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[Vampire Month] Victoria L. Szulc interview

18 Sunday Mar 2018

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Victoria L. SzulcSo, as we move into the third week of March, we get to our third Vampire month victim. This week we have Victoria L. Szulc, author of The First Ten Bites. After her interview today, she will tell us all about her hints and tips for how to live forever…

  • What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

 

I remember telling a lot of stories, when I was about five or six years old, about a girl (who later became a princess) and her animals to my best neighborhood friends. I had a pretty wild imagination. I starting cartooning them, all over my school folders, scraps of paper, and whatever else I could find.

  • When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

 

In my twenties, I started writing professionally as part of advertising, marketing, and creative jobs. I was already an artist and writing became another tool in my arsenal of creativity. By the time I reached forty, I realized I had a lot of stories to share that weren’t covered in my visual art.

  • What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

 

The greatest strength, without a doubt is imagination. I have some crazy storylines and plot twists that I just rejoice over. I love hearing readers’ reactions to them. Weakness? I swear I have ADD creativity. Sometimes I’m working on a project and the wrong muse comes calling, like the need to draw, or other stories in the planning stages. I almost hate when I’ve got a storyline ready for a character and realize that it belongs in a totally different story.

  • Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

 

I’m from St. Louis, Missouri, USA which is almost dead center of the U.S. I write a lot of Steampunk as well, and during the Victorian/American Guilded Age, St. Louis was the third largest city in the country. Fortunately, unlike a lot of American cities, many of those historic homes, parks, and areas remain here. I’m definitely inspired by the architecture and my hometown history.

  • Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

 

I’d have to say, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis. I started reading the series when I about ten years old. I was captivated by these children and their adventures. Oh and Turkish Delight. I always wondered what the heck it was and wanted to try it.

  • What drove you to write about Vampires?

 

I was working for a Halloween/costume shop part-time to make extra money. Steampunk was just beginning to take hold as a genre and I used to chat with one of my coworkers about characters I was developing. I thought about bringing in a vampire. An undead who, despite living a long time, was struggling with human realities. “What do you do when you have forever on your hands?” William, the vampire, eventually became his own series of short stories.

  • What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

 

I think the idea of living forever, having great strength, and power is very appealing. Sometimes in a negative light. So much so that people that “suck away” anything from you, emotionally, physically, are called “vampires” in modern slang.

On a positive side, it’s very erotic. The idea of being with a lover for eternity. There’s a ton of psychological sexual nuances. Being “punctured”, feeding off someone, the ability to change forms to please and attract someone else. That’s a lot of fodder for fantasy and stories!

  • In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

 

Good question and hard to answer. I know that Blade is more of a comic than literary character, but he is bad ass. Then again, you have Dracula, the oldest and the one who started it all.

  • What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

 

I’m going to separate male and female if that’s okay? Lestat (Ann Rice) has just been incredible. Fragile but classically handsome. I think it’s his human qualities that make him sexy. And again, not from literature, but Selene from the Underworld series is incredibly beautiful and deadly. Strong and smart is very sexy to me.

  • How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

 

I have vampire who is a trained assassin in the undead world, Anna. She knows vampire history and is fully educated on living in the modern world. She has a reputation, but is brilliant at disguising herself. She could be a housewife, a CEO, or a club kid. I think she could be the last man (woman) standing.

  • Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel.

 

“I Died Here”, v.11 from my “Vampire’s Little Black Book” short series is about William, my main character, and how he finally handles an old enemy, Stephen. But in this conflict, he is both in love with a human woman, Caroline, and Anna, a vampire assassin he’d sired long ago. Everyone is caught in the crossfire, as Stephen is bent on revenge in any form he can get against Will. Will is torn between his new love and Anna, who has since moved on to a human lover of her own. There’s underlying themes of death, resurrection, and how we handle or don’t come to terms with life events. The first ten shorts of this series were about Will’s naughty and turbulent past and how he’s tried to change. These were compiled into “The First Ten Bites”. Without giving too much away, the next ten stories continue to explore that past but focus on Will’s rediscovered anger after losing so much. I haven’t set the release date, but it should be before the end of March. It’s been fun to write about Will again. It’s been almost three years since I’ve had a chance to put out new vampire material.

Social Media Links:

Blog: https://mysteampunkproject.wordpress.com

Amazon author page: www.amazon.com/author/victorial.szulc

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MySteampunkProject

Twitter: https://mobile.twitter.com/thecountesssp

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/steampunkcountess/

Tumblr: https://thesteampunkcountess.tumblr.com

Etsy Store: http://www.etsy.com/shop/TheHauteHen

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC98VXA1LQVGE-_rqLV6XLdQ?view_as=subscriber

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[Vampire Month] Richard Writhen interview

13 Tuesday Mar 2018

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Richard Writhen selfieOur second Vampire month victim is Richard Writhen, the author of three novellas on Amazon KDP: A Kicked Cur, A Host of Ills and The Hiss Of The Blade. His fourth novella, Angel of the Grave, is currently being written.  Richard comes to us all the way from New England and will be talking to us about his world building in his blog post later this week.

1)     What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

I had read a lot of early Stephen King and Clive Barker, Falling Angel by William Hjortsberg, The Lord of the Rings, as well as Neil Gaiman’s Sandman, in the late eighties and when I was about twelve I tried writing a few cute little stories and comics which are thankfully lost in the abysses of time or whatever. I also had two letters published in the Gladstone / EC Comics reprints of the early nineties.

 

2)      When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

In truly characteristic fashion, I had always toyed with the idea yet procrastinated, but a confluence of events made me become serious after I turned thirty-six. I had been working as a copy-editor for about four years, I was reading the King James Version of the Bible, and I came across an ad looking for blog contributions. And I was like, sure let’s give it a go. A couple months later I felt that I wanted to segue into fiction, so I pitched the idea of a serial to the website’s owner and he was interested. The work later became my first novella and I’ve been serious about writing ever since.

 

3)      What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

My greatest strength as of now is the internal continuity. I have some pretty detailed notes, though as I get older it may become harder to keep it straight; however, they have specific assistants and editors for that nowadays if I ever find success. My greatest weakness is world building / exposition, but that’s the thorn in the side of every writer, really. It can only be overcome through constant practice, as far as I know; writing more books. It’s very difficult to avoid the info dumps and have unobtrusive exposition, one of the most difficult writing skills. The greatest authors make it either fun somehow or almost invisible, seamless; simply part of the prose that the reader almost sub-consciously absorbs.

 

4)      Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

I am from Newport, RI, USA. I also lived in NYC for several years. Everywhere I go influences how I depict fictional locations, be it Providence, RI, Long Island, NY, even places where I spent a lot of time in my youth such as Seekonk, MA affect my sense of place and I try to convey that in my fantasy settings. Street names, names on historical buildings … as a matter of fact, I got many names for the first two books in the Celestial Ways Saga from local gravestones, I would just change a few letters.

 

5)      Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

My greatest? The Case of Charles Dexter Ward. H.P. Lovecraft’s masterpiece, unpublished in his lifetime and left to turn yellow in a drawer somewhere. His depiction of magic is exactly what I’m trying to convey. Its sense of history and antiquity and the manner in which it gives the city of Providence, RI its own personality. That’s another one of my goals with the novellas, to assign a real sense of place to the dark fantasy settings.

 

6)      What drove you to write about Vampires?

I’ve always been a fan of vampire lore. I was quite taken with the Interview with the Vampire Movie, I saw it when I was in college. My first love was Lost Boys, though. I wanted to see it original run but I was still well underage, so when I finally caught it a few years later on HBO or whatever, I was floored. I also like Underworld saga, Let The Right One In, Twilight Saga, Vampire Academy Series, Blade Trilogy and more.

