 10 times fast!) I love the idea of love, what it means, what it can be. I don't think that has ever left me, that fascination, that obsession, that need to feel it, experience it, and give it back.

When I write, I find that so much of my stories revolve around this insanely powerful thing called LOVE. It's more than an emotion; it's the driving force of humanity, of the cosmos. It's like we're privy to this spiritual enlightenment and all we have to do is accept it. Love finds its way into my stories in one way or another. Sometimes it's tragic, sometimes it's beautiful, most of the time it's complicated. Like, Facebook complicated. But it's one of those things that just never gets old, a concept that will still feel brand new to me even after I've written about it a hundred and one times. It leaves me in awe. My Arson books hint at it. My short stories (Baby Blue, Vanilla Red, The Man in the Colored Room, Music Box hint at it), but my newest work, Winter Sparrow, really attacks this concept full throttle. It's about true love. It's about the forever kind of love, and I'll admit, that's becoming less and less popular nowadays. So it's up to hopeless romantics like me to remind you classy peeps of it. To remind you to look back to that moment when you were a part of something magical or wonderfully tragic or to look forward to a time when love will once more come your way. It's a beautiful mystery I'll never fully understand or ever fully be good at. But a guy can try.

Go kiss somebody!

For more information about Estevan and his books, you can visit his website, EstevanVega.com.