Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Well this is awkward. Talking about myself isn’t a strength, but let’s give this a try shall we? As covered in my bio I am really into playing with imagination. I’m a hypnotherapist by day. That’s a lot more like storytelling than it isn’t. By night, as I’ve pointedly said before, I am not a vampire. This too is storytelling. Although it is a very short story to be sure. I’ve written more books than I have released and hope to release more books than I have currently written in the future… Right now though I’m releasing my second officially out there book in my Witchlight series.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
BUMP is the title of my current release. It was dreamed up after I wrote a short story that was accepted into an anthology. I really liked the character in the short I’d written and I wanted to explore more of her and her world, so I started writing more. It developed into more ideas than you could fling one page at…or 20 or even 300, because BUMP is more than that in itself. The more I learned about my witch, her friends, her thing for werewolf girlfriends, and the world she lived in, the more I wanted to know. Hopefully, you do too!
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Well, every few months or so (usually around the time visitors show up) I clean up my desk till it’s neat (as a pin) and organised. This generally means that there is only a monitor and keyboard on the desk, along with a very small number of carefully selected (and oh so tasteful) knickknacks. You want examples? Well, recent winning pieces were a Green Lantern figurine, a skull carved with Celtic knots, a crystal ball, and a Han Solo figure in heroic pose. Interestingly, I usually struggle to get very much down on my current work in progress until I’ve managed to pile that clean desk full of notes, reference material, random bits and pieces drawn from who knows where and a few crumpled up pieces of paper for good measure. Clutter, clutter, clutter! What can I say? I write well on a messy desk… This is why I need a private writing space. Yeah, because I’m hiding my messy desk syndrome. Shhh!
What authors, or books have influenced you?
Barbara Hambly’s Darwath Series threw me deep into a fantasy reading spree from which I have never recovered. Before dipping my peepers into this series I’d been into mysteries and whodunnits. Goodbye guess the villain, hello magic! It just snowballed from there and to try and list them all–Katherine Kerr, Stephen Donaldson, Mary Stewart, Anne Rice, Tim Waggoner, Patricia Kennealy, Clive Barker, Jimk Butcher–isn’t possible. Nope…not even a drop in the inky oceans I’ve paged and dreamed my way through.
What are you working on now?
At the moment I’m working on a novel in a world where the Empress rocks, the Inquisitor keeps the really nasty stuff in check, the Sorceress is a nontraditional nun, and the Courtesan is a taserslinging monster hunter with a preference for parting vampires from their heads. The latter is a lot of fun to write and is the principal in this cast of interesting people. Would you like to meet her?
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Clearly, I’d recommend Awesomegang… Other than that I’d say I’m still feeling the media waters and trying to see where my best X marks the spot place are. It’s tough to judge some of the promo sites because they have quite a high entry point and it’s something you have to build up to.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Just write. Don’t try to do what every other author does. If you like taking advice (okay…yeah…maybe you’re reading this for more than just the pleasure of reading me write) then I would say find one guru in the writing world that really gets you pumped up, nodding your head, and thinking inside their boxes, and follow them. Don’t be distracted by the shiny gurus to the left, to the right, or the new one popping up ahead. You can switch from one guru to another if you want…but don’t collect them like shiny tokens to bestseller success. You’ll only burnout trying to do everything that they tell you will bring you raving fans and killer royalty zeros. Try just being you…with a touch of your lit-hero if you must.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Just write. A friend–probably growing really tired of me telling her, I want to be a writer, and what do you think of these first chapters of this book I’m never gonna finish, and how does this story idea sound–told me that. In her mind she was probably yelling at me… Thank you, Misty.
What are you reading now?
I’ve just finished a book actually…and it was awesome! Kim Newman’s The Night Mayor. It’s like LitRPG before LitRPG; yeah Kim Newman was ready player one-ing in the 1980s!
I’ve got a thousand books to hand for what to read next–some of it on my desk under those sheets of paper, chapters, notes, and scrawls that I may be able to decipher some day. Not to mention an ereader bulging at the pixels. Although I’ll probably stumble across something new before I get to any of these. Shiny new things are cool…even if they’re from the 1980s…
What’s next for you as a writer?
Erm, you’ve probably heard this one before…I mean it’s all right, I know I’m an addict, but more books. You can expect more books. Lots more books if I have a say in it, which technically and ultimately I do…if I say so myself. I do have a crystal ball on the desk…but it’s just shiny and reflective right now, so I’m not completely 100% on the direction I’ll take with those new books. More than likely I’ll be playing in the big wide open world of fantasy…I like it with a contemporary bent at the moment, with a big dash of diversity, and a whole lot of racing through from one page to the next. I figure it’ll go on like that…but look me up in a few years. See if I’m writing contemporary or non-contemporary. You never know where the next line will take you.
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
If I had that much foreshadowing, I think I’d get them to build a library on that island first…just saying. Books to keep me from talking to a football or befriending a corpse… I guess I’d start with a massive mythology volume, because I love that stuff… Then a dictionary because who can’t get lost in a few pages of that? Not too much plot, but the words are stellar! I rarely reread fiction books because I come out of them remembering every last page I’ve just immersed myself in so any other books I bring along of that nature would only give me one good read. I’d have to be really picky about it… Something really good on that day when I end up stranded on a desert island… Maybe I’ll find it now and save it for then?
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