What
is your name, where were you born and where do you live now?
Melissa Darnell. I was born in California, grew up in East
Texas, and have since lived in the following states…Louisiana, Alabama,
Kentucky, West Virginia, Puerto Rico, Utah, Iowa, and South Dakota (where I
currently live).
What
is the name of your latest book, and if you had to summarise it in less than 20
words what would you say?
The Clann Series #1: Crave is a
contemporary YA series featuring a forbidden romance between members of warring
vampire and magically-gifted societies.
Who
is your publisher? Or do you self publish?
The publisher for my Clann Series is
Harlequin Teen. My cheerleading and
dance nonfiction books are all self published at www.CheerAndDanceBooks.com.
How
long does it usually take you to write a book, from the original idea to
finishing writing it?
For fiction, unless I’m under a deadline I
tend to wait until I can see the story like a movie inside my mind before I
ever start writing it, which can take anywhere from a month to several
months. Next, I plot out each scene
using Post-it notes on a bulletin board in my office. Then I’ll spend about a day creating a custom
playlist of music specifically for that book to give myself a “soundtrack” to
listen to while I work. At that point,
I’m then ready to write. I write the
rough draft of every book in longhand using a pen and a stack of composition
notebooks, and average 50-60 pages a day writing 6-8 hours at a time. Since I tend to write fairly long novels
(usually around 100,000-150,000 words) and also have a family that sometimes
requires me to take days off here and there, the rough draft can take a few
weeks to get down on paper. Once the
rough draft is completed, I type it up and make the first round of revisions as
I go. Then it’s off to the agent or
editor for feedback and more revisions.
What
can we expect from you in the future? ie
More books of the same genre? Books of a different genre?
There will definitely be 3 books in the
Clann Series, with book #2: Covet due out in the fall of 2012 and book #3:
Consume due out in 2013. I also recently
wrote an urban fantasy YA romance revolving around teens and illegal magic use called
The Source. And I have a YA conspiracy
thriller and a contemporary YA Greek mythology story in the works as well. So while I’m sticking with YA, the specific
genres tend to range a bit in variety. I
don’t worry about genre too much, as I prefer to go with the strongest story
ideas that I have brewing in the back of my mind at any given time! Whichever “pot” boils the quickest is the
next title to be written.
Where
do you get your book plot ideas from?
I get ideas from everywhere! And I do mean literally everywhere. Two of my latest ideas came from actual news
stories. Another was inspired by the
Greek meaning of my name!
Do
you read all the reviews of your book/books?
I started out reading all of the reviews
for Crave. But then I realized that
everyone’s opinions vary wildly, and it is impossible to please everyone or
even to try to. What one reviewer loves
another hates with a passion! So in the
end the two reviews that matter the most to me are my agent’s and my
editor’s. However, I will confess that I
do still read the good reviews when I need a little pick-me-up to keep me
going. I just let my hubby filter out
the bad ones nowadays.
How
do you market/promote your books?
I’m just now learning how to use social
media (sad, I know, but I’ve been spending all my time reading and writing till
now!). I’ve always enjoyed designing
websites, though, and I think a really good site can add so much to the
fictitional world that the books create.
So I like to design websites for each book series. TheClannSeries.com, for instance, not only
features each book’s summary and book trailer, but it also includes information
about the vampires and magically powerful Clann, images of the East Texas woods
and the lead characters, as well as an online playlist app that allows you to
listen to the soundtrack for each Clann Series book without having to download
anything.
Have
you ever based characters on people you know or based events on things that
have happened to you?
Absolutely!
My characters tend to be more melodramatic combinations of several people
I knew in real life, and my own life’s events and experiences either directly
or indirectly inspire a good portion of the scenes and events in my
stories. This helps me to really get
inside my characters’ heads and the emotions of each scenario taking place.
What
do you think about book trailers?
I LOVE book trailers. They’re simply commercials for books, and
they don’t last very long, but for that short minute or two it’s like getting
to watch that book in movie format.
Do
you or would you ever use a pen name?
While I do not use a pen name for my YA
books, I did use a pen name for several adult romance books I wrote years
ago. My adult romance books were more on
the steamy side, and as a mom, I know how I would feel if my kids accidentally
stumbled on an adult book beyond their maturity level because they were looking
for more works by that author. By using
a pen name and making sure to never do any cross promotion between the two categories
of my writing, none of my YA readers will ever accidentally read something
inappropriate for a YA audience.
Have
you ever suffered from a "writer's block"? What did you do to get
past the "block"?
My husband has got to be THE most
supportive writer’s spouse on the planet.
Not only does he serve as my primary beta reader before anyone else gets
to read my stories, but he also lets me bounce ideas off him for hours if
needed while I’m plotting out a book.
Thankfully once a book is plotted out, I know exactly what needs to be
written and don’t generally get writer’s block.
Readers can learn more about the Clann
Series at www.TheClannSeries.com,
about me specifically at www.melissadarnell.com,
and I love to interact with readers on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/theclannseries
and on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/TheClannSeries.
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