1. Which
is your favorite genre to write?
I always seem to default to some form of speculative
fiction or fantasy, although I’ve written a number of more ‘straight’ works,
too. I think it’s the freedom to be able to create worlds, to take ideas and
stretch them as outrageously far as I want, including with characters, where I
can play with a lot of stuff in creating different species and cultures that I
couldn’t pull off with a strictly ‘human’ cast. Maybe it’s my history
background, but I also really love creating fictional wars, religions,
political systems, corruption…especially when interwoven with our own. It’s a
lot of fun!
2. Do
you title the book first or wait until after it’s complete?
99% of the time, I title the book first, especially
novels…although those titles have changed halfway through the writing a number of
times, and sometimes even at the end, I’ll realize I got it wrong, or maybe
that there’s something that would work a lot better.
3. Is
there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?
I think messages end up being there, even when
authors really intend them to be. In terms of things I do intentionally,
however, rather than a message, more what happens for me is that I have
concepts I chew on (sometimes obsessively) in the course of writing the book. I
don’t usually come to any specific conclusion with those concepts…nor do I
really try. Personally, I’m not into preachy books, so I’ve never tried to use
fiction to sell any particular idea, since I find that kind of obnoxious. Also,
to be totally frank, I often come out of those ‘mulling’ sessions with only a
vague inkling of what I think myself. Like in the Allie’s War books, including Shield:
Allie’s War, Book Two, I’m often playing around the with the notions of
good and evil, obsession versus love, possessiveness, trust, aggression and so
on. I wouldn’t say there is any “message” there, though. My only real goal is
to create characters that are believably complex, and yet ones I can relate to
and like, despite those contradictions, and the fact that they do some pretty
questionable things at times.
4. Is
the book, characters, or any scenes based on a true life experience, someone
you know, or events in your own life?
I think as writers we can’t help but draw from our
own lives and experiences with other people and the world. For me, I would say
this definitely happens, and gets mixed in with the reading I do, both
nonfiction and fiction, and the places I’ve traveled and so on. At the same
time, I don’t think I’ve ever written a 1:1 in terms of characters or
situations. I use a lot of composites to play with ideas, but I’ve never based
a character on a real person or an exact situation.
5. What
book are you reading now?
I’m actually getting ready to go to a workshop on
writing mystery novels, with a bunch of other professional writers, so I’m
making my way through the reading list for that workshop. I just finished
Robert Crais’ very excellent book in the Elvis Cole universe, called L.A. Requiem. I absolutely loved it, and
am now buying a bunch of other books in the series. Totally in love with Joe
Pike now, lol…he’s a hottie, for sure.
6. What
is your current “work in progress” or upcoming projects?
I’m currently working on book seven in the Allie’s
War series, tentatively entitled BRIDGE.
7. Can
you share a little of your current work with us?
Sure! It’s pretty rough at this point, and I cut it
down some to pull out a few spoilers, but here’s a short scene from Chapter
One: “Damaged” ~
*
The younger
seer started to speak, his full mouth curling into a frown.
Before he
could get out the words, Revik shook his head, once. His jaw hardened, but he
was speaking over the other’s expression without bothering to reach out with
his light for the specific objections in the young seer’s mind.
“...I don’t
want to hear it,” he said.
The younger
seer opened his mouth.
“––I mean
it, Maygar,” Revik growled. “No excuses. We try it again. From the beginning.
Or I start training you the way I was taught. No modifications.”
Maygar’s
eyes hardened to brown stones in his high-cheekboned face.
“Yeah,”
Revik said. “You’ll like it less than this. Significantly less.”
Maygar
glanced at the one-way window, right before he looked back at Revik. Something
in the gesture conveyed helplessness, which only managed to anger Revik more.
Resting his
hands on his hips, Revik hit at the younger seer with his light, until he had
his full attention again.
