Over at Abaddon/Solaris Books, they’re releasing some great new books, especially some wonderfully dark fantasy. I’m going to be doing some interviews with a few of the authors there so I hope you’ll take the time to check out their work.

First up, Rebecca Levene, who’s book Cold Warriors is being released in May 2010.

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To start, can you tell me a little about yourself.

As a friend of mine once said, I want to be known for my work, not my face – like an arsonist. I don’t really know what to tell you. I grew up in rural Suffolk – used to milk the goats when I was a kid – and for obvious reasons escaped as soon as possible and have been living in London ever since. Other than that, it’s just been a life, filled with the kind of stuff lives are filled with. So instead, here are three random facts about me:

a) My dad made some of the costumes for Lawrence of Arabia.
b) I worked on mainland China’s first soap opera – which was originally intended to feature a eunuch travelling back through time to recover his lost genitalia.
c) I once accidentally started a religion.

How long have you been writing and how did you get to this point in your career?

Like most writers, I imagine, I’ve been doing it since I was a kid – I used to distract myself from my carsickness on long journeys by making up stories in my head, and some of those characters have been living in there ever since.

I’ve been writing professionally for around twelve years now. I’m not quite sure what stage you’d call this in my career – the ‘not struggling quite as badly as before but still not always making ends meet’ stage? Anyway, I got here by writing whatever someone would pay me to write – that included a beginner’s guide to poker and a novelisation of a video game. People can be snobby about that kind of work-for-hire stuff, but it’s how I learnt my craft.

Your new novel is called Cold Warriors. Tell me what inspired or drove you to write this book?

Cold Warriors‘ initial inspiration was probably John Le Carre. I read The Spy Who Came In From The Cold when I was quite young, and it made a huge impression on me, the page-turning action combined with the aching melancholy. I also loved fantasy books, and a combination of the two seemed like the best thing ever to me then – and still does.

Other than that, I think it was the usual: I wanted to write something I would have enjoyed reading in that magical, voracious, book-consuming period of my youth when I truly could get lost in a work of fiction in a way that’s frustratingly elusive now.

I have a keen interest in dark and paranormal fantasy. Tell me how you would classify this book and what’s dark about it?

I’ve always described the book as a supernatural thriller – it’s about a British spy agency seeking out occult means to defend the nation. I guess the darkness comes from my interest in the terrible things people can do, and what motivates them to do them. I’m not just talking about the big, ending-the-world stuff, although that too, but also the smaller cruelties even good people are capable of.

Often there are characters in a book that we just love, but what character of yours would you completely despise if you were to meet them in real life? Why?

Hmm… I usually have a sneaking fondness for even the worst of my characters, but – without giving too much away – there’s someone in this book who’s committed a crime I find utterly unforgivable. I think readers will know who I’m talking about when they get there.

There’s a Richard Prior routine – this is relevant, honest – in which he talks about spending time in prison to research Stir Crazy. When he first gets there, he looks at all the inmates and thinks what a terrible waste it is to lock them up. And then two hours later he’s thinking, thank god these maniacs are in jail – let’s throw away the key. I worked in Brixton Prison for a while, and that really is the mental process I went through about the inmates. You start off feeling sorry for them, and then they scare the shit out of you, and you finally end up feeling sorry for them again – because many of them are victims – but also hoping very hard you’ll never meet them in the outside world.

I think that’s how I feel about my villains. They can be charming or funny or pitiful, but they really do need to be stopped.

Sometimes we have to be ruthless in writing/editing. We cut scenes, eliminate characters or even kill them off. Tell me what was the hardest of these in this book.

Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever cut a scene I truly mourned – I trained as a sub-editor in magazines and that’s made me pretty brutal with material that’s surplus to requirements, even my own. There is a decision I made about one of my characters in this book which was very hard. I hadn’t planned to do it in my original synopsis, but when it came to the moment I realised it had to happen.

This blog is called Random Musings, so give me a random quote from the book – something that you’re particularly fond of.

Hmm… How about:

"He was huge, a beached white whale in this shallow pool, roll after roll of fat leaving the greying head on top looking too small, like a deformity."

What can we expect from you next? Is the next book in the series already written?

The next book is written and out this summer, possibly as early as July. It’s called Ghost Dance. I did actually take a year to write it, not 2 months – my editor held off until he could publish the first two close together, to get some momentum going for the series. I’m also working with a friend on a non-fiction book about the videogame industry that I’m very excited about, but I shouldn’t say more till I know whether it’s been commissioned.

Where can we find you on the internet? Blog? Twitter? Web site? Book trailer?

