Note: I’m sharing these character profiles to reintroduce you to some of the characters in Reborn. This means they may contain some spoilers. So, if you haven’t read Reborn yet, beware…..
Victoria (Nike)
Age: Like all of the Olympians, she’s really old, but she looks about early twenties.
Physical Description: Tall; athletic; auburn hair usually worn in a ponytail; amber-colored eyes; white feathered wings
Species: Olympian; goddess of victory
Relationship Status: In a relationship (you’ll meet her in Relapse)
Other relationships:
Siobhan’s (and Tanya’s)big sister in Gamma Lambda Phi
Goals: In Reborn, Victoria’s main goals were to send Jasper back to Olympus and to protect their college campus. As you find out at the end of Reborn, Victoria and Jasper are related. You’ll learn more about their rocky sibling relationship in Relapse. As the patron goddess of Gamma Lambda Phi, and its chapter president, Victoria’s ongoing goal is to maintain the trust and respect of her sorority sisters. She’s someone the sisters, particularly Siobhan, go to for advice.
As the paragon of victory, she’s also motivated by winning. And, as you’ll see in Relapse, she sometimes takes this need to win a little too far…
Strengths:
Practical
Sincere
Wise
Charismatic
Weaknesses:
Self-conscious, especially about how the sisters perceive her
Hobbies:
President of Gamma Lambda Phi sorority
Running
*****
“I have a dark side, too. You just haven’t seen much of it.”
Only two more weeks until Relapse comes out…..eek!!!!! Why did I decide to release it right after Thanksgiving again? Oh, right, because I love you guys, and I want you to have something to read over winter break. 😉
Before we go on with today’s post, I thought I’d mention I got a little (very, very little) writing done this weekend…335 words, to be exact. I’m working on a novella from Anna’s POV. The novella takes place somewhat parallel to the events in Reborn. I don’t know if I’ll do anything with it, or if it will become part of the next book. I’m mainly doing it to find her voice and flesh out her back story, since I want to incorporate more from her POV in future books.
But, anyway, that’s not what today’s post is about. I want to talk about influences: the authors, themes, and types of characters I’ve become obsessed with over the years. This may turn into a two-part post…we shall see…
1. Mischief and Mayhem
As a reader and writer, I’ve always been intrigued by the idea that there could be these otherworldly, always mischievous (and often malevolent) beings sort of lurking in the background, in worlds adjacent to our own, influencing it in ways we don’t realize. (Or sometimes, as they do in Reborn, they get very mixed up in our world.) It’s a totally freaky, even creepy idea–one I think is so much fun to explore in fiction, but nothing I actually believe in real life. When I was first playing around with the story that would eventually become Reborn, this is the concept I knew I wanted to capture. I wanted my supernatural beings to be volatile, mischievous, and manipulative–characteristics often embodied by The Fair Folk. I’m talking about the devious Fair Folk of Irish lore, or like Puck et al in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, not the Disney fairies like Tinker Bell, lol. To be quite honest, I don’t know a lot about Irish folklore besides what I’ve seen other authors use–and they’ve incorporated it quite well already into works of fiction, so I wanted to do something a little different.
I think Karen Marie Moning’s Fae are the best–but, as she is my favorite author, I’m probably biased. In Moning’s Highlander and Fever series, the Fae are arrogant, devious, and lethally seductive. Back in the day, I wrote a book review of The Immortal Highlander–my absolute favorite of her Highlander romance novels. Immortal’s antihero, Adam Black, is a good example of this type of character, although he’s not mischievous in a cruel way. The Seelie Queen places a curse on Adam that strips him of his immortality and makes him invisible. His is a hopeless case until he meets Gabby, a sidhe-seer–gifted with seeing beyond the glamour used by the Fae, and the only one who can see Adam. Since Gabby seems to be his only hope, Adam ingratiates himself into Gabby’s life and eventually convinces her to help him. It’s been awhile since I’ve read this book, but I remember Adam perched on Gabby’s desk at her law firm while she tried to get work done, nagging her. Obviously, that kind of behavior would be super creepy and annoying in real life, but the love-hate dynamic between Adam and Gabby made for a very entertaining book. It didn’t help that Adam’s glamour was that of a sexy Scottish Highlander, making it almost impossible for Gabby to resist him.