 

7)      What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

My theory for the past several years has been that the werewolf legends represent man’s struggle with his own animality, and the vampire legends represent mankind’s self-victimization, i.e. man victimizing his fellow man. A lot of what is successful as art and / or entertainment has subconscious roots in age-old social and psychological rhetorical or unanswered questions about the human condition. That’s why it’s never-ending …

 

8)      In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

Well, Lestat and Dracula are two of the most powerful vampires of fiction. I’d be hard pressed to figure out which one of them is stronger. David from Lost Boys is pretty awesome; Eli from Let the Right One In as well. A lot of the vampires from Blade trilogy are also very epic.

 

9)      What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

Sexiness? Fashion sense? Prolly Vampirella for both. After her, maybe the trio of female vampires in Francis Ford Coppolla’s Dracula. And of course, I must mention Lina Romay in Female Vampire by Jess Franco, may she rest in peace.

 

10)   How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

My vampire angle is as yet undeveloped. There’s a nation of vampires, Drackhon, that has fought wars in the past with the denizens of Khlarion, on the continent of Holrud. The vampires’ society and all of that will be revealed further in books to come. So my strongest vampire as of now is probably Debarah, one of the protagonists of A Kicked Cur. He has grotesque physical strength, almost like Edward Cullen from Twilight Saga, so I think he would certainly survive a fight with the likes of Dracula and Lestat, but overcoming them …? IDK about all that.

 

11)   Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel.

My latest work is my third novella. It’s called The Hiss of the Blade, and it’s a bleak treatise on the manner in which those in my gothdark world called Cedron first live and then die by the sword. Mercenaries, fled slaves, agriculture and mining magnates, every man is out for himself and much like our real world, the center can’t hold and people wind up dying … or worse.

[Vampire Month] Alicia Wright interview.

05 Monday Mar 2018

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Alicia Wright Vampire authorSo, the first victim of the Vampire interrogator in 2018 (by dint of the fact she got her responses back to me within 48 hours of getting the invite) is Alicia Wright, author of the Vampires Don’t Belong in Fairytales series.

Later this week, she will talk about some of her research into fairy tales – the Fairytale kisses that never happened – but first she has to endure the torture of the infamous interview questions…

1)      What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

My earliest memory about writing is writing a story in primary school. I wrote 2 sides of A4 about myself having an adventure with my many, many imaginary friends.

2)      When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

I’d always wanted to be an author, ever since I was about 8 years old. I had it in my head that one day I would write a book and try to get it published. I finally sat down to do that when I was 19, and it was because I’d just quit after my first semester at university. I just wasn’t ready for university at the time. So I thought ‘What now?’ and it seemed like the right time to get on with it.  I didn’t finish a manuscript until November 2007, when I was taking a forced gap year from my second time at university and I discovered NaNoWriMo.

3)      What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

I had great trouble with my manuscripts until that first full manuscript in 2007, when I tried writing comic fantasy for the first time.  Until then, whenever I read back my manuscripts, they just weren’t good enough, they didn’t sparkle, there was something missing. Humour was that missing element that let me find my writing niche. Comedy has always been my thing, the majority of the things I read and watch have always been comedy-based.

My weakness is action scenes. I always seem to hurry over them and they’re too short. I cope by re-reading them and seeing what I can do to improve them, and my beta readers tend to point out to me if my action scenes are too short.
4)      Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

I live in Newton-le-Willows now (10 years after starting a book about a girl who moves to Newton-le-Willows…) but I grew up in Lowton.  Most of my inspiration comes from my travels over the years. I’ve been to Iceland, Japan, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Greece and Poland, usually for study or volunteer work, and other countries and cultures always leave an impression on me, as do the people I’ve met there. You meet the most extraordinary people abroad, and that certainly shows in my writing, such as my quarter-Japanese Icelandic snow woman. I never actually base characters on anyone I know as that would make them awkward to write for me, but I might use a tiny piece of their background as inspiration. I also like to take photos of scenery so I can use them as inspiration for descriptions and comic backgrounds.

5)      Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

Patricia C Wrede Enchanted ForestThere is no single book, but my earliest influence was Patricia C. Wrede’s The Enchanted Forest Chronicles. I picked up Dragonsbane when I was 11 and it was this book that taught me a woman could be a king. It was this book that pointed out to me how silly fairy tales are and how much fun it is to poke fun at them. A few years later, I discovered the Discworld series and from when I was 14 until there were no more Discworld novels I always got the new one for my birthday. I think anyone who reads my work can tell it has also been a big influence on my writing.

 

6)      What drove you to write about Vampires?

I do believe, and this is going to sound weird, that I write vampire fiction because I don’t like most of it. I love vampires as a subject, but even though I am happy to read about other people’s interpretations and I always find them interesting, I’m incredibly picky about what I find satisfying.  If they are just monsters or if they are too brooding or dark I find it hard to get too invested, but if they’re too silly – I know that’s rich coming from me – I find that too far the other way. Not that I object, I am always very clear that everyone is entitled to their own vision of folklore and that if we all write using the same template then stories will stagnate.
I did not intend for Miss Prince to be about vampires as such. Johann was meant to be a minor character and then he – and his entire family – went on to hijack not only that story but the entire series! Part of what took me in that direction was actually that Twilight was at the height of its popularity and much as I am not a fan, as I said above, Stephanie Meyer has and had every right to write vampires however she wanted. I saw it as a sort of parallel of the boxes we all try to put ourselves and each other in, how society wants those in a box to act a certain way, and woe betide you if you don’t. I don’t think that’s right, in fiction or real life. No-one belongs in a box.

7)      What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

I think it’s because they are such a human sort of monster. There are so many directions you can take that. Are they a gleeful predator, who views humans as talking sheep? Are they the reluctant monster, consumed by their sins? Bit of both?  Something else entirely, a cloud cuckoolander, a grim overlord? A soulless, shuffling corpse doesn’t make for great character development, but that has its merits too.

And then there’s the blood thing. We’re pretty fascinated by blood and unlike getting your brain eaten, you can survive losing some blood. You can also link it to sex if you want to. And people do. Because if you CAN link something to sex people will. So there’s all sorts of other avenues to explore than ‘is the scary thing going to kill me’. Again, I think it’s to do with the sheer variety of directions you can go.

8)      In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

I have to say, it’s got to be Dracula, hasn’t it? Of all the classical literature vampires, he has the most powers and he’s the most iconic and he’s been the template for vampires since 1897.

9)      What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

Best Vampire in General AND Best Alternate Form awards must go to Carmilla. She gets up at noon, drinks hot chocolate, sleeps with anti-vampire charms under her pillow and her animal form is a panther. Come on, people. Vampires don't belong in Fairyland Alicia L. Wright

10)   How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

Oh dear, that’s quite a complicated question. Many of my vampires and my other characters would struggle with Dracula, but anyone with strong magical skills like Contessa or Tyrian could just turn him into a squirrel or something. My ONE vampire hunter would manage if he had a decent plan and back up.
Carmilla isn’t as much of a threat, and she would inspire pity and an offer of aid rather than aggression. She’d be up to her ears in vampire medicine, psychological help and possibly even a donor or two, although she’d have to be put under house arrest for her crimes.

11)   Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel.

