I’ve always loved vampires. My favorite show as a little kid was Dark Shadows. In the eighties and nineties I read a lot of Anne Rice. Vampires are like dark superheroes. I was always drawn to the sense of otherness about them. Their immortality, eternal youth and super powers were really cool to me as a kid. As an adult, I was attracted to the sense of being on the outside of society, living off the grid and observing the spectacle of the mortal world.
Cara Mia was my first novel and my current release, Twilight of the Gods second. I’ve just sent the third, My Fearful Symmetry to my publisher. The idea for the series evolved over a period of time. I kicked the first novel around for a long time before I sat down to finish it. Back when I was reading a lot of Anne Rice, I had a dream about a female vampire. I’d never read a book about one at the time. My husband and I brainstormed a little. He suggested exploring the fact that my protagonist was a woman and the implications of being both female and a vampire. Vampire sexual politics--who knew?
I based a lot of the Immortyl culture on ancient ones. I created a multi-layered society that enslaved three fourths of their population. Then I got interested in biotechnology and came up with the idea of a race to harness immortality. The revolution was Kurt’s idea entirely. The little bugger decided to take the series this way. Book two deals a lot with Mia and Kurt’s relationship and the revolutionary force they build. It’s funny how a character can hijack a series. Cedric MacKinnon, the hero of the third book, started out as a love interest for a character in the later novels. He soon became one of my favorites. His story begged to be told. An entire religious cult and art form were born from his creation. This is why I love speculative fiction so much. You can do things like this. I really get into building the world and the characters.
I did a lot of research when I was writing Cara Mia. I try to read up on current science articles. The books are a good excuse to go to New York once a year to take pictures, visit neighborhoods and museums. I used to live there, and I miss it a lot. I’m always looking up cultural information, foreign language, names, places etc. The most research I’ve done is on the third book, which is set mostly in India at the chief elder’s court. I did a lot of research on Indian culture, religions, costume, music, dance and mythology. Not that I’m trying to replicate actual life in that rich and fascinating culture. What I set out to do is to create a vampire subculture that has assimilated elements of that culture. Luckily I have a writer friend who was around in the sixties who found me great information on tantric sex rituals. Most of the stuff I found is very scholarly and doesn’t really get into what the process is like. Not the book is pornographic, but if a character is a practitioner of sexual rituals it’s important to know what he’s doing in his profession. I don’t write erotica. In my books sex is either about connection between characters or politics.
If you’d like to learn more about the series, I’m on Facebook at my Immortyl Revolution page just about everyday. For character profiles, excerpts and the Immortyl Lexicon go to my website http://www.deniseverricowriter.webs.com/ . I do author interviews and giveaways at my blog http://www.immortylrevolution.blogspot.com/ . I’m also on Twitter. My blog feeds are on Facebook, Amazon, Goodreads and Booktown. My books are on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Fictionwise and other sites. I sell autographed copies at my website. If they are not carried at your local bookstore, they can be special ordered. Autographed copies can be purchased through my webstore. By golly, I’m all over the place.
I’ve got a great Twilight of the Gods launch giveaway on my blog right now. You can win a gift package including a signed copy of each book, one signed poster of each book cover and a Cara Mia or Twilight of the Gods t-shirt (your choice). Visit my blog for details on how to enter.
Today, here at Fang-tastic Books I am offering a signed copy of Twilight of the Gods to one lucky reader.
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Roxanne, thanks for having me as your guest! I really enjoyed being here!
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