Moning went on to write the Fever series–a sexy urban fantasy series in which the walls between our world and that of the Fae become even thinner. The Immortal Highlander isn’t an official prequel to the Fever series, but it’s definitely where her books about time-traveling, sexy Scottish Highlanders start to get much darker, and it sets up the conflict for her later books. I think the Fever series was a pretty daring one–primarily, I’d call it an urban fantasy, but Moning combines elements of a bunch of different genres and just makes it work so well (mystery, sci-fi, romance, and they’re funny as hell). I’d say for marketing purposes, it’s a good strategy to choose one or maybe two genres that your work fits into, but her books have taught me that it’s okay to push the limits of a genre and mix things up a bit.
A very much related type of character is:
2. The Trickster
You didn’t really think you’d get through this post without a picture of Hiddles, did you?
The Trickster is, according to TV Tropes, which I can’t stop reading lately, a type of character that “plays tricks or otherwise disobeys normal rules and conventional behavior.” This is definitely related to what I’ve described above, but I’m separating them out. We can depict these qualities in an entire race, like the Fair Folk (or the Olympians…), or in an individual character (whose peers may or may not embody these traits). I prefer the darker, more anti-hero-ish tricksters who use outright manipulation and deception to get what they want, without (much) remorse. They also pretty much pop in and out of places and situations as they like without a whole lot of consideration for rules or puny humans other people. Recent examples include Rumpelstiltskin on ABC’s Once Upon A Time and Loki in the Thor franchise. Another classic example (teehee) is Jareth from Labyrinth.
One of my other favorite trickster types is Julian from L.J. Smith’s The Forbidden Game. I’ve most definitely fan-girled over this trilogy before on this blog, but it’s one of my all-time favs. One of my friends introduced me to L.J. Smith back in freshman year or so of high school, and my life was changed, forever. (Dramatic much?) These books were already ten years old or so when I originally read them, and now…yes, I just confirmed on Wikipedia, The Forbidden Game is twenty years old. Aaaaaand now I officially feel old.
Anyway, I reread them this summer (they were first published as separate books, but since they’re short, they’re published now in an omnibus edition), and…they were still good. Sure, they’re written at about a middle school reading level, and, since they are so short, I noticed some of the repetition. Smith is a fan of the epithet, which, in a longer book, may help you remember each character–but, in a shorter book, it gets repetitive. Even so, there’s just something about Smith’s writing I’ve always loved. It almost has a beat to it–like poetry.
The Forbidden Game is an urban fantasy trilogy with a tiny blonde-haired, green-eyed protagonist named Jenny Thornton. Jenny starts out as an innocent, naive girl still dependent on her childhood sweetheart, Tom. (I mean, Tom’s nickname for her is Thorny. You don’t get any more disgustingly cute than that.) There’s mystery and magic from the start of Book One, The Hunter, when Jenny, who is being followed by two delinquent-types, takes refuge in a strange store called “More Games.” She buys a game in a plain white box, simply called “The Game,” from the even stranger boy running the shop. Of course, with his white-blonde hair and otherworldly blue eyes, he’s über attractive–and, despite his seeming indifference towards her, Jenny feels a strange connection to him.
That night, Jenny, Tom, and the rest of their friends start to play The Game, setting up a paper house and drawing their worst nightmares on sheets of paper. The next thing they know, they’re inside the paper mansion, transported there by the cyberpunk boy from the More Games store. His name is Julian, and he’s the youngest of an ancient race called The Shadow Men. In order to win Julian’s twisted game, Jenny and her friends must confront their worst fears–and, if they lose The Game, they lose their lives. Julian is a predator and master of manipulation (and very Jareth-esque). Of course, as the series goes on, you find out that Julian maybe isn’t the ultimate big bad he claims to be.
The Forbidden Game includes one of L.J. Smith’s favorite themes (and, okay, one of mine): the love triangle. Ms. Smith’s love triangle is usually set up as the relatively innocent girl caught between the good guy/hero type and the seemingly bad boy/antihero. In this case, Jenny’s good guy is Tom, and Jenny’s bad boy is Julian. Jenny knows that sweet and caring Tom is the guy for her, but she can’t help but be tempted by Julian’s beauty and charisma. These books are also about obsessive love: Julian is obsessed with Jenny and will do anything to have her.
