Roxanne Rhoads: Interview with Susan MacNicol

What inspired you to become an author?

I have a particular fascination for a British actor called Benedict Cumberbatch. I really want one. However that wasn’t going to happen. So I thought, “Right, the next best thing is write a role for him in a book, which someone will find incredibly amazing and want to make a film about it, then we can do a screen play and ask Benedict Cumberbatch to star in the film/TV series.” I kid you not, that was my inspiration. So I created the persona of Bennett Saville, London actor, inspired by Benedict. The story line was inspired by an actual event happening in my home town, when a concrete block was thrown from a motorway bridge onto a woman’s car below. Hey presto. I had ‘Cassandra by Starlight’ my first (M/F) novel.

Do you write in different genres?

I suppose I do. I write M/F and I write M/M now exclusively. I write contemporary Romance, but I write in both ‘worlds’, the real world of real people and events and the paranormal world where fantasy and magyck abound like in Double Alchemy. I’ve also written an romantic erotic crime thriller called Born Human so yes, I definitely like a challenge.

If yes which is your favorite genre to write?

Definitely M/M. I was hooked on this genre while researching the material for Born Human which has a bisexual serial killer as one of the main 4 MC’s. I needed to understand sex between men, so I read some novels which told me just how that was portrayed and never looked back.

How did you come up with the title for your latest book?

It was a play on the fact that there were two kinds of magyck at play in this story. One, the actual magyck Quinn has a Warlock, with his Withinner, Taliesin, a sixth century Welsh sorcerer. Two, the magic of love and the sizzling chemistry between two men, Quinn Fairmont and Cade Mairston. Theirs is an overwhelming passion because of the bond they share as Fey beings and because they are meant to be soul mates. So Double Alchemy was born. Alchemy of course is defined as ‘the medieval forerunner of chemistry, based on the supposed transformation of matter. It was concerned particularly with attempts to convert base metals into gold or to find a universal elixir.’ I simply took this definition to another level both emotionally and metaphorically.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?

I suppose we all sub consciously impart messages in our work. But I don’t set out to do so consciously.

‘Worth Keeping’ was about a man called Nick who was horribly abused who believed he wasn’t worth anyone’s love. And boy, did Owen prove him wrong on that one. This story was about hope, that love is something that can heal.

‘Saving Alexander’, the story of another abused man, Alex and his saviour Sage, was also about hope and healing and the fact every person in the world is worth fighting for.

‘Stripped Bare’ was about one man’s unconditional love for another helping him break out of his prison walls and finding love again.

*Sits back and narrows her eyes* Hmm I’m sensing a pattern here. Maybe I do have a message to send. Perhaps the eternal optimist in me is coming out in each book I write. Only the readers can judge that one.

Is the book, characters, or any scenes based on a true life experience, someone you know, or events in your own life?

There are no real life experiences of mine in Double Alchemy. I have visited the places where the book is set, Hampstead Heath in London, walked by the ponds Cade swims in and soaked up the atmosphere of this beautiful greenlands in the middle of a city. I’ve been to the place where Quinn, Percy and Magnus defeat the Witchfinder General, stood on the marsh flats and seen the skeletons of the boats sunk into the mud. But unfortunately I’ve never been able to time travel like Taliesin, never defeated another Warlock and certainly haven’t faced the trials that Cade and Quinn have to. *Sighs* I wish I could say I had..

What book are you reading now?

I‘ve just finished ‘Always’ by Kindle Alexander (still sniffling after that one, I needed half a dozen box of tissues to mop up the tears) and I’m currently reading a book called Same Page by Lily Velden, with the second in this series , The Race is On, queued up on my Kindle. I like to wait until there are a couple of books in a series then read them together. I’m enjoying it so far, but I’m not too far in yet..

What is your current “work in progress” or upcoming projects?

I’ve already mentioned my Men in London series. That’s going to take me most of 2014 and the start of 2015 to complete. It’s a six book series of about 50k words in each novella. But I do have a yearning to write a really detailed historical M/M romance, a saga that spans a longer time that my usual books. I haven’t quite decided on the era yet, but I’m toying with Victorian London.

I’m also trying to finish a book I’ve been busy with for a while, a ‘factional’ true life story about a man called Joe Leistman who was a victim of sexual abuse while in the Boy Scouts. Fellow author Sue Brown is co-writing this with me and we’re both excited about it. If you want to find out more about it, you can visit our Facebook Page.

https://www.facebook.com/BrokenBoyMeaningfulMan

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?

Like any writer out there trying to write and promote themselves at the same time, the biggest challenge is the time to actually write. I love the promotional side of the business. I have made such good friends and had a blast of a time. But I can sometimes get so caught in the Facebook and Twitter activity, writing guest posts for blog tours like this one, keeping my own blog up to date etc that the writing seems to take a back seat. Then when you do sit down and try focus, your mind wanders. So it’s a bit of a battle to create new words when you’re in that mind mode. One needs to give oneself a slap around the back of the head and tell oneself to concentrate on the task in hand.

Who designed the cover of your latest book?

I am very fortunate to have an Editor in Chief at Boroughs who is hands on with the cover design and writing the blurbs and key notes. Chris Keeslar is a genius and I love his style on all my covers. He’s done them all to my knowledge, perhaps with a little help from someone, and he has involved me every step of the way. I love my book covers. We get a lot of compliments on them.

Double Alchemy

Susan MacNicol

Genre: m/m paranormal romance

Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group

ASIN: B00J7FVYRC

Book Description:

Powerful yet tormented modern warlock Quinn Fairmont must initiate the silver-eyed Cade Mairston into the world of witchfinders, Withinners, and what can happen when two men fall truly, madly, deeply in love.

THE WORLD IN SHADOW

In modern London there lurks a warlock, Quinn Fairmont. Dangerous, powerful, tortured, sharing his body with the soul of an ancient Welsh sorcerer, Quinn is never alone—and never wholly himself. He fights against all those who would exploit his kind. He takes pleasure where he can find it.

In the forest of Hampstead Heath, Quinn’s hometown, Cade Mairston appears to him like a waking dream. Lithe, lean and silver-eyed, he evokes feelings in Quinn unlike any other: lust with true affection, immediate and shocking. Cade is clearly more than he seems. And yet, if a man of the world, Cade is innocent. He knows nothing of warlocks, witchfinders or Withinners. He knows nothing of what he is, what he might be, or what he might feel. For him, the story is just beginning. Magyck, peril and passion await.

Available on Amazon

Book Trailer : http://youtu.be/Un64l7-7P8k

About the Author:

Sue Mac Nicol was born in Leeds, Yorkshire, in the United Kingdom. At the age of eight, her family moved to Johannesburg, South Africa where she stayed for nearly thirty years before arriving back in the UK in December 2000. She has written ten novels, two novellas and a screenplay since February 2012 and clearly believes in keeping herself busy. She has found herself wanting to stay in the genre that is M/M Romance so more can definitely be expected.

Sue is a member of Romance Writers of America and Romantic Novelists Association in the UK. She is also a member of a rather unique writing group, called the Talliston Writer’s Circle, which in itself has a story all of its own to tell and lives in the rural village of Bocking, in Essex, with her family. Her plan is to keep writing as long as her muse sits upon her shoulder. Her dream is to one day make enough money to give up the day job and get that big old house in the English countryside overlooking a river, where she can write all day and continue to indulge her passion for telling stories.

website: www.susanmacnicol.com

blog: www.susanmacnicol.wordpress.com

facebook: www.facebook.com/susiemax77

twitter: www.twitter.com/SusanMacNicol7

linkedin: http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/susanmacnicol/48/a44/602