I recently read Ms. Sarina’s debut novella, Gilded Destiny, and was thoroughly impressed! I plan to post my review next week, but in the meant time she was nice enough to drop by to guest post:
Thank you so much for hosting me today on Your Urban Fantasy!
Forgive me if this is a little scattered. My book releases on MONDAY *EEK!* and I’ve got a million things battling in my thoughts for priority like “Pick me! Pick me!!!”
I’m on week two of the blog tour and so far, I’ve had such an absolute blast. And I’m thrilled to be here on Your Urban Fantasy. I thought I’d answer a question I’ve heard a few times about GILDED DESTINY: A Vesper Novella in advance of the release.
“What’s the Biblical connection in your Vesper series, and how does it affect the story?”
Vampires were my original inspiration for creating a new creature of the night to prey on the human race. I wanted my creatures to carry that same, bizarre sex appeal of being comparable in shape and size to a human, but still wielding different abilities and features than a human. I knew my creatures would live in the shadows, and lack a reflection (thanks to the curse of Vanity on their heads when they committed Original Sin), and have sharp, toxic fangs.
But I didn’t want my creatures to drink blood often like vampires, and I didn’t want them to be able to blend in with everyday society or have shape-shifting abilities. If you see a Vesper, you’ll know it: Black eyes, black veins, and pale skin with neon, glowing fangs dripping with potent poison. But you won’t see them because the shadows hide them, and that poison is the key to their feeding process.
I wanted to see vampires kicked up a notch and the old stories adapted, the same way I like to see Biblical stories adapted to fit modern interest. Biblical FanFiction is one of my favorite types of fiction (along with Paranormal/UF, and New Adult). So to kick up the fear aspect of the Vespers, they poison their victims with their fangs. As the poison moves through the body, the prey shrivels up and dehydrates so the Vesper can swallow it whole with unhinge-able, serpent jaws given to him with his curse by the snake in the Original Garden.
I’m a regular blogger over at New Stories, Old Book blog (http://newstoriesoldbook.wordpress.com) where I’m fortunate enough to blog with some really talented, fantastic authors about the connections between the Bible and modern fiction that can be seen almost everywhere. We talk with our readers about movies and TV shows and look for hidden representations of Biblical tales. In my Vesper series, I made the Vespers cursed by Original Sin, which gives all the characters a deep appreciation for the spirituality that shapes the human race, though they don’t discriminate at all between Christian and other faiths.
As an author, I love pulling the Catholic lessons of my upbringing into my fiction. As a human being, I don’t associate with any organized religion and carry a personal relationship with my spirituality that combines aspects from several faiths including Buddhism and Pagan beliefs. But though my spirituality is not black-and-white, it’s a big part of who I am and I hope that reflects in my fiction.
Gilded Destiny really only touches on this part of the Vesper world very lightly, introducing the fact that the Vespers have a Biblical background in the Original Garden, but not taking it further. There simply isn’t time for Calli to learn more about Nycholas’ world before the deadly, terrifying Vespers pursue them and Nycholas makes his choices, while Calli’s most shocking, buried memories surface.
Thank you SO MUCH to Your Urban Fantasy for having me on board today for the blog stop, and I’m so excited to hear what you think of the concepts in Gilded Destiny (the novella is out May 13! AAAHHH!!!). What traditional myths, legends, stories, or beliefs would YOU like to see challenged in fiction? What would you like to see left alone, and kept the same?
Strangely enough I hadn’t really thought about placing biblical story lines twisted into fiction until very recently and the idea really appeals to me. I’m not a Christian, but I love bible stories. I think this plus a new creature of the night sound awesome.
Slcurwin – I’m so glad it appeals to you! I hope you enjoy reading the Vespers as much as I love writing them!
I just saw that you are going to be at When Words Collide! I just stumbled across your name when I was going through the program. Small world, I hope I’ll get a chance to meet you.
Hi, Slcurwin!
I’m so excited you’ll be attending! Be sure to track me down and say hi. I’m easy to spot, because I’m covered in tattoos haha. I’ll be putting on a first chapter workshop and taking blue pencil sessions as well as book signing.
Did you manage to find GILDED DESTINY on Amazon.ca? I can link you if you haven’t been able to track it down. The second Vesper novella comes out August 6th. 🙂
Only for e-reader on Amazon.ca, so I stuck with Kobo. Are you going to bring any print copies with you to sell?
I hope to, as well as a few of the second novella. Amazon.com does ship the paperbacks to Canada if you want to be sure you get one!
They do ship it to Canada, but they charge twice the book’s cost to do so (and they used to charge more, just noticed the change). It just seems silly. If you find out ahead of time that you wont have print copies though, you should let me know because I’d do it anyways in that case. 🙂
There are a surprising amount of authors that will be there that it’s hard to find some books for. I’m assuming many will have some for sale there though. Apparently there is an author that has a vampire story centered in Calgary and I can’t find it for the life of me and but the idea is so funny that I desperately want to.
Just picked it up for my kobo! Sadly the print version wasn’t available on the Canadian amazon site yet 🙁
It won’t let me reply directly to your comment so I’m replying took this one 🙂
Yeah, I understand the shipping thing. I will have some with me, just not sure how many. Track me down early! I’m there all weekend. 🙂
You can be sure that tracking you down is one of the first things I’m planning on :). I noted your “out of the gates” at 2 on Friday, but (since this is my first year at this and I haven’t a clue) where can one find you other than at your scheduled programs? Is there a place authors go when not presenting?
Ooooh your first year! You’ll LOVE it. This con is so craft-based and there’s so much to see… you can’t possibly make it to all the presentations you want to, ya know?
My workshop (and all the workshops run by one individual rather than a panel) is a small one, and requires advance sign-up. There’s usually a main room with sign-ups for blue pencil/pitches/workshops along with people selling books, so be sure to get your name down early if you want to join me at Out of The Gates.
Otherwise, we’re pretty much all over the place. I’ll be sitting on a number of panels at the bigger presentations, and then there’s a mass autograph session on one of the nights. Also, the after-party socials in the hotel rooms are fantastic. Everyone is really friendly. I end up in the hallways in between events yapping with other authors all the time. 🙂
So how early would you have to be to be most likely to sign up for everything(ish) you want? Do you have to show up hours in advance? half hour early? (I have no clue how packed this thing gets).
I’ve informed my husband that I’m abandoning the family for the three days and booked a hotel room so I can fully revel in my geekery with like-minded people and not worry about driving in and out of Calgary every day. He even pretended for a minute to be shocked that I would want to do so. He keeps going to concerts out of town, it’s my turn!!! It’s like comic-expo excitement all over again!