The latest one is Vampires Don’t Belong in Fairyland. It’s about Fairyland collapsing into civil war, which I promise is funnier than it sounds. Fairyland is split into three Realms, with three countries, all with their own set of royals, but they all consider themselves one country and family. But you know what families are like. Kids squabble over the silliest things, usually toys, only with royals the toy they’re fighting over is the entire country and the resulting tantrum and girly slap fight is replaced by everyone hiring assassins.
So out of all the Fairyland royals we have only two left standing – Queen Regent Lir and King Tyrian. Tyrian has a problem other than his cousin is trying to nick his crown and possibly kill him, and that is the fact that he’s a king. In fairytales, whenever kings try to do anything remotely adventurous they tend to die, so there’s no chance he can save the country by himself. He’s going to need help, and the traditional thing to do is to find a prince to do the adventuring for you. We might just have one knocking about…

Bio:

Alicia L. Wright is a YA comic fantasy author from Lancashire in the North West of England.

She studied both art and graphic design in high school and college, where she was told to stop drawing dragons and fairies. She didn’t listen. She also went to university, which seemed like a good idea at the time.

She writes books about fairies, vampires and other nerd things, playing with tropes and drawing a webcomic – poorly.

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[Vampire Month] Rose Jones interview

22 Tuesday Mar 2016

Posted by in Musings, Vampire Month

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Our next victim is Rose Jones, author of the Shades series among other things. Rose is currently the fourth and therefore last victim our vampiric interviewer has lined up this year, though there were rumblings of a fifth person who had caught our attention… whether our interviewer manages to catch that person before the end of the month remains to be seen… if not we can leave them hanging in the pantry for next year.

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  • What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

 

I still have notebooks from my Primary School days where I wrote stories about time travel at about age seven. My first published piece was a poem in a school magazine when I was eleven, about rainbows and thunderstorms.

  • When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

 

I’ve spent too much time keeping my writing to myself. I think at some point to have to publish somewhere, just to stop tweaking and re-tweaking a project. Like a painter, if you spend too much time messing with the composition you can ruin it. Besides, I like to share. Story telling is all about sharing isn’t it? Making some money out of it would be nice too, but that’s not why I write.

  • What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

 

As a teenager around 13, I wrote two scripts for my then favourite TV show (Randall & Hopkirk Deceased) – I thought I could do as well, if not better than one particular scriptwriter on the show. I think that ever since then my main strength has been in dialogue. I hate writing long exposition and tedious descriptions and I prefer not to dump long words that make you reach for the dictionary! I like to keep things simple and put in just enough to let the reader form their own world from my words.

I think my greatest weakness is dwelling on criticisms and procrastinating too much. Writing is a very personal thing; well it is for me; but I have learned to harden myself to at least constructive criticism. We need to understand how others see our work and it’s an important part of the writer’s journey. We can’t grow unless we learn and we can’t learn unless we can accept criticism. Procrastination is something I’m still working on!

  • Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

 

I live in a small town between Bristol and Bath in the UK. I haven’t really used my home environment as inspiration, but I have used past experiences and places where I have been on holiday. Sometimes I pick a location just because I want to get some spatial awareness of it for a project – such as Prague for my current project, White Thorn. I’m looking forward to seeing if it got it right in Savannah, for my Shades plotline. As a geographer and a historian I think it’s important to maintain spatial continuity and research your material well enough to avoid the major faux pas. Quite often I find that researching a place or a time gives me ideas to advance the story I’m working on. It’s one of the good reasons to side track and procrastinate!

  • Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

 

51cc7ly30ol-_sx331_bo1204203200_Difficult question as there isn’t just one. As a child I absorbed the Greek myths and Arabian Nights and the various fairy stories. I also loved the Trigan Empire strips, which probably spurred on my interest in Science Fiction – along with Thunderbirds and Star Trek. My favourite book is probably Paul Gallico’s The Snow Goose and my favourite Science Fiction book is HG Wells’ The Invisible Man. When I write SF, it tends not to be hard science, but soft, psychological issues. I like using mythology and SF to play with ideas that plague us in the modern world. It gives you a different perspective.

  • What drove you to write about Vampires?

 

I’ve always been interested in mythology and the supernatural and I went through a phase in my youth where I read everything I could about ghosts and spirits. Liminal spaces and metaphysics fascinate me. Playing with ideas in fiction is a way to try and get a handle on these slippery issues.

As for vampires, I woke up one morning with a cracker of an idea involving a character who might be seen as one. I wrote it down real quick as the detail of dreams tend to vanish like a will o’the wisp and it’s still in my box of futures. It’ll be a cracker when I finally get round to it, but it still needs a lot more work.

I was never really interested in vampires in fiction though until the short-lived TV series Moonlight. I enjoyed the different take on the genre as I was never into horror and gratuitous bloodletting. This is still the case. In my opinion, there always has to be a reason for someone to behave the way they do. When the show was cancelled, I decided to try my hand at writing in the genre with a similar sympathetic vein (!) and in the process of research, got stuck in to all the vampire fiction out there to see where mine might fit and to try and provide something different. I read the good, the bad and the atrocious, the classical and the modern, but in the absence of much ‘factual’ evidence, I found out how writers had manipulated the mythology for their own purposes. I have now followed suit and done the same myself.

  • What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

 

It’s the lure of immortality and how we might cope with it. It’s how we deal with otherness and the scope of time. In some areas, like the JR Ward Black Dagger Brotherhood, and its knock offs, it’s definitely the sex. For me it’s how you cope with desire and how you learn to fit in with a world that is different from you. The genre appeals to young adults because for teenagers, it’s a time of change in their lives, of feeling alienated, of having feelings and emotions they might have difficulty controlling or expressing. They also feel as if they’re immortal.

I personally like the vampire novels that have a historical flashback element. You can see the past through their eyes, as well as their present. A previous favourite show/film was Highlander, which did this really well. The immortals in that are similar to vampires, but they’re not bloodsuckers. Another current favourite is the Outlander series (books and TV – no vampires, but the person out of time trope and the history hopping is similar)

  • In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

 

In the literary realm, I still don’t think you can beat Dracula, but Marcus in Ann Rice’s books, rates up there, as does Yarbro’s Count St Germain. I also like Matthew in Deborah Harkness’s All Souls trilogy, Henry in Blood Ties and the Charlaine Harris books (but not the TV series). TV it has to be Mick St John and Eric Northman (So sue me, I made an exception to the True Blood, but then he was my favourite in the books too).

  • What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

 

Are we talking vampires or me here? As Mick St John said in Moonlight ‘perpetual coolness is the vampires’ curse’. I just dress for comfort, but try to be quirky where I can. Sexiness – that’s none of your business! As for sexy vampires, it’s Mick and Eric for me.

  • How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

 

They’d definitely kick ass whoever they were up against. After all, some of them have managed to survive for thousands of years. My male protagonist is a newbie, but he’s learning and being taught by the best. He has a conscience, but that’s not going to stop him surviving and protecting the people he loves.

  • Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel. 51linlhvlal-_sx258_bo1204203200_

 

White Thorn is the third novel in the Shades series, the first two being Shades and House of Lilith. The first two books interweave the story of the main protagonist and his associates with the story of the characters they play on the TV show they are making. This means that you get two completely different novels between one set of covers, linked by the actors. This gave me an opportunity to write two different versions of the vampire genre. Flashbacks with a difference! In the third book, my protagonist is still acting, but the Shades TV series is over, so the storyline is concentrated just on the problems he has to face in real life. I am hoping to eventually write the story of the film he is making, but it will be a standalone Noir novella.

At the beginning of this third novel, my protagonist, Alex Keating, is still coming to terms with the fallout from events in House of Lilith, as well as with his new life as a vampire. The story picks up from the end of the last book which ended with him and his ancient vampire wife, Lilith going to visit the others of her kind. He then comes back to a new filming project and has to get back to pretending he’s a normal human. He and his assistant, Annabel, go off to Prague to film a cold war drama.