Which brings us to one of my other favorite topics, and the final one for tonight:
3. Forbidden Desires
Two of my favorite themes in fiction are sin and temptation (well, what is perceived to be sinful by that character). Often, this takes the form of fairly-innocent-girl-gets-tempted-by-dark-sexy-mysterious-man’s-dark-world-of-…..darkness…..okay, I’m becoming less and less articulate as this post goes on, but you get the gist. 😉 Let’s just call it forbidden love/lust. This theme probably at least in part stems from the idea of sex as a sinful or evil act–perhaps a very Western/Christian notion. In some of these stories, the innocent heroine, initially intrigued by the sexy, devilish antihero, ultimately resists temptation and does the “right” thing. Going further with this interpretation, maybe it has something to do with the antiquated notion that women retain their virtue and innocence for as long as possible. And, even though I don’t agree with that, it’s a fun theme to explore in fiction. This is probably why Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was big on writing about sin, temptation, and the hypocrisy of the Puritans, remains one of my favorite classical authors.
Like I said, The Forbidden Game is the perfect example of this. Throughout the series, Jenny has to battle against her attraction to Julian in order to do the right thing and save her friends. But Julian’s influence on her isn’t all bad: Jenny transforms from the innocent girl who still relies on her boyfriend for everything into a more independent and confident young woman who thinks for herself. This theme of the allure of darkness is also a major theme in the musical The Phantom of the Opera. And in a certain 80s children’s fantasy movie.
With the relatively recent explosion in popularly of paranormal romance and other darker forms of romance and fantasy, the above types of characters and themes are fairly common right now–although not every author approaches them in quite the same way. These otherworldly characters, whether they’re the Fae, gods, fallen angels, vampires, etc., may be charming and alluring, but they’re also cunning, dangerous, predatory, and don’t play by our (human) rules. Of late, they’re also typically inhumanly beautiful, which further emphasizes their almost irresistible pull and maybe plays a little bit into the notion that not everything attractive is good for you.
*****
When I think of what a paranormal romance is–just what exactly the genre encompasses–these types of characters and themes are what come to my mind. I think everybody is a little bit different with regards to this. Although many paranormal romances still have that major, initial element of forbidden love, some authors go on to develop a story that is a little more traditionally romantic/lovey dovey, and it’s this type of story a lot of readers are used to now. Since I’ve been marketing Reborn as a paranormal romance, I think a few people have been confused by how I chose to approach Siobhan and Jasper’s relationship. It’s not traditionally romantic–it’s passionate and intense, but also a roller-coaster ride, and even a bit scary at times. That’s because the, er, “classic” paranormal romances, like L.J. Smith’s work, combine themes from the romance and horror genres. I’m not even sure “romance” is the right word, except that it captures the passionate relationship between the two lead characters. But these stories are also about temptation, forbidden desires, obsessive “love,” good and evil, dominance and submission, predator and prey. The settings are dark, mysterious, and sinister–as are some of the characters.
If you’ve read Reborn, you may see now how the above ideas have influenced it. My Olympians are, for the most part, volatile, capricious, mischievous, and manipulative. And even the ones that aren’t completely devious have a dark side (as the tagline for Relapse says, everybody has one…although perhaps not quite to the extent that my characters do, lol). Siobhan isn’t completely innocent in the conventional sense, but she’s a bit of a small-town girl thrown, thanks to Jasper, into the darker, alluring world of the Olympians. Jasper is her forbidden fruit–Siobhan knows he’s dangerous, but is tempted all the same (and Jasper will go to any lengths to keep her). And, unlike the strong, “virtuous” ladies described above, Siobhan isn’t as good at resisting temptation. In Relapse, Siobhan’s struggle against this forbidden world is taken to a new level as she begins to realize she’s more like the manipulative, control-freak Olympians than she thought. As a final tease, you’ll also meet a new character in Relapse–a sexy, silly, trickster-type like Jareth or Julian. I’m excited for you to meet him. 😉
You may remember Apate as Eric’s other “teaching assistant”/minion of darkness in Reborn. She’s the goddess of trickery/deceit and has a much bigger presence in Relapse. Now that Jasper’s gone for good (…), Apate is next on Gamma Lambda Phi’s list of asses to kick back to Olympus. She also antagonizes Siobhan like it’s her raison d’etre. I’ve been having a blast writing her character, so thought I’d share!
Species: Olympian
Age: In Olympian years, a young adult
Physical Description: Petite; obsidian hair; creamy complexion; wine red lips; cat-like green eyes; often wears black; smells like iron and roses
Relationships: In Relapse, she sets her sights on Jimmy to be her “new toy” (poor Jimmy).
But her most important relationship is with her twin brother, Dolos, who Eric is holding captive to get Apate to do his bidding. Dolos is really the only person Apate would do anything for.
Goal: To free her brother
Obstacles: Being a spirit of deceit, she has trouble getting people to trust her. She also has a hard time trusting other people.