“Balidor’s
not going to help you,” he warned, gesturing towards the same one-way window
etched into the organic face of the room’s wall. “No one’s going to help you,
Maygar. You said you wanted this, and I have neither the time to waste nor the
inclination to pretend I give a damn about your feelings of inadequacy...”
Revik
gestured around at the broader room, a nearly featureless square cell they’d
built in the basement of the four-story Victorian in which the infiltration
team currently lived. He knew there were plans to move the whole operation a
few hundred...if not thousand...miles inland of their current location. He knew
they would likely need a bigger space soon, and approved of the overall plans,
but he wasn’t leaving here until she was able to be safely moved.
Balidor
understood.
In fact, he
hadn’t even argued, which Revik appreciated more than he’d expressed, or likely
would express. The Adhipan leader made a few jokes about the mountain coming to
Mohammad, and that was the end of it. He put his people to work, and they’d
left Revik to do what he was doing, and only interrupted him when they needed
something specific.
Revik
appreciated that, too.
Still, it
felt temporary here. All of them felt it. On some level, it was utterly insane
to stay here, given San Francisco’s location along major fault lines and its
proximity to the sea.
Revik
didn’t care.
Revik
rarely left this specific building.
The room’s
walls glowed with organic life, shimmering with a disconcerting glimmer of
sentience as his eyes and light followed their snaking trails. It was the first
such room the Adhipan and their technicians had ever attempted to build. While
it didn’t quite have the impenetrability of the tank Galaith had built in the
mountains of Asia––which had been designed to cut a seer totally off from the
Barrier proper––when fully activated, this room came close.
Revik’s
eyes didn’t leave the other man’s while he thought this.
“...Plenty
of other seers want to be on the ground for this,” he growled at Maygar’s
silence. “Plenty of other seers would kill themselves for the opportunity to
help, particularly at this level. Say the word, and I’ll start training for a
different approach...one that doesn’t need your skills. Or your excuses.”
Maygar’s
frown deepened, but something in that last speech caused his dark brown eyes to
clear somewhat. The younger seer shook his head while Revik watched, clenching
his jaw as if he didn’t trust what might come out of his mouth if he were to
speak.
Revik found
himself hardening his light against the expression there.
He saw the
grief behind it. He felt enough of a flavor of Allie’s light on the other seer
that a pain rose abruptly to his chest. He felt the intensity of Maygar’s hurt...and
that sadness resonated briefly with his own, enough that he had to fight back
his light, to control it with an iron hand before he did something he would
regret.
His words
came out the same as before, however.
“Now try it
again,” he said, aiming his light deliberately at the relevant structure over
the younger seer’s head. “Exactly like I showed you...”
That time,
Maygar nodded, his expression taut, almost vulnerable in its determination.
“All
right,” he said, unfolding his arms. “...I’m ready.”
*
8. Do
you have to travel much to do research for your books?
I did some traveling in the beginning, especially
for the first few books. I visited Vancouver, B.C. to find them a good hideout
while they were on the run in book one. I also took a cruise ship to Alaska,
since I’d never been on a cruise before and I’d planned to set a chunk of the
book on one, so I figured I should have some idea of what they were like. I
also traveled to India, and ended up drawing from that experience quite a bit
in writing some of the sections located in that part of Asia, in the foothills
of the Himalayas.
9. Who
designed the cover of your latest book?
Actually, I’m embarrassed to admit that I did. I did
hire people a few times, but I never ended up with something that seemed to
capture the feel of the series well enough to market it effectively. So this
version can be blamed squarely on my shoulders, since I designed all of the
covers myself. I did try to study what was out in my genre, so I wouldn’t be
working in a total vacuum, but yeah, I’ve obviously still got a lot to learn.
10.Do
you have any advice for other writers?