Alex hopes that his life will settle down after the excitement of his first year as a vampire, but it seems trouble can be found in Eastern Europe, not least from his mortal co star, who seems determined to get him in her bed. The filming does not run smoothly and he is running out of blood supplies, due to delays on the production and a rogue vampire who seems to have an agenda of his own. This results in Alex being staked by a vampire-killing priest and rescued by another of his kind who is known for writing historical fiction. Together they hunt for a vampire serial killer who is murdering women in the city. Alex finds that real life seems determined to overshadow his acting yet again. The denouement of the story happens with a fight to the death on a rain soaked night on the roof of St Vitus Cathedral. There are flashbacks in this novel, but this time they give the reader the back story of the serial killer.

 

Bio:

Rose has been putting pen to paper and fingers to keyboard all her adult life. She lives near Bath, UK with her ‘rocket scientist’ husband and a house full of books and quirky stuff. She considers herself to be a recorder of moments in time and is a keen photographer as well as a writer. The picture for the covers of her books were taken by her. She has a Masters in Cultural Astronomy and Astrology and a love of all things mythological, paranormal, really ancient and really futuristic. She loves to travel, both in body and mind. She doesn’t really mind where, so long as it’s interesting and there’s something to learn.

Listen to two of Rose’s short stories as performed by actors from Word in Your Ear  in Bath at these links:

http://www.awordinyourear.org.uk/storyfridayarchive/story-fridays-harvest/

http://www.awordinyourear.org.uk/storyfridayarchive/black-sheep-2/

 

[Vampire Month] Martin Tracey interview

15 Tuesday Mar 2016

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The third victim for Vampire month this year is Martin Tracey, author of Beneath the Floodlights, a book combining Vampires with Football (that’s Soccer for our American readers). Here he answers the questions and Wednesday he entertains us with a blog post.

1) What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

As a young schoolboy I won 2 back to back national story writing competitions, one was about the dangers of playing on building sites and the other was keeping safe when crossing the road. The latter saw me creating a magic ice cream van which appeared like a superhero offering safety advice, so from an early age I was destined to write about supernatural elements.103_0397
2) When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

My debut novel Beneath the Floodlights was released in 2011 and it was vampire themed. Building on my answer to question 1, my writing creativity evolved into song writing and becoming a pop star was more on my agenda than becoming an author. I had some musical success via supporting the Fine Young Cannibals & securing my song Raging Bull on the album Old Gold Anthems – The Songs of Wolves, but then as ‘stardom’ seemed to be passing me by as I reached the ripe old age of 30 plus, I remembered the story writing success of my younger years and that famous cliché ‘everyone has a book inside them’. However, I haven’t stopped at one book because I simply love the novel writing process.

3) What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

My greatest strengths are: working within a framework rather than a rigid plan which enables me to explore many twists and turns and subplots in order to keep the reader engaged; writing in a style that comes over as honest and therefore believable even when writing about the paranormal – I have a knack of telling great stories as opposed to being a literary genius like the ‘classic’ writers of yesteryear. My weakness is definitely trying to devote enough time to my craft. Other writers are far more prolific with their output than I am, and I find juggling life with writing extremely challenging. I am trying to discipline myself to find more time.

41grui6y21l-_sx311_bo1204203200_4) Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

I live in Birmingham and Birmingham and the surrounding areas feature heavily in my books. In Beneath the Floodlights I use Sutton Park as the training base for the footballers and I have the world’s first vampire buried there. Sutton Park is centuries old and soaked in history. It is amazing to think that this piece of unspoilt land is in Birmingham, but such historical points to note are King Henry VIII using the land to hunt deer and a Roman road still exists within the park. Both references are utilised in Beneath the Floodlights.

5) Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

That’s a tough one. Not the book itself but more the concept around the book and its character has inspired me which is Dracula by Bram Stoker. Sorry to be a bit obvious there but if writing about vampires its influence can’t be ignored, much like the influence of The Beatles can’t be ignored in the music world. A vampire book that I also found inspiring is The Travelling Vampire Show by Richard Laymon. In terms of inspiring authors, I like Peter James as he manages to weave supernatural elements into very believable and entertaining stories, Martina Cole for her straight-talking style and Dan Brown for leading the way for mixing fact with fiction. All of these authors can be seen as inspiring my work.
6) What drove you to write about Vampires?

Since an early age I’ve always been fascinated by werewolves, ghosts and of course vampires. My original idea for Beneath the Floodlights was to use werewolves but then I felt that vampires had more scope with the plot and the two films of The Lost Boys and From Dusk till Dawn were a huge inspiration

7) What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

That’s a great question and perhaps a very subjective debate could be had. However, for 000_0003 (2)me I think it opens up temptation in the mind. ‘Lust’ and even ‘Love’ seem to always be connected to the ‘sexy’ vampires and the reader falls into that world of, ‘well I shouldn’t but I probably would!’ There is a magnetic quality about vampires -they have the X Factor.

8) In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

Count Dracula. Bram Stoker’s creation set it all in motion so respect is due.

9) What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

I think Anne Rice created something a bit different with her vampires so her vampires win in that department for me. After all Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt played her vampires in Interview with The Vampire. Le Stat is a cool creation. Enough said!

10) How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

Professor Cezar Prodanescu would give the Count a run for his money. Cezar is from the bloodline of original master vampires. He is wise, cruel, manipulative, magnetic and good at what he does – killing for blood and recruiting for his vampire nest.

11) Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel.

I’m giving vampires a rest for now. The project I’m currently working on is a haunted house novel. A failing rock star buys a haunted house in the Peak District. Mind you I may yet weave a vampire into the mix!

Biography:

Martin Tracey is an author who likes to push the boundaries of reality. Weaving fact with fiction he likes to explore elements of the supernatural but aims to keep his novels relatable, ensuring that he is able to connect with the reader in a gripping fashion. Martin has had several interviews to showcase his work on BBC radio and attended several book signing events. A short story, Divine Inspiration was published in Words magazine. Martin’s first novel Beneath The Floodlights remarkably brought together the worlds of vampires and soccer. Martin Tracey lives in Birmingham and is married with 2 daughters.

Website:

www.martintracey.co.uk

Blog:

https://martintracey.wordpress.com/

twitter:

https://twitter.com/martintracey1

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/Martin-Tracey-Author-162311767171904/

Amazon page:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Martin-Tracey/e/B009ANTBWG/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1456595773&sr=1-1

Beneath the Floodlights on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/BENEATH-THE-FLOODLIGHTS-MARTIN-TRACEY-ebook/dp/B005FQK84M/ref=pd_sim_sbs_351_1?ie=UTF8&dpID=413Swz0eCuL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR100%2C160_&refRID=03AJDW4AZYEPXYMXEEHR

 

 

[Vampire Month] Ambrose Hall Interview

08 Tuesday Mar 2016

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Our second victim in the Vampire Month interrogation chair is Ambrose Hall… find out more about their life in the questions that follow…

  • What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

 

I did a lot of writing and drawing as a kid. I think most of my writing was fantastical orBFD Wool Exchange magical in some way. I remember being obsessed with witches, as well as Narnia and Robin Hood. I think I was a bit of a goth, even then. I had a secret magic club in my mum’s garden shed, which I shared with my friend. I wrote a lot of poems as a kid, and in my teens, but I’ve lost my bottle for it as an adult.

  • When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

 

I studied English and media with the intention of writing professionally, in journalism or political communication, but graduated during a recession, so I ended up teaching instead. By my mid-thirties, I’d done a lot of jobs that I hadn’t really found very rewarding. I wanted to do something that was creatively and intellectually stimulating. Then I had a family crisis, which caused me to take stock of a lot of things. As I needed to take a break from working anyway, I had a chance to reassess what I wanted to do with my life, and I started putting a lot of time into my writing. It’s still early days. Hopefully this will work out, as I feel like I’ve finally found something I love.