Strengths: Beautiful, confident, independent, doesn’t (usually) care what people think of her, loving (at least when it comes to her family)
Weaknesses: Jealous, suspicious, mischievous
Power: Apate and her brother can produce complex illusions, making others see/hear/taste/feel/smell whatever they want them to.
Who would play her in a movie: Phoebe Tonkin, of The Secret Circle/The Vampire Diaries/The Originals fame
Theme Song: Kesha’s “Cannibal”
“I’m impulsive. I do things for my own amusement, not really thinking through how it affects other people. Sometimes not really caring.”
Below is the video update I posted to my Facebook page last night! It’s my first vlog, so don’t judge. 😉 I used my phone (in retrospect, I should have turned it the other way, horizontally, lol)…so it’s REALLY upclose and personal, ha! But give it a watch for some exciting news and updates about my WIP!
[One correction: Towards the beginning I say it’s Reborn’s half-month birthday…I meant half-birthday.]
The subject of “strong” female characters has been on my mind a lot lately. A few of my fellow bloggers and writers have addressed this subject, most recently H.N. Sieverding’s blog post The Trouble with Alpha Males. So this is a post that I just really needed to write. I hope we can have a thoughtful, productive conversation about it.
First off, I want to say that I think it’s GREAT that people are talking about how women are portrayed in books, on TV, in movies, etc. It’s a subject that really needs to be talked about, especially considering the way girls and women have been portrayed through these media in the past. I think it’s fantastic that we now have characters like Scarlett Johansson’s character in the Marvel franchise, Black Widow, who is beautiful and smart and can kick ass. Women haven’t always been given these kinds of roles, and I think it’s an important step for our society to show women as warriors, fighters, soldiers, “superheros.” It may be especially important for young girls to see these kinds of role models–to read about strong female characters like Katniss from The Hunger Games and Tris from Divergent and then to see them in film. We need to teach and show them that women are smart and strong and awesome.
But today I’d like to make the point that being physically strong isn’t the only type of strength and isn’t the only way to make a “strong” female character. And to start criticizing female characters for being “weak” because they are not as physically strong as a man is going down a road that I think is just as bad as not showing women as warriors at all. I don’t know if you’ve seen this, but I certainly have. And I am going to attempt to explain what I mean by this in the following post.
Not everyone is physically strong–men or women. There are a lot of men who aren’t physically strong–who don’t fit the stereotypical “alpha male” mold. The alpha male is the ideal–we’re a society that reveres demonstrations of physical strength and power. And yet I think in our society there persists this idea that a man doesn’t need to be physically strong to be considered “strong” or “dominant”–there’s just something about being a man that automatically makes you “strong.”
I’m a woman, and I’m not physically that strong. I want to work out as much as I need to be healthy, but health is what’s important to me, not being “as strong as a man.” I’d also like to take some self-defense classes at some point because I think those could be useful. But I have no desire to push my body as far as the human body can go. If that means I’m not as physically strong as some other people, be they men or women, I don’t really care. There are other things I like to do that are way more important to me. Does this make me weak? If I write a female character who is like this, does that make her weak?
Fuck no.
Like I said, as a society we may look up to people who can kick ass, but physical strength isn’t the only type of strength. I’m going to be self-centered and use myself as an example again. I’m really smart. I feel that my intelligence is probably my greatest asset–my greatest strength. I know that I can intellectually do the same things “as men.” It may not feel like it sometimes, but we have made great strides since the 1930s or so when women were expected to be housewives and maybe teachers or nurses. (Again, not that there is wrong with ANY of those things. The problem is not with being a stay at home parent, but that is what was expected of women at the time–like all women are the same and should be content with that and aren’t given any other options.) I’ve grown up in a society that has allowed me to go to college and graduate school and pursue scientific research. Generally speaking, I’m pursuing something that was once really considered a man’s world (and maybe, to an extent, still is). Intelligence is another type of strength.
So is what I’ll call emotional intelligence. Going back to the physical strength thing–in a lot of ways we’re still a male dominated society, and maybe we seem to admire physical strength because that’s what men look up to. You’ve probably heard that women tend to be more helpful, more nurturing, more caring. Is that true? I don’t know–but I do know that they tend to be seen as more submissive traits, “weaker” traits, and that’s perhaps because they’re not valued as much by men. (Not all men. Or it’s that men are taught this. Again, I’m not talking about specific people, but about our society and culture.) Being nurturing or wanting to raise your children–whether you’re a woman or a man–does not make you “weak” or “submissive” or (gasp) “girly.” It’s not that there’s something inherently wrong with being this way, it’s perception–it’s the way we regard the task and why we look at it this way.