I’m afraid you can’t – I really know I should do some of those, but I’m terrible about keeping that kind of thing going. Like most writers (well, I tell myself it’s like most writers) I’m horrifically lazy. Writing is my job and I write what I have to, but the thought of producing a word more than that makes my heart sink.

You could check out the Abaddon website, though. And my friends’ wonderful site refers to me now and again.

Any final comments or thoughts you’d like to convey that you haven’t covered?

Nope – I think your questions have pretty much done the job. Thanks for taking the time to come up with them!

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I really like the insight you have into the criminal mind. There is understanding and empathy, yet revulsion. I can’t wait to read this. Thank you, Rebecca, I really appreciate you taking the time to answer these questions. Looking forward to the May release of Cold Warriors!

Over at Apex Book Company, they’re releasing some great new books, especially some wonderfully dark fantasy. I’m going to be doing some interviews with a few of the authors there so I hope you’ll take the time to check out their work. Last week I interviewed Sara M. Harvey. Today, we have Maurice Broaddus.

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To start, can you tell me a little about yourself.

I’m just me. Father of two (rambunctious boys), husband of one. Full time writer, sometime editor. All around bon vivant and mischievous imp.

How long have you been writing and how did you get to this point in your career?

Been writing as long as I can remember. In second grade, my teacher didn’t know what to do with me. She had an overloaded class and I could be a handful since I was easily bored. So she put my desk in a corner, gave me a stack of paper and just told me to “create”. I guess I’ve been doing that ever since.

I started to seriously begin pursuing being published in 1999, when my story Soul Food was published in a little known magazine called Hoodz. I started my blog in 2004, had a column in a local paper, and had a few dozen short stories published. All of which brings me to now.

You have two new works out, a novel and an anthology, King Maker and Dark Faith, respectively. Tell me what inspired you to write the one and edit/compile the other?

Oddly enough in both cases, my faith. I was working with a homeless teen ministry called Outreach Inc. After talking to many of the kids, I got this sense that they couldn’t think of themselves with a future. It was difficult for them to conceptualize of survival further out than a week. So I began writing a story, more as a lark, imagining some of them as knights and princesses of the streets. Eventually, it led to King Maker.

Dark Faith sprang from my eponymous conference, MoCon. Originally we wanted to produce an anthology which was a tribute to it and its guests. The premise was any of the themes of some of our MoCon panels: spirituality, race, sex, art. The prospect of writing stories revolving around the idea of faith caused us to be hit with a lot of submissions and the anthology grew into something more. So we have science fiction, horror, and fantasy writers all playing with the idea of faith from various perspectives.

I have a keen interest in dark fantasy. Tell me how you would classify both of these books and what’s dark about them? In particular, tell me more about what you are trying to explore in the “dark side of faith” with the anthology.

King Maker is urban fantasy, after all, it’s the re-telling of the legend of King Arthur except playing out in our modern, inner city streets. I’ve had many folks come up to me and tell me “I couldn’t read your other stuff because you’re a horror writer. King Maker sounds like something I can read.” I guess they forget that I *do* have a horror writing background. So there is definitely some dark scenes. It really isn’t too different than the kind of horror I typically write, as I like exploring the dark side of humanity and the evil that people do to one another. This is no bunnies and rainbows version of King Arthur.

In Dark Faith, I wanted artists to engage the idea of faith and let it take them wherever the stories take them. Some stories are dark (like Douglass F. Warrick’s Zen and the Art of Gordon Dratch’s Damnation) and some are a little lighter (like Jay Lake’s Mother Urban’s Booke of Dayes or Kyle S. Johnson’s Go Tell It on the Mountain).

Which was harder to edit: the anthology or your own novel? Can you explain?

Yes. I should probably mention that King Maker is book one in a trilogy called The Knights of Breton Court. Book Two is King’s Justice and Book Three is King’s War. I was editing Dark Faith while writing King’s Justice, as both projects were due at the same time. Once it became evident that I was going to be deluged with submissions, I brought in co-editor supreme, Jerry L. Gordon. He made it his mission to keep my anthology plate as clean as possible and give me room to write book two. We made a great team as we both had similar tastes and ways of working.

In many ways, editing was easier. It’s not really a chore to take breaks from writing to “have” to read stories from Catherynne M. Valente, Alethea Kontis, Kelli Owen-Dunlap, and Brian Keene, if you know what I mean. It was also a HUGE learning experience. I think every writer needs to have to deal with a slush pile and see the submission process from the other side.

This blog is called Random Musings, so give me a random quote from the books – something that you’re particularly fond of.