  • What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

 

I’m good at coming up with ideas, and I can be very focused when I want to be. In the past, I was a terrible perfectionist, and found it very difficult to get useful critical distance from my work. I joined an online writing community, which has helped me a lot with learning to revise and edit my work, and getting that critical perspective I need.

  • Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

 

I live in Letchworth Garden City in Hertfordshire at the moment. I’ve not really lived here very long, so I don’t think it’s had a chance to get under my skin yet. I originally come from Bradford, in West Yorkshire. Being surrounded by post-industrial decay, and the remains of a Victorian boom, has definitely influenced my gothic tendencies. I’m fairly obsessed with the idea of decay, and write dystopian fiction, as well as gothic. I worked on a dystopian noir novel last year, set in Bradford. I’m just trying to shop it round agents at the moment. I’d say the Yorkshire countryside has influenced me as well: the ruggedness of it, and of course, people going mad on moors, Wuthering Heights style.

Love is the Cure is set in London. I’ve got a bit of a love/hate relationship with the city, as a northerner, but I’ve spent a fair amount of time there over the years. It’s a place of extremes, which suited this story.

  • Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

 

loveiscrowtreeI’ve taken influences from a lot of places. I’m a pretty avid reader. My biggest influences are probably Chandler, Camus and Conrad. Heart of Darkness is definitely an important one for me. I love empty spaces, howling holes and rotten hearts in stories, and characters that are strangers to their emotions.

  • What drove you to write about Vampires?

 

I played a lot of vampire roleplay games in my late teens and early twenties, so the genre is one I’ve always been interested in, but I avoided writing vampires for a long time, for fear of churning out something derivative. Then a friend in my writing group suggested a Halloween vampire challenge, so I thought I’d give it a go. It was great fun seeing all the very different takes on vampires. I started out with a short story, but it kept growing. Soon enough I had a six part novella, told from different points of view. I got really into the challenge of portraying the very different voices, with their different historical influences and personalities.

  • What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

 

I suppose, as gothic monsters, they represent our fears and desires, and those can come out in different ways, depending on the writer. The idea of human monsters is a fascinating one—vampires allow us to explore a lot of different facets of humanity and morality. They tend to be larger than life characters, so you can amp everything up to an almost mythic level of intensity. Immortality is both attractive and tragic, and something that people have written stories about as long as people have written stories. One huge advantage of these potentially very old characters is it gives writers an excuse to plunder history for goodies.

  • In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

 

I have a feeling it would be Dracula. He’s the original badass, and he’s so steeped in violence. He’s also completely ruthless.

  • What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

 

Anne Rice’s Lestat. He’s a pretty irresistible bad boy.

LestatandLouis-1

Ann Rice’s Bad Boy, Lestat De Lioncourt

 

  • How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

 

I have two very ancient vampires in Love is the Cure, and they’re both powerful. Bren, who is first introduced as the Crow King, reads others’ minds like they’re open books. He’s amoral, and takes whatever he wants from people without much thought. He embodies death and decay, and patriarchal arrogance. His one time lover, Ena, is very different. She’s the spirit of fire and anarchy. She’s more moral than Bren, but she’s trapped in a cycle of vengeance. I think either of them would give Dracula a run for his money, if they stopped fighting each other.

Only one of my vampires, Sebastian, is concerned with appearance, but he’s also a little stuck in the 1920s. His mortal days represent a golden time for him. Based on reader feedback so far, he seems to be most popular character. I had a lot of fun writing him. He’s a bit of a fop, extremely arrogant, and with a taste for re-enacting Hellenic myths.

  • Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel.

 

Love is the Cure is a six part novella, told from different points of view. Although the different fragments fit together to tell a story, it’s unified more by common themes. I explore how the very different vampires cope, or don’t cope, with immortality, as well as ideas about power and consent. At the heart of the story is Kerrick, a vampire created in the late Victorian period. He had a particularly violent creation, and still bears the emotional scars from that. He’s desperately lonely, but his own violent nature always acts as a barrier to finding companionship. In trying to keep his newly created child alive, he stumbles into an ancient feud between Bren and Ena.

There were a few things I wanted to do with the story. I wanted to explore the idea of these creatures all being monsters of one kind or another, however human they were, or appeared to be. I was interested in the idea of them being locked in cycles of behaviour, determined by their creation. I wanted to be conscious of the way their power is exorcised, as a few people had said to me that one of the things which made them uncomfortable about some vampire fiction is that vampiric powers are used as a way to override or dismiss the need for consent. So I decided to try and confront that idea head-on. One of the main bones of contention between Bren and Ena is that he takes without asking.

It’s not all serious. I’ve played around with ancient mythology, and history, in some pretty cheeky ways. Although it’s not paranormal romance, it’s very homoerotic. Most of the characters are unambiguously gay or bisexual, which I guess is my antidote to the lack of pay-off during my teenage years reading Anne Rice. It’s definitely larger than life. I wanted to show extremes, from petty criminals and rent boys, to baroque splendour and depraved aristocracy. One of my early readers said the story made them think of Caravaggio. I guess that’s a win.

Biography

Ambrose Hall is a speculative and literary fiction writer who currently lives in the South East of England. He originally comes from Bradford, in West Yorkshire, where he fell in love with gothic decay and wild moors. Ambrose has had flash fiction published in Crannog and A cappella Zoo magazines, and recently published a gothic vampire novella, Love is the Cure, available on Amazon. You can find out more about his work, and read some free short stories here: https://mrvolpone.wordpress.com/

This is the link to my book on Amazon UK: Buy Love is the Cure on Amazon

[Vampire Month] Here we go again…

01 Tuesday Mar 2016

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Another year, another Vampire month. This feature is like the mythical creature it is named after, difficult to keep down. It certainly seems one of my more popular features with several articles from past years cropping up in my views stats on a regular basis. So, until such time as I run out of author/artist/academic victims to mercilessly interrogate in my spikey Vampire Month Questioning Chair, we won’t be putting a stake into this feature or serving the garlic sauce. Especially not after the wonderful R.A Smith (who I finally allowed to feature in last year’s event) said he was jealous of it…Vampire

Also, I am still waiting patiently for Ann Rice or Rachel Caine to get in touch…

For those new to this feature, Vampire month is where we dedicate the whole of March to all things Vampire. The usual format is to give over a week each to four people with an interest in Vampires and in that week two posts are produced. One is an interview so you can learn all about them, the second is a guest post on the topic of their choice. You can browse the previous years to see what has been posted before (just type Vampire Month in the little search box above) and prepare yourself for a month of interesting posts and interviews.

As ever it is never really possible to predict the response to the call for posts I put out. Sometimes I despair of filling all the slots (though managed it somehow every year so far) whereas others I end up with more than I need. This year seems to be the latter as there are (at the last count) five authors on our line up… so there may have to be some wrangling of the normal schedule to fit them all in… Stay tuned to find out who they are and what they have to offer us.

[Vampire Month] The Vampires of my life by A.J Campbell

26 Thursday Mar 2015

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For her guest post, Alex gives us this quirky little play… Spot the not so subtle political metaphor for bonus points…

Scene: A bedroom, at night. Long white curtains billow at a casement window. Three redhaircandles, in a tall wrought-iron stand gutter threateningly in the draft. Our protagonist lies, in a gauzy nightgown, on the high four-poster bed. Suddenly, she awakens to a rapping at the window.  