Speaking of which, let’s talk about “girly.” It’s not a bad thing to be girly. It’s not bad to be a woman that has traits that are typically thought of as more masculine–but it’s not bad to be feminine, either, and being feminine doesn’t make you “weak.” I like the color pink. I like wearing skirts and dresses. I like flowers and bunnies and unicorns. I like romantic comedies. I don’t really give a crap if this is because somehow I was taught to like pink and romcoms. Maybe it is, but they’re things I like, and I’m not going to reject who I am. I also like things that aren’t typically geared toward women, like action movies and science magazines. Yes, Scientific American still seems to be in the men’s section of the magazines, and this really pisses me off. But my point is, you can be feminine and be smart and strong, too.
Maybe you’re wondering why I’m writing this. I’ve read a lot of articles and blog posts criticizing certain female characters for being “weak.” Like I said at the beginning of this post, “strong” female characters is definitely something we should be talking about. I’m glad people are talking about it. But the times I’ve seen female characters called “weak” seems to usually be because they aren’t physically strong. I think this needs to stop. Yes, it’s good to have female characters that are warriors, but not every single woman needs to fit this mold. And if she doesn’t, that doesn’t mean she’s weak. I’m afraid we’re approaching an all-or-nothing type of model–that, unless a woman is EVERYTHING, smart, beautiful, strong (but also has the type of body typically thought of as sexy), clever, then she’s not interesting or not deserving or something.
This is a theme I’m trying to incorporate into my Reborn series. If you’ve read Reborn, you know that my main character, Siobhan, is a runner, so she is athletic in this way, but she is not a super soldier. She has other types of strengths that will revealed throughout the series (and that may arguably make her a better match for the Olympians than physical strength would). She’s petite, blonde, and, yes, she was a cheerleader in high school and is a “sorority girl”–which I know bothers some readers. She likes pink and shiny stuff and dressing up. She also like scifi and fantasy and is a biology major. Her big sister in Gamma Lambda Phi, Victoria, is intelligent and clever, but also a warrior. In my book, I wanted to have all different kinds of female characters, but they are all strong, in my opinion. (But I’m sure at some point someone will insist Siobhan isn’t a strong female character…and if they do, kindly refer them to this post.)
I’m done babbling. So, what do you think makes a “strong” female character? Please respectfully share in the comments!
One of my fellow writers (and also my cover artist) Heidi asked me to share a character profile for Peter. Peter is one of my favorite characters in Reborn–probably because he embodies my favorite glam rock artists. He loves to gossip, and in Reborn he functions mostly as comic relief, but you’ll get to find out more about him and his “powers” in Relapse.
Well, Valentine’s Day is over, thank goodness. You have no idea how tiresome it was seeing the men’s offerings. I mean things like….
was tiresome when some of them don’t have an eye. As for Tibbs threatening to capture the hearts of some of the local wenches, well, that resulted in him ending in jail.
However, we meet again today with the lovely Siobhan, the fictional creation of S.L. Stacy, whose name is already causing some trouble for the gentlemen but there.
you can see that they are all agog. So, without further ado, I just think we should get going before the jail gets filled and we have to leave here in disgrace… Already last week’s offering from the lovely Milady Donahue resulted in the men holding the cover upside down in a bid to see up her heroine’s skirt… I am sure, had Milady Stacy known that, she…
A couple of months ago I cast the main characters of my book Reborn. (Read Part I of my Reborn Dream Cast here.) It was a fun “what if” post to write, and a Part II is long overdue. So far, we have:
1. Candace Accola (Caroline on The Vampire Diaries) as Siobhan Elliot
2. Tom Hiddleston (Loki from the Thor franchise) as Jasper Hart (mostly because my love for Tom is deep and never-ending)
3. Leighton Meester (Gossip Girl) as Anna Wallace
4. Mark Salling (Glee) as Jimmy Wallace
5. Charlize Theron (from lots of things) as Farrah
6. Anna Kendrick (Pitch Perfect, among other things) as Victoria
Although I have much love for my main characters, my secondary characters are just as near and dear to my heart. They might not have as much “page time” as the others, but I’ve obviously included each for an important reason. (Otherwise, they wouldn’t be in the book.) In fact, sometimes I have more fun writing my secondary characters–namely Peter and Apate. So, without further ado:
Zac Efron as Max
When Zac first popped into my mind as a potential Max, it made me teehee a little. He’s most well known for being in the High School Musical franchise. But actually, Zac is visually a perfect fit for Max. Max is the token human in Reborn–gets mixed up in everything without really meaning to. He’s supposed to look like the stereotypical all-American boy, boy-next-door, whatever you want to call it–and Zac Efron is definitely that guy.