So I whisper his name. And he tells me to call him Jeezy. “Seriously, man. Everybody does.” (From Kyle S. Johnson’s

Go Tell It on the Mountain)

What can we expect from you next?

King Maker hits the U.S. shores in August. King’s Justice around December. In between, I have stories coming out in the following anthologies: Dark Future, Dead West, and Ancient Shadows.

Where can we find you on the internet? Blog? Twitter? Web site? Book trailer?

Oh, you can’t avoid me on the interwebz. I blog at my web site, I tweet endless gibberish about my life, and you can find me on Facebook.

Any final comments or thoughts you’d like to convey that you haven’t covered?

Buy my books because I speak of the pompetous of love.

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And I thought I was busy! Wow! Thank you, Maurice, I really appreciate you taking the time to answer these questions. Best of luck and looking forward to reading both of these works.

Well, the results are in (see below). I’ll blog about this more later.

I’ve had a couple of interviews lately. Feel free to check them out. Nikola’s Book Blog – where I’m giving away 5 free ebooks! Curling Up By The Fire Also, some great reviews at the following sites: The 24/7 Mom Gnostalgia Ebook Alchemy Amazon Smashwords Goodreads And I have some interviews lined up with authors from Apex Book Company and Solaris/Abaddon Books. There’s some really great dark fantasy coming from these publishing houses, so check back for more! Oh, and if you’re a paranormal/fantasy author (particularly dark paranormal/fantasy) looking to do an interview, feel free to drop me a line! I’d be more than happy to host an interview here.

