I've just been tagged in The Next Big Thing, a way for writers to share their upcoming projects, by my friend and fellow NIWA member, William Hertling. Will is the author of SMALL PRESS AND INDIE MARKETING—one of my favorite books on marketing. He’s also written two singularity-focused techno-thrillers: AVOGADRO CORP and A.I. APOCOLYPSE. You can read his post about his upcoming work here. THE INTERVIEW What is your working title of your book? STEALING LUCIFER’S DREAMS EPISODE TWO: THE SHADES OF VENICE Where did the idea come from for the book?
I wanted to write about a character whose job would drastically mold her personality, a job just a few paces into the future on the imaginable cusp of familiar technologies. At the time I was brainstorming, 3D TVs were the talk of the industry. How long, I wondered, could it really be until the entertainment industry attained that full immersion experience? How would the film industry gather those sensations to envelop us in these new, relived stories? Alyse’s career of sensory immersion artist was born. I knew I wanted a flavor that combined the adrenaline of LAURA CROFT: TOMB RAIDER with the folklore surrealism of PAN’S LABYRINTH. Venice, layered with all that rich history and oral tradition, just seemed like the perfect metaphysical grounding for a character who was otherwise very concentrated on the physical. All in all it’s quite the writer’s playground. What genre does your book fall under? Like so many indie authors, that depends on who you talk to! I get anything from urban fantasy thriller to paranormal thriller to paranormal romance to science fiction. I tend to stick with urban fantasy thriller. While there are romantic and mild science fiction elements to my work, my focus is almost always on the folklore and folk-history. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? I developed this series with an image of Angelia Jolie’s Laura Croft on my desktop. That was a lot of years ago, though. After spending way too many hours on IMDB, here’s the best I could come up with: Alyse Kate Bryant – Maggie Q/Angelina Jolie Bryce Deacon – Toby Hemmingway Matteo Ranier – Raoul Bova Ben Norris-Stevenson – Lance Gross Ryan Gunner – Santiago Cabrera Tamsin Leonides - Scarlett Johanssen Jürgen Phan Mai – Andy Lau Cirena – Tamsin Egerton Vittorio Tassini – Paul Bettany Anna Parks – Natalie Portman Lucianna Venier – Rachelle Lefevre You can find the images on my pin board here. If anybody out there has some great suggestions, I’m all ears! What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? Trapped in the flooded ruins of Venice, sensory immersion artist Alyse Kate Bryant seeks vengeance against the faceless, ephemeral enemy which orchestrated her ruin…but will Venice’s dark legends steal her soul first? Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? I’m all indie. I’m even the Vice President of the Northwest Independent Writers Association (NIWA). I love the creative and entrepreneurial freedoms this publishing path provides. It’s not without its headaches, of course, but I’m having fun and gaining a readership and that’s what I was after to begin with! How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? It takes me anywhere from 3 to 6 months to complete a first draft. STEALING LUCIFER’S DREAMS has been held up by some life changes here at Ca’ Macalino, but we are settling in and the project is working up steam again. My SHADES OF VENICE books take considerably longer to produce simply because Veniceis a bear of a setting. Every time I move a character six inches, I have to look something up and since most of the source material is in Italian (which I don’t speak), it can really take some digging! What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? I haven’t settled on an exact match, but here’s the authors I reference most often: Marjorie Liu and her THE IRON HUNT, Liz Maverick and her CRIMSON CITY, Shana Abe and her SMOKE THIEF, Patricia McKillip and her SOLSTICE WOOD. Again, if anyone has better suggestions, I would love to hear them! Who or what inspired you to write this book? I visited Venice once in my college years. The magic of her stuck with me. If you look beyond the over-commercialized tourist attraction, if you watch, if you look deeper into the shadowed alleys, she’s still there, whispering her stories. Be still. Listen… In the coming weeks, please check out some other fantastic writers who will share their projects with you: Brad Cameron, author of THE ZEKE PROPER CHRONICLES, a young adult urban fantasy series steeped in Norse mythology. Find his blog, YOUNG ADULT GUIDE TO NORSE MYTHOLOGY, here. See Brad discuss his book, THE SERPENT’S SHIP, at Bards & Brews here. Delilah Marvelle, author of the RUMOR series, award-winning historical romance so rich in well-researched detail, you can practically taste the air those characters breathe. Find her blog, A BIT ’O MUSLIN: SEX THROUGH HISTORY, here. See Delilah discuss her book, FOREVER AND A DAY, at Bards & Brews here. Muffy Morrigan, author of the CUSTODES NOCTIS series, adult urban fantasy for those of us needing a between-episodes fix of SUPERNATURAL-style adventure. Muffy also wrote THE SAIL WEAVER, a futuristic fantasy. You can find her blog, HERE THERE BE DRAGONS here.
2 Comments
3/19/2013 05:49:42 am
You are too kind! Having way too much fun crafting book two. Hope folk enjoy reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it!
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The Story of Place
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