Claire Holt as Tanya
Tanya is Siobhan’s roommate at the Gamma Lambda Phi house. She’s a blonde bombshell and GLPhi’s recruitment chair. She can also be rather whiney and bitchy. Claire Holt is probably best known for her role as Rebekah on The Vampire Diaries and its phenomenal (at least in my opinion) spin-off The Originals. I really like Rebekah’s character–she’s actually quite complex. Hard and unfeeling on the outside, vulnerable on the inside. But it’s Rebekah’s blonde bitch side that Claire could channel for her new role in my imaginary movie.
Shailene Woodley as Carly
So after being the primary character in the Divergent movie, Shailene is probably not going to settle for a secondary role. She’s really just the only actress I could think of that looked like the Carly I have pictured in my mind palace. (I believe my cousin also thought Shailene would be a good match, if I’m remembering our conversation correctly…) Shailene just needs to make her hair WAY curlier and crazier. In Reborn, Carly often gets talked into doing things she doesn’t really want to do. You’ll be seeing more of her in Relapse.
Shemar Moore as Hephaestus
Shemar Moore is on Criminal Minds…a fantastic show, which I often just can’t watch because it freaks me out. Shemar is great on CM and sexy as hell. I think he’d make a great Hephaestus. As the god of fire and the forge, Shemar would be an imposing figure.
Gabriel Mann as Peter
To be honest, I have never watched Revenge, even though it looks like a show I might like. But one night I saw this blonde British guy on one of the commercials for it and thought, “It’s Peter!” Peter is the keyboardist in Jimmy’s band Search and Destroy–he’s tall, blonde, lanky, British, mischievous, silly, and a bit flamboyant. I don’t know, maybe Gabriel is too old to play Peter, but as I’m looking up pictures of him for this post, the more certain I feel about this casting choice.
Joe Manganiello as Dr. Eric Mars
Um, first of all, let’s just gaze fondly upon this picture of the gloriously hot Joe Manganiello. In Reborn, Siobhan jokingly refers to Eric as a “sexy lumberjack.” Eric embodies virility and physical power, but also violence and chaos. Manganiello’s sexy is definitely raw, powerful, and masculine. He also went to my alma mater (not at the same time as me), and I’d like for him to keep having work.
Phoebe Tonkin as Apate
Phoebe Tonkin is another actress from The Originals. It was actually her portrayal as teenage witch Faye on the short lived The Secret Circle (based on another series of books by one of my all-time favorite authors, L. J. Smith) that made me think of her as Apate. Faye was always very mischievous and attracted to dark magic. Apate is developing into a similar character (you also see much more of her in Relapse)–she’s a spirit of deceit and mischief with an inner struggle between her good and it-feels-good-to-be-bad sides. (As several of my characters do, because I’m completely obsessed with this concept.)
*****
Have you read Reborn? Who’s on your dream cast! Please share in the comments, or let me know what you think of mine! 😉 (I know I have some male readers now and would be interested to know who your favorite female character is and who you would cast!)
It’s a totally freaky, even creepy idea–one I think is so much fun to explore in fiction, but nothing I actually believe in real life. When I was first playing around with the story that would eventually become Reborn, this is the concept I knew I wanted to capture. I wanted my supernatural beings to be volatile, mischievous, and manipulative–characteristics often embodied by 
I think Karen Marie Moning’s Fae are the best–but, as she is my favorite author, I’m probably biased. In Moning’s Highlander and Fever series, the Fae are arrogant, devious, and lethally seductive. Back in the day, I wrote a book review of 
Thornton. Jenny starts out as an innocent, naive girl still dependent on her childhood sweetheart, Tom. (I mean, Tom’s nickname for her is Thorny. You don’t get any more disgustingly cute than that.) There’s mystery and magic from the start of Book One, The Hunter, when Jenny, who is being followed by two delinquent-types, takes refuge in a strange store called “More Games.” She buys a game in a plain white box, simply called “The Game,” from the even stranger boy running the shop. Of course, with his white-blonde hair and otherworldly blue eyes, he’s über attractive–and, despite his seeming indifference towards her, Jenny feels a strange connection to him.
Weaknesses: Jealous, suspicious, mischievous
slstacy.com 