Over at Apex Book Company, they’re releasing some great new books, especially some wonderfully dark fantasy. I’m going to be doing some interviews with a few of the authors there so I hope you’ll take the time to check out their work. ———— First up: Sara M. Harvey, author of The Labyrinth of the Dead, which is now available for pre-order! To start, can you tell me a little about yourself. My day job is as an instructor of fashion design and fashion history at the International Academy of Design and Technology. I have a master’s degree in costume history from New York University and I’ve worked for the costume shops of Walt Disney World and the Renaissance Pleasure Faires of California and Wisconsin. I am a native Californian and a huge hockey nut (a loud and proud Nashville Predators fan, also known to root for the San Jose Sharks and occasionally the Pittsburgh Penguins). Here in Nashville, I live in an older neighborhood that is chock-full of delicious ethnic diversity (mmmm authentic tacos for $1 down the street and a wonderful coffee shop on the next block!) with my husband and three dogs: two of which were strays that adopted us from the neighborhood, the other was one we actually went out and got from a shelter. (For anyone who cares: Guinevere the border collie/blue heeler mix, Eowyn the basenji/yellow lab mix, Javert the german shepherd/hound? mix.) I do a lot of writing, reading, cooking, and gardening. Life is good. ^_^
How long have you been writing and how did you get to this point in your career? I started writing about age 10 or 11 and have just been at it since then. I wrote my first complete novel, A Year and a Day, in 2003 and sold it in 2006. Since then there have been a lot of non-fiction costume history textbooks, a few short stories, and the novella trilogy for Apex Book Company. I have a another novel out for consideration right now and one that I am in the middle of. How did I get here? A metric buttload of tenacity and no shortage of charm and luck. Your new novel is called The Labyrinth of the Dead, the second in a series. Tell me what inspired or drove you to write this series? I had this crazy dream, years ago, about these young people in a magical boarding school where a murder has taken place and the ensuing witch-hunt (pun sort-of intended!) puts most of the teachers and some of the students in peril at the hands of a treacherous betrayer, sort of a very dark version of Harry Potter but years before the books existed. I wrote a little snippet of what would become The Convent of the Pure, the first book in the trilogy. The second books came out of the plot that grew way too big for a single 35,000 word novella. I would love to put out a larger volume of the whole trilogy collected into a single book, or even expand each novella into its own full novel. That would be great fun. I have a keen interest in dark and paranormal fantasy. Tell me how you would classify this series and what’s dark about it? Classify? Bah, I can’t hit the broad side of a genre barn! Jason Sizemore, my editor, refers to it as Paranormal Steampunk: there are angels and demons and magic and ghosts and a deep, abiding sense of spirituality. And there is betrayal and true love and life and death and heartbreak. There’s a lot of dark elements in Labyrinth, especially seeing as how it takes place in the underworld and puts the heroine at the mercy of a demon queen and her creepy constructs that do her will, which is to consume souls. So yes: dark, paranormal, fantastical, Steampunk. All of the above. Often there are characters in a book that we just love, but what character of yours would you completely despise if you were to meet them in real life? Why? It’s too easy to say that I’d hate Nigel, the villain in Convent but he’s so oily and cunning that he’d fascinate me more than disgust me. In Labyrinth, I have to say I probably like Lahash, the demon general, the least. He’s just a bastard, plain and simple and not in a cool, curmudgeonly way, and has a tendency to follow the person with the biggest gun rather than have any sense of loyalty or decency. Sometimes we have to be ruthless in writing/editing. We cut scenes, eliminate characters or even kill them off. Tell me what was the hardest of these in this book. The middle of this book got rewritten about three times. The start of it got rewritten about four times. And the end, at least twice. So lots got cut and lots got rearranged. And although it hurt at the time, they made for a really kick-ass book at the end. In terms of killing characters, actually, the body count in the short story we put out to promote Convent, called “A Prelude to Penemue,” had a pretty high body count including a character that was the first piece of fan art ever done for the series. She’s in the story for a few hundred words but she stole everyone’s hearts and her fate really sucked. But fret not, fans, when writing about ghosts and the undead, no one is ever written out of the series for good! This blog is called Random Musings, so give me a random quote from the book – something that you’re particularly fond of. This is Portia talking to Belial, the Demon Queen of the Underworld: "I had no idea who you were until a moment ago. You aren't Lilith, for crying out loud. Your name was never taught to me in Penemue, where we were schooled on all of the important demons and fallen angels. But yet you think so much of yourself." "I have been compared to Satan!" "Really? So have I. Ask my mother." What can we expect from you next? Next? So many things! I have a short story out in the Dark Futures anthology coming this summer from Dark Quest Books and edited by our fearless leader over at Apex, Jason Sizemore. There is also a short story of mine in the Trafficking in Magic anthology out from Drollerie Press also this year, in the autumn. I have a stack of story requests through which I am currently working. Even though I started with short stories as a teenager, I have evolved into a novelist and short work is a real challenge for me, but I never shy away from a challenge so keep your eyes open for more short work from me! Based on what I read, there seems to be a queer element to this series.
Tell me about that. Well, Portia had been basically hashed out and then when I placed her into the world of the town of Penemue in the first book, I stumbled across the love of her life and it turned out they were both women. I think it was as much of a surprise to me as it was to Portia who had never given love much thought until a certain redhead came into her life. The strength of their love never ceases to surprise and amaze. And, to me, that is the important part, not their genders. Although my very first review called the book “fluffy, lesbian erotica” which still boggles my mind. Ah well, the book has found a lot of traction in all corners of the world and with all sorts of people, which pleases me greatly. Where can we find you on the internet? Blog? Twitter? Web site? Book trailer? I am all over the internet! My website is www.saramharvey.com. I blog both at LiveJournal under the username of Saraphina_Marie and at Charmed and Dangerous. I tweet also under the username of Saraphina_Marie . Labyrinth doesn’t have a book trailer yet, but check out the amazing one made by the one and only Catherynne Valente and featuring the awesome music by Abney Park. Any final comments or thoughts you’d like to convey that you haven’t covered? Buy my books? Oh, and also books with my short stories in them! And lastly, come see me at a convention near you, I love to meet new people! ——— Thank you, Sara, I really appreciate you taking the time to answer these questions. Sounds like you have a lot going on and lots to look forward to. I wish you the best of fortune with it all!

Wow, this ad had a huge impact on me.

This is Justin, or as he was named in his native Russia, Artyom. He’s seven years old. Yesterday, Justin was shipped out like a piece of luggage to his country of origin because he was no longer wanted. He was sent alone. Justin was adopted from a Russian orphanage last year. I have no idea what the circumstances of his past are. I’m sure it wasn’t good. I’m sure he’s been seriously affected by trauma, both from his birth parents, or lack there of, and by his time in an orphanage. He’s seven. He will remember a lot of what has happened to him. I’m sure he has behavior issues. Likely he has problems remembering things, has difficulty in school, and might have some social issues. Not pretty. In fact, let’s look at what his adoptive mother had to say about him:

“This child is mentally unstable. He is violent and has severe psychopathic issues….I was lied to and misled by the Russian Orphanage workers and director regarding his mental stability and other issues…”

And according to his grandmother,

the child had a "hit list" of people he was targeting, including her daughter, who he said he "wanted to kill for the house." He threatened to kill her grandson for a videogame, she said.

And apparently,

the final incident that convinced Hansen she should send the boy back to Russia was when she caught him starting a fire with papers in his bedroom last Monday, she said. She feared the child might burn down the house and kill her family, she said.