Protagonist: Who’s there? What is it? [Through the window enters a small, scruffy boy, ghostly pale with small fangs poking over his bottom lip.]

Boy: Muahahaha! I am here to suck your blood!

Protagonist: What? Who the… Oh, it’s you.

Boy: [Strikes a pose] Yes! ‘Tis I. The nightmare of your childhood! The creature who gave you sleepless moonlit hours and began your life-long fascination with the denizens of the night!

Protagonist: You’re The Littlest Vampire, aren’t you? When did you learn a word like “denizens”?

LV: Ah… you remember me!

Protagonist: Yes, I remember you. I remember hiding your book as far away from me as possible in my room so you wouldn’t crawl out of the pages and nibble on me in my sleep. I was still in junior school at the time though.

LV: [Looks pleased with himself] And since then? Do I still terrify you?

Protagonist: Are you kidding me? I used to think that sleeping with a scarf on would stop you being able to get to my neck. You were a good first introduction to the genre, but the only thing making you scary was the fact that I was a bit too young when someone gave me your book to read.

LV: [Subsides, crestfallen] Oh.

Protagonist: Go on. Go home before it gets light.

[The Littlest Vampire exits, and our protagonist settles back down to sleep, but is soon awakened once more by a knocking at the window.]

Protagonist: Littlest Vampire? I thought I told you to go home.

Sultry Voice from Outside: “Littlest” Vampire?

[At the window, David Boreanaz appears, doing his best to smoulder.]

Protagonist: Oh my… What are you doing out there?

DB: I can’t come in unless you invite me.

Protagonist: Oh yes… I remember that little bit. That’s about the first thing that stopped me being quite so terrified of Vamps. The idea that they couldn’t get at me unless I let them in. Problematic idea, really, tallying with notions of victim-blaming and bad things only happening to bad people. But it’s very much a case of a little knowledge being a dangerous thing, only able to be countered with a lot more knowledge. Like the time we did the Black Death in school, and I had nightmares for weeks until Mum told me about Penicillin.

DB: So…

Protagonist: Oh no, you’re not getting an invite. You can stay right there, mister. I remember Angelus. And your Irish accent Sucks.

DB: You’re a… fan then?

Protagonist: Oh, I used to love Buffy. Still do. It’s a cult classic. Makes me feel very old knowing it finished over ten years ago now. It was something of a defining feature of my teenage years – forget Edward or Jacob – the question was always whether you fancied Angel or Spike more.

DB: Which team were you on?

Protagonist: I was a geek. I fancied Xander.

DB: Oh. I should probably go then. See, I had this whole bit worked out about coming in, representing your every teenage fantasy, showing you how sexy vampires can be…

Protagonist: Nah. Sorry. Not tonight. Whilst it might be fun someday to revisit my burgeoning youth, I just want to crack out this article and get to bed.

DB: Another time then?

Protagonist: Perhaps. Shut the window on the way out?

[Boreanaz blows a kiss, and exits. Our protagonist again addresses herself to sleep, when a further knock on the window disturbs her attempt at slumber…]

Protagonist: Again? Really? Who is it this time?

[A tall, immaculately dressed Victorian gentleman appears at the window, incongruous only because of the small, round, black-tinted spectacles he is wearing.]

[Guest Post] What is Horror? by Rebeka HarringtonProtagonist: [Squealing like a completely star-struck fan-girl] Oh My God, it’s Garry Oldman as Dracula… Oh, this is the Francis Ford Coppola version! I remember this! I’d just read Bram Stoker’s book, and thought it was the best thing since sliced bread! My English Teacher at the time had this theory that if Stoker was alive today he would have published the book as an interactive work – just a box full of diaries and notes and newspaper clippings and “phonograph recordings” which would probably be MP3s or something these days. You’d get the entirety of Dracula on a USB stick and have to piece it all together. Wow! And I saw that film, and I was thinking, I don’t remember all those sexy bits in the book, but I was seventeen, so I didn’t care, and… and… and… Keanu Reeves was a perfect Johnathan Harker, because he has all the acting ability of a wet dishrag, and that’s absolutely fine, because Johnathan Harker is a wet dishrag – seriously, who cuts themselves shaving, watches a grown man that he’s only just met lick the blood off the razor and then hurl the mirror out of the window, and his only thought is “That’s most inconvenient, I’ll have to get a new shaving mirror.”? Oh my God, I am amazingly psyched to meet you, sir, this is fantastic.

GO: [Mildly perturbed] Are you going to be like this all evening?

Protagonist: I’m sorry, I may settle down soon, but I’m not at all certain.

GO: In which case, I think I’d probably better go. It was a pleasure meeting you. [He tips his top hat]

Protagonist: No, don’t go! See, that’s exactly why you were amazing, you showed how vampires could be suave and sophisticated, yet also menacing and creepy and sexy and… and… [realises how over the top she is being.] Ok. I get it. You probably should go. I’m really sorry, I’m not usually like this. I don’t know what’s come over me…

[Gary Oldman turns into a bat and flies away, blowing the entire special effects budget in the process. With a sigh, our protagonist once again turns to the bed. She has not long laid down when there is a clicking sound, like that of a camera shutter, and a doctorwhotwilightsmall flash of light.]

Otto Chreik: Vonderful! Simply vonderful! Ze vay ze candlelight shines on ze flowing curtains, and ze hair spread like zat on ze pillow! Ya, ya, von more! Svoon please! Ya, more svooning, zat is perfect!

Protagonist: Otto?

Otto: Ya? Von second please… [he takes another picture, then puts down the camera.] Can I help you?

Protagonist: Otto Chreik? Otto: Ya, ya, it is me?

Protagonist: You must be here to represent my Pratchett phase. Which, in fairness never really ended. It’s wonderful to see you. I’m so, so sorry about Sir Terry. He was a master of the genre, this must be a terrible time for you.

Otto: Ya, ya… Vell, unlife goes on, as they say.

Protagonist: Pratchett’s vampires taught me so much about the genre… Count Magpyr and his family – the fact that the worst villains are those who pretend they’re doing this for your own good…

[A spectre of David Cameron floats lazily past]

Cameron: Don’t mind me, I’m just a metaphor.

Protagonist: [after his retreating back] Now there’s a vampire I could quite happily stake.

Otto: Indeed.

Protagonist: Even the comic vampires – I’ve always loved comedy, wish I could write it myself, but I tend to overdo it. Comedy is the best teacher, because it allows learning to sneak in round the edges while we’re laughing. Even a character like yourself can show us that there is so much that vampires can teach us about the nature of humanity, the nature of evil – your own comic persona being just that, hammed up round the edges deliberately to seem non-threatening, because we all know where we are vis a silly accent, and we forget about the blood.

Otto: [Bows slightly] Vell, I’m glad to haf been of service. But now, I really must be goink, I haf a scoop to catch for ze evenink edition.

Protagonist: Send me a copy of the pictures, won’t you?

[Otto exits with a dramatic flourish.]

Protagonist: Well, that really must be everyone – I can’t see how…

[At this point Edward Cullen pops up at the windowsill]

EC: You know, you’re like my own personal brand of…

Protagonist: No! No, no, no, no, no! You can fuck right off! I had to read your books when I was considering writing my PhD, but that was only ever so I could rip them apart!

EC: But teenage girls love me! Protagonist: Yes, and I probably would have done so when I was fifteen, but I’m a lot more savvy now, and I’ve discovered feminism, so screw you and the dodgy paperback you rode in on! You’re as bad as Fifty Shades of Grey, what with teaching impressionable young girls that stalking is the basis of a good relationship. And I don’t even think you’re a real vampire – you’re some sort of crystalline blood-powered golem anyway. Vampires don’t sparkle!