Honestly, this is such a great time to be a writer,
you almost can’t go wrong as long as you are constantly striving to get better
at your craft and continue to put stuff out there. Audiences are growing,
retailers are proliferating, independent bookstores are doing great…it just
became a lot easier for indies to get paperback books in bookstores at the same
level of discounting as the major publishers. You can pursue a hybrid career or
go exclusively indie or exclusively traditional, if you so desire. You can
pretty much write whatever you want and still find a market for it somewhere,
so for the first time in ages, it doesn’t matter so much what a bunch of
salespeople in suits think about your stuff being “marketable” in that broad,
mega-seller sense. You can be a niche writer and still make a living. I would
say, in terms of advice – just have fun, and write what you love, and worry
about the market later. For once, that’s actually a viable strategy, no matter
how off-beat your writing and/or voice is.
June 10 Tour Intro
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My Paranormal Book Review
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Escape Into A Book
June 21 Interview
Mythical Books
June 25 Interview
Pembroke Sinclair.
June 26 Interview
Paranormal Romance Fans for Life
June 26 Spotlight
Jody's Book Reviews & Giveaways
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The Creatively Green Write at Home Mom
July 1 review
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Books & Tales
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Cabin Goddess ~
July 5 Spotlight
Share My Destiny
July 5 review
A Bibliophiles Thoughts on Books
July 8 Guest blog
Romance on a Budget
Shield
Allie’s War, Book Two
JC Andrijeski
JC Andrijeski
Genre: New Adult / Urban Fantasy/ Romance
Publisher: White Sun Press
ISBN-10: 1456555731
ISBN-13: 978-1456555733
ASIN: B004TXR750
Number of pages: 432
Word Count: approx. 160K
Cover Artist: White Sun Press
Book Description:
“And they say Death will live among them in the guise of a child....”
Grappling with her new identity as “Bridge,” a being meant to herald the end for all of humanity, isn’t even Allie’s biggest problem. She’s also coping with a whole new set of rules around her seer marriage, as well as the power-hungry Rook she helped put in the White House, who is currently doing his best to start a war with China.
Then the boy appears. A sociopath with all of the energetic markings of Syrimne, a highly dangerous telekinetic seer who killed thousands during World War I, he doesn’t appear to have aged in one hundred years.
Worse, he thinks Allie belongs to him.
About the Allie’s War Series:
An urban fantasy paranormal romance set in a unique, gritty version of Earth, populated by a second race of beings called seers, the Allie’s War series centers on the relationship of a strong female protagonist, Allie Taylor, and her antihero guide, Dehgoies Revik. Falling into the new adult genre of books, the Allie’s War series takes place in a modern version of Earth you’ve never seen, that spans centuries along with the lives of its main characters, the seers, and the wars they fight with themselves and their human allies and enemies, (steamy sex scenes in parts!).
Allie's War series
Shield: Allie’s War, Book Two
About the Author:
JC Andrijeski has published novels, novellas, serials, graphic novels and short stories, as well as nonfiction essays and articles, including the Allie’s War series, The Slave Girl Chronicles and bestselling novella, The Alien Club. Her short fiction runs from humorous to apocalyptic, and her nonfiction articles cover subjects from graffiti art, meditation, psychology, journalism, politics and history. JC has traveled extensively and lived abroad, but currently lives and works on the Oregon Coast.
Please visit JC's blog at http://jcandrijeski.blogspot.com or her website at www.syrimne.com
website: www.jcandrijeski.com
FB author page: https://www.facebook.com/J.C.Andrijeski
Goodreads author page:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jcandrijeski
@jcandrijeski
Amazon Author page: http://www.amazon.com/JC-Andrijeski/e/B004MFTAP0/
4 comments:
I do not read a lot in this genre but I would love to read this one.
debby236 at gmail dot com
Hey, thanks, Debby! And best of luck on the giveaway! I hope you get a chance to check it out :)
Thanks for the giveaway! I have Book 1, though I haven't had a chance to read it yet. It fits in well with my typical reads and I'd love to have book 2 so I can read them back-to-back! I can't believe JC's already on book SEVEN!!
Thanks for participating, Holly! And for checking out the series - I really hope you like it! And yeah, (re: the 7 books) I'm a bit obsessive-compulsive like that. : ) Best of luck on the giveaway!
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