The Russian orphanage even called the boy “stubborn”. For the sake of argument, let’s even say he has oppositional defiance disorder. That’s stubborn times ten. I’ll take all of this as truth. Let’s just assume for one moment that there’s no way the mother or grandmother are stretching the truth or even lying. What I see here is a seven year old boy that has been taken from or abandoned by his birth parents and dumped into an orphanage (and I’m sure there was mistreatment in one case or the other). After that, he was ripped from all that he knew, including his own mother tongue, and placed in a strange land where he doesn’t speak the language with a woman that he knew for all of four days. This child needs help. Possibly a lot of help. He’s acting out. He’s screaming for attention. He has likely been severely neglected and needs a lot of empathy, compassion, and understanding. He needs a decent play therapist that can help him cope. All of this takes a lot of effort, patience, and work. A lot. Let me repeat that. A LOT. The issues that this child has will require years of work. But let me reiterate: this child, like all children, want what we all want. Happiness. Love. Laughter. It’s very simple. Children are not inherently bad. Sometimes they make poor choices. Their behaviors develop due to the circumstances around them and it’s our job as parents to guide and teach them. It takes work. A lot of it. It takes patience. Even more. But these are children. And when it comes to adopting older children, there is a lot of work to undo what has happened to them. But let me tell you, OMG is it worth it! I should know. We adopted three boys (brothers) between the ages of 6 and 9. Justin is the same age as our middle son when we adopted him. In this particular case, and what really upsets me, is that this mother obviously had no clue what she was in for. Again, let’s assume all of the worst possible things here simply because we don’t know the actual facts. I’m not going to run under the assumption that this child was perfect with no behaviour issues. But I think this woman was so blinded by her desire to have a child that she foolishly overlooked the risks. I don’t know what her credentials are, but here is some information that is troubling and makes me question her ability to parent.

Nancy Hansen outlined for CNN the process she followed after she decided Justin must go back to Russia. When the lawyer she found online advised her the adoption could be reversed, Hansen booked the flight and paid the fee for a steward to escort Justin through the airport, she said. She hired a driver in Moscow she found online to pick the child up from the Moscow airport, she said. She found "safe references" for the driver online, she said. She then prepared a letter for Justin to present to Russian officials, which included a photo of the driver, whom she identified as "Arthur," she said.

She followed the advice of an online lawyer on how to handle this situation and found references for a driver over the internet. If this is what she does with a seven year old child in trying to return him like a pair of shoes, I can just imagine what her parenting skills must have been like. And this makes me question the credibility of any of her statements. As far as I’m concerned, this should be investigated as child abandonment. No biological parent is allowed to abandon their children in this manner. It is just as unacceptable if the child is adopted. There are resources and services out there to help parents who need it. And what’s also a shame is that the private adoption agency should have ensured that this woman had all of the resources and support in place to handle an older child as part of the screening process. If she couldn’t handle the potential issues that could arise, she should never have been approved in the first place. The focus on ALL adoption should be what is best for the children. At the end of the day, this is about finding the right home for a child, not fulfilling a parental need. Just because you have the money to pay for the adoption process/fees, it doesn’t make you a fit parent. What concerns me the most in all of this, though, is what will become of seven-year old Justin. This is more trauma that this child has suffered now with a failed adoption. And it will take even more work from, hopefully, a more competent parent to undo. I wish him nothing but the very best because goodness knows he deserves it.

If you didn’t enough of this song the first time,…try it with a cat.

Here’s a brilliant feature that I’m looking forward to in the next release of Adobe Photoshop!

To celebrate Easter, why not try something completely sacrilegious….The Second Coming.
Now on Kindle, Nook, Sony, and the iPAD! Only $1.99!! To purchase at Amazon for the Kindle ($1.99)
To purchase on iTunes for iPhone/iPod Touch ($1.99)
To purchase in various formats (ePUB/MOBI/PDF/LRF/PDB) for Nook/Sony ($1.99) visit Smashwords
And to purchase on iBookstore for the iPad ($1.99) you’ll need to search for it. I don’t have the link yet, but if someone has it, please let me know what it is. Five hundred years have passed since the Earth shifted on its axis – a catastrophic event that wiped out civilization and released the powers of the dead back to Earth. With technology long abandoned, a dark age has shrouded our world once more. Travel to a future of blood sacrifice, demons, witchcraft, and an immoral God that has returned to reclaim his former dominion. “Beautifully written, dark and eerie vision of an apocalyptic future.” - New York Times Bestselling Author, Margaret Weis. “David H. Burton is a dark new talent in the genre.
This one will make you leave the lights on for a week!” - USA Today Bestseller, Cathy Clamp.