EC: I’m only sparkling because I love you…

[At this point, our protagonist punches Cullen square in the face, causing him to fall out of the window. There are loud cheers. She then pulls down the casement and locks it firmly against any further night-time intrusions. Finally, she manages to get a good night’s sleep, though what she dreams about is anyone’s guess…]

Bio

Alex Campbell was born in the wilds of Northumbria, and from an early age cut her teeth on legends like that of the Lampton Worm, which formed the inspiration for her first book, Wyrm’s Reckoning, out later this year..

She obtained a degree in English and Creative Writing at the University of Warwick, then in a shameless attempt to avoid Real Life, followed this up with two Masters Degrees in Science Fiction and in Writing from the University of Liverpool and Liverpool John Moores respectively.

Now, she lives in Portsmouth, at what she insists on referring to as the “wrong” end of the country, with her fiance and a number of dead house-plants. She is a keen gamer and LARPer, for which she makes many of her own costumes. She is not ashamed of being a geek

You can find her on her blog:  https://galacticavoice.wordpress.com/ and also on her facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/AJ-Campbell/1525096601059912

[Vampire Month] R.A Smith Interview

17 Tuesday Mar 2015

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This week we have R.A Smith in the chair, being expertly probed with Vampire mesmerism and ‘love bites’. He is the author of the Grenshall Manor series of books. Oblivion Storm and Primal Storm are out now and he is currently working on book 3 which also has Storm in the title but I am not going to reveal it in full yet…

R.A Smith at the 2014 World Book Night at FAB cafe

R.A Smith at the 2014 World Book Night at FAB cafe

What is the earliest memory you have of writing? What did you write about?

A solid memory comes from an English class, in which I got the best news ever in that our assignment was simply, “Write a story.” Not being a hugely keen on homework pupil, but brimming with ideas, I went away and worked on one for just about the entirety of the weekend. There were aliens involved, is about all I can remember, and it was in secondary school. We got back in on the Monday and our teacher happened to be in a bad mood, and decided, at length, to give the entire class a dressing-down. He spent longer with some of us than others, however, and I was called out in front of the entire class for having written “seven sides of rubbish.” To this day, I haven’t forgotten. I tend to remember harder when I need motivation the most.

When did you decide to become a professional writer? Why did you take this step?

A combination of unemployment and some unfinished business from my M.A. course got me started with what eventually became Oblivion Storm. It was a strange thing to be busier in out-of-work patches than I have been in 9-5 days, but set me on a path from which I’ve never truly stopped.

What would you consider to be your greatest strength as a writer? What about your greatest weakness? How do you overcome this weakness?

I think I have two big strengths: a love for writing a good action scene and a willingness to continue to learn new things about my craft. I love working out action scenes work and putting them into action. On the second point, I like the ‘research’ elements of reading in multiple genres, watching films and listening to songs and finding inspiration in these things. Sometimes it is a simple, “how would/should I approach this?” and other times just an appreciation of how wonderful a scene/character is to me.

Weakness? As usual, these things tie into strengths nicely. I can struggle for focus in slower scenes which are nonetheless essential either for exposition or another story purpose. You know the bits where things aren’t really happening but a conversation, flashback or even a painting which happens to be important to the tale can just feel like a grind at times. I handle it the same way as I do any other scene though, try and bring myself into the atmosphere a little with music or other ambience (within reason). Or, you know, I just double up on writing session snacks.

Tell us about the place where you live. Have you ever derived any inspiration from your home or from anywhere you have visited?

I currently reside in Manchester, but was born in Croydon, much further south in England. My home town has definitely had a part in my work before—specifically, a pub I grew up passing just about every day called The Half Moon. It closed down years ago but that actually kind of made it all the more useful for a fictional urban fantasy section. It was as it was rather than as I remembered it, having been way too young to go into it when it actually existed! There’s another venue before my time, a much more famous one, that I will be incorporating into my WIP, but its exact geography is almost a point in itself…

As for Manchester, well, it’s where Kara, an ever-present in the Grenshall Manor Chronicles so far, hails from. It’s another I’m hoping to delve into a little further in the next work.

Which book, if any, would you consider to be your greatest influence and inspiration?

This is what I like to call an evolving question. It’s amazing how I’ll change my answer to this from one week to the next, or depending upon where I am, who I’m talking to and/or what about. Because this is Vampire week, and because it comes up a lot, I’m going to choose Bram Stoker’s Dracula here. Just how much has been spawned from this one book? I find it incredible, and very inspiring.

What drove you to write about Vampires?

I’m kind of cheating here, in that I haven’t officially released a vampire novel as such. I have a scruffy manuscript at home on an idea I really want to come back to and develop one day, but I’m not ready to make it what I want to yet. It has very much been a spin-off tale from the Dracula universe though, I can tell you that much.

That said, certain aspects of the vampire novel live in certain Grenshall Manor Chronicles characters, in particular Lady Mary Grenshall and Aurelia Raine. They are very opposite sides of the coin in their inspiration though, with Raine’s main traits very firmly entrenched in the predatory aspects that only an adversary with her resources can. Wealth, status and access to raw supernatural power make her a foe to be reckoned with in Oblivion Storm.

The new cover of Oblivion Storm

Mary’s own power is as much a curse as a blessing, which I very much equate to the vampire’s necessity for blood to survive. It doesn’t work quite like that, and she won’t be biting necks any time soon, but in Oblivion Storm and Primal Storm, the reader will see her struggling with the significant price her powers come with. You’ll notice that if she cuts loose with everything she has, she is utterly formidable, but every power has a consequence. She can gain inhuman strength, but has to drain another mortal’s life energies by touch to do it [editor note: This is actually a good definition of a vampire – gaining power from the lifeforce of others]. She can extract memories from others by the same means, but she can’t just ditch them once she has them. If she really wants to, she is capable of raising the dead. BUT.

What do you think is the attraction for Vampire fiction? Why is it such a popular topic?

I find vampire fiction tends to gain popularity in cycles. It is often easy to equate to current social trends, to which I must point you at one of the greatest Cracked.com articles ever written in my opinion [link here: http://www.cracked.com/article_19402_6-mind-blowing-ways-zombies-vampires-explain-america.html ]

Also, since we decided there is a genre for just about everything going from A-Z, it’s a measure of the strength of bloodsuckers in our culture (allegorical or no) that they can be found under several headings. Gothic? We were there from day one, man. Urban Fantasy? Pretty much a staple along with their hairier counterparts (and often foes). Horror? You betcha! Comedy? Sometimes. Children’s stories? Plenty. The rules may change, but the game remains the same.

In a fight between all the greatest Vampires of fiction, who do you think would come out on top?

Despite Anne Rice’s Lestat being an epic-level vampire, I’m going to continue being a terrible Stoker fanboy and going for Dracula again. However I have the firmest possible reasoning. Count (pun intended) the number of times that Drac has been destroyed that you can recall. Now see how often he stays dead. Even BUFFY couldn’t keep him slayed! Should tell you everything!

What about in some other contest such as sexiness or dress sense? Who would win that one?

Pam from True Blood. One of my favourite characters anywhere, let alone one of my favourite vampires. Her wit is sharper than any vampire’s dress sense, and those bloodsuckers are dapper as hell.

How well do you think one of your characters would fare against the winner(s) of the above?

I doubt most vampires would want to go anywhere near any of the self-labelled New Musketeers. However, if I had to pick a champion, Lady Mary Grenshall is any vampire’s worst nightmare. She’s poor nourishment for them for a start, and can guarantee any one of them a bad night just by turning up.

The old (first edition) cover of Oblivion Storm

The old (first edition) cover of Oblivion Storm

Tell us the basic premise behind your latest novel.

My latest released novel is Primal Storm. It follows a year on from Oblivion Storm and shifts the focus from high-octane adventures with the undead to an action adventure in the living world—and beyond. Jennifer Winter, one of Mary’s new friends from book one, steps up to her own tale and we start with her attempting to get herself fighting fit almost a year after sustaining grievous injuries at the hands of one of the main villains there (note I am working hard to avoid spoilers to those who haven’t read Oblivion Storm). Though Jennifer, being way beyond normal human physical capability, needs to push herself a little harder. She takes up parkour and runs around London, straight into a daring robbery attempt upon the British Museum! What initially appears high-tech turns out to be something else entirely, and her interference sets her on a path which delves into her own origins, some of which she doesn’t know herself! Jennifer must endure a harsh voyage of self-discovery in an entirely new world before she and her friends can face their new enemy. Discover the prophecy of the Face of War and who or what is truly behind the robberies right here!

 

Bio

R.A. Smith

Russell is a displaced Londoner, now living in Manchester, and is writing in the hope of funding his car addiction. He lives with his girlfriend, two kittens, a small army of bears and two larger armies of miniatures.

An avid gamer, he is happy mashing buttons on a Playstation pad but happier mashing his mates in a field at weekends or slaying demons with dice, a pencil and paper.

He has held an eclectic collection of jobs, including editing a student magazine, several stints as a Tudor soldier and a mission in Moscow. He still does hold a Masters in Creative Writing, which he took to force himself to finish at least one novel. The plan worked better than expected.

Feel free to stop by on Twitter: @RASmithPSL or the blog site projectshadowlondon.wordpress.com. There’s also the Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Mister.R.A.Smith.

[Vampire Month] Let’s Talk About Vamps by Elizabeth Morgan

12 Thursday Mar 2015

Posted by in Musings, Vampire Month

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So the end of the week is in sight and Elizabeth is back again to wow us with her guest post… here she talks about why she loves vampires so much.Elizabeth Morgan

Let’s talk Vampires and why I think we love them so much.

What is it about these creatures of the night that excites us as readers? Is it their immortality and the idea that they are endless; that they can see how the world changes? That they can experience everything the world will ever have to offer them over time? Is it the fact that age does not touch them? That they will remain young and possibly perfect forever? Is it that they are dangerous? That they are killers and there is a part deep in all of us Vamp lovers that longs for their redemption? Is it their kiss? Bloody, and deadly, yet said to give a form of pleasure that no human could possibly imagine? Is it their allure? The fact that deep down we know they are dangerous, but we yearn for such risks? Is it that we find them romantic? They’re mature and full of knowledge; the fact they are from a different lifetime?

Vampires are ageless, and I don’t mean in the sense that they are the undead and frozen at a particular age. There are myths descending back further than the 14th Century which tell of creatures that prey on the weak and thirst for blood. Every culture in the world has its own brand of Vampires. Thousand – if not more – books have been written on this particular species and a ton of films have been made. No one, despite the ever wavering interest in this particular being, will ever tire of hearing about Vampires, but why? What is it that we love so much about them? I have been a fan of Vampires since I was a child. That infatuation first began when I watched the movie Bram Stokers, Dracula. Now, I can hold my hands up and say that the big appeal was naturally the love story. I’m a sucker – forgive the pun – for love. I’m a huge romantic, and the idea of a man condemning god and turning himself into something so beastly, so evil, simply because he felt betrayed and was grieving for his soul mate . . . Well, be still my heart. We have centuries of heartache and turmoil and undying hope mixed in with that, and hot damn, it’s magical.

When I was a child, Vampires were terrifying, but seemed really cool at the same time; they were like the bad boys and girls, rebels, dangerous, and otherworldly. What kid didn’t imagine possessing powers and getting away with all sorts of kick ass things? Naturally, once I was older I began to see other sides of their appeal. They are flawless, sexual creatures. Who doesn’t love that? Who hasn’t at some point in their life liked the idea of being that appealing, or of having someone that hot and mysterious pay them attention? I’m not afraid to say I have, and on many occasions. Then there is power; they are strong, and fast, and they remain healthy. They are past death; something very appealing for anyone who fears death, or for someone who feels they haven’t had enough time in this life. Vampires move with the ages, they can watch the world climb and falPageflex Persona [document: PRS0000038_00064]l around them. They can be a part of history. Just think of all those experiences!

Lastly, and probably the most appealing side to these beings, would be the fight for their soul – whether or not you believe they have one. As readers we all want to believe that these dark and sometimes tortured creatures can be saved, and naturally, we want the heroine/hero – heck, sometimes we want to be in their place – to do the saving. We want the vampire to be redeemed, and to have hope, and love, and happiness. We want a happily ever after for these bloodsuckers.

In my opinion Vampires – or rather the paranormal genre in general – is limitless. Each person will have their own idea of what a vampire is, how they should look, how they should act. In my Blood Series my Vampires are the bad guys and they look similar to the guy from Salem’s lot. They have human features, but when they are ready to feed or fight, their hair falls out, their jaws dislocate and their fangs extend to a horrible length. You really wouldn’t want to bump into them. Trust me.

No one’s view of Vampires is wrong. It is interpretation and belief. It is what a person’s imagination creates. As I said earlier there is a variety of different type of Vampires, depending which country they come from. Every writer will create them differently, tell them differently; some have souls, and some don’t. Some look human, but with fangs and others will shift forms. Some Vampires sparkle and some are blue, bald, and completely terrifying, but no matter what form they come in or how handsome or scary they are, we love them. I think the reason for that is because they are an altered, magical, and limitless version of ourselves. They are the impossible. Humans “aren’t” supposed to survive after death; they “aren’t” supposed to live forever, and they “aren’t” supposed to remain ageless. Vampires break the natural code; heck, they break all the rules and they do it with such style.

Whatever the reason may be for why we are fascinated by this particular species, I honestly believe that they will continue to be one of the most – if not the most – written about species in literature.

 

About the Author:

Elizabeth Morgan is a multi-published author of urban fantasy, paranormal, erotic horror, f/f, and contemporary; all with a degree of romance, a dose of action and a hit of sarcasm, sizzle or blood, but you can be sure that no matter what the genre, Elizabeth always manages to give a unique and often humorous spin to her stories.

Like her tagline says; A pick ‘n’ mix genre author. “I’m not greedy. I just like variety.”

And that she does, author of erotic ménage horror, Creak, paranormal erotic horror and UK, US & Australian Amazon best seller (Gay/Lesbian, Fiction, Lesbian), On the Rocks, erotic romance, US, UK & Spanish Amazon bestseller (Erotica Short Story) Truth or Dare? And sweet contemporary romance, UK & US Amazon bestseller (British/Drama & Plays) Stepping Stones.

She also has her hand in self-publishing. Look out for more information on her upcoming releases at her website: www.e-morgan.com

Away from the computer, Elizabeth can be found in the garden trying hard not to kill her plants, dancing around her little cottage with the radio on while she cleans, watching movies or good television programmes – Dr Who? Atlantis? The Musketeers? Heck, yes! – Or curled up with her two cats reading a book.

Where to find Elizabeth Online:

Website: www.e-morgan.com Blog: www.xxxxmyworldxxxx.blogspot.co.uk Twitter: @EMorgan2010 Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/ElizabethMorgan Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/elizabeth.morgan.944 Blood Series Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/TheBloodSeries?ref=hl Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/elizabethm2012/boards/ TSU: https://www.tsu.co/ElizabethMorgan Blog: (Shared with Dianna Hardy): http://notjustastiffupperlip.blogspot.co.uk/