Friday - Jamie Gray - Talking About Heroes, Heroines and Villains #MFRWauthor #Urbanfantasy

1. Do you write a single genre or do your fingers flow over the keys creating tales in many forms? Does your reading choices reflect your writing choices? Are there genres you wouldn’t attempt?

Much like my reading choice, I tend to write in more than one genre, although romance will play a part no matter the story. My first series, The Kyn Kronicles, is Urban Fantasy, while my second series, PSY-IV Teams is Paranormal Romantic Suspense. I’m in the midst of planning a third series which won’t have magic, but is set in a post-apocalyptic timeframe and yep, there’s romance.

My reading choices are all over the fiction board. I grew up on high fantasy (nope, won’t ever try my hand at that one), sci-fi, mystery, thriller, romance (of all kinds), and urban fantasy. Lately I’ve been in a romantic suspense with military overtones, plus my normal UF fare. I try not to read in the genre I’m currently working it, just because…no sense in tempting the writing gods.

Other than high fantasy, I don’t think I’ll ever venture into erotica or horror. Those genres require a uniquely artistic touch I’m not blessed with.

2. Heroes, Heroines, Villains. Which are your favorite to write? Does one of these come easy and why?

Wow, this is a tough question. Is it a cop out to say all three? Let me explain. The relationship between your hero/heroine and your villain is symbiotic. If one side is weak, so is the other. Developing strong heroes/heroines means you, the writer, need to know what drives them to face down insurmountable odds, despite high costs. You villain should be worth of that type of passion, so you, the writer, need to develop your antagonists as intricately as you do your protagonists. I started out with heroines, strong, kick-butt type, who face down equally determined and strong villain/villainess. On SHADOW’S MOON, the third book in the Kyn, I decided to venture into a hero’s mind, and alternated between a male and female protagonist. I’ve discovered that certain stories make it easier to connect to one or the other. While heroines tend to stay close to my heart, I found it easier to relate to my hero in the second PSY-IV book, TOUCHED BY FATE (out in Spring 2016).

3. Heroes. How do you find them? Do pictures, real life or plain imagination create the man you want every reader to love? Do they come before the plot or after you have the idea for the story?

I’m a character driven writer, so most of my story ideas come after a character emerges in my head. I start with personality traits, strengths, weaknesses, then move on to motivation. Once those start to come together, I’ll haunt the internet for some visual aids for physical descriptions. My story tends to develop around my characters. My heroes have to help balance my heroines. In SHADOW’S EDGE, Gavin’s ruthless practicality offsets Raine’s temperamental reactions, and together they’re a very lethal duo.

4. Heroines. How do you find them? Do pictures, real life or imagination create the woman you want the reader to root for? Do they appear before the plot or after you have the idea for the story?

Same deal as my heroes. Most of the time my heroines come to life before my heroes. It makes it easier to craft my heroes if I know what type of man will stand best beside the woman. In SHADOW’S CURSE I faced a daunting task of telling Natasha Bertoi’s story. As queen of the demons, she can an extremely intimidating woman, so forging a connection with my readers meant delving into her motivations behind her decisions/actions.

5. Villains or villainesses or an antagonist, since they don’t always have to be the bad guy or girl. They can be a person opposed to the hero’s or heroine’s obtaining their goal. How do you choose one? How do you make them human?

Your villains/villainesses have to be as motivated as your protagonists, and a reader has to be able to connect to the reasons behind those motivations. Any one can be a villain, because it comes down to perspective. You believe you’re outnumbered by a race of beings who can do things no human can, how do you even the odds? What would you do to ensure your survival? Understanding why your antagonists have chosen their paths, also helps me, as a writer, create conflict for my protagonists. Like I said before, it’s a very symbiotic relationship for protagonists and antagonists.

6. What is your latest release? Who is the hero, heroine and or the villain?

My latest release was SHADOW’S CURSE, the fourth book in the Kyn Kronicles. Our heroine is Natasha Bertoi, head of the Amanusa House, and she’s joined by Darius Abazi, our hero. Together they take on an unknown traitor who’s working for the Council.

In Spring 2016, TOUCHED BY FATE, the second book of my PSY-IV Teams series, follows Tag and Risia as they face down a ruthless businessman with very little scruples or patriotic loyalty.

7. What are you working on now?

I’m currently working on a collection of short stories from the Kyn worlds to come out in Fall 2015. I’m also in the midst of planning a new series, and the next Kyn novel.

8. How can people find you?

           

Website/Blog:  https://www.jamigray.com

          

            Twitter  https://twitter.com/JamiGrayAuthor

            Facebook  https://www.facebook.com/JamiGrayUFWriter

Friday - Jude Pittman Talking About Heroes, Heroines and Villains

Do you write a single genre or do your fingers flow over the keys creating tales in many forms? Does your reading choices reflect your writing choices? Are there genres you wouldn’t attempt?

Mainly I write mystery, however, I’ve also co-written a paranormal time travel with author Gail Roughton.  My reading choices definitely reflect my writing choices, I’m an avid mystery fan and always have been.  I would never attempt horror because I’m sure I’d scare myself too badly to finish my book.  I’m also not a fantasy writer – my mind is too full of this one world without trying to invent worlds on my own, but I really admire people who can do that – what a job building an entire world for your characters to inhabit.

2.     Heroes, Heroines, Villains. Which are your favorite to write? Does one of these come easy and why?

I love writing hero’s – especially detectives and high profile investigators, They come easiest to me, and it’s the most fun for me to imagine myself in one of those personas. 

3.     Heroes. How do you find them? Do pictures, real life or plain imagination create the man you want every reader to love? Do they come before the plot or after you have the idea for the story?

The hero’s in my stories just seem to find me. I have an image of what they’re going to look like before I even have the story.  I don’t know about all writers but for me it’s important that a hero possesses characteristics that I feel are important in a person I would admire.  The characters always come before the plot in my stories. I have a general idea of what’s going to happen and where I want the story to go, but it doesn’t always happen that way, sometimes right out of the blue a character will take off in a completely different direction than what I envisioned. 

4. Heroines. How do you find them? Do pictures, real life or imagination create the woman you want the reader to root for? Do they appear before the plot or after you have the idea for the story?

               Heroines are harder for me because they always have to be smart and good at what they do and strong with definite ideas and attitudes, so I have to be careful not to let the heroine overshadow the hero.  Again, my heroines do pretty much the same as my hero’s, they just come along when I’m writing and  sometimes they take a much bigger role than what I had originally envisioned for them.

5. Villains or villainesses or an antagonist, since they don’t always have to be the bad guy or girl. They can be a person opposed to the hero’s or heroine’s obtaining their goal. How do you choose one? How do you make them human?

               Villains are always bad guys in my stories.  I have very definite ideas of what a makes a bad guy, and they are usually characters that are composites of people that I have known, heard about or read about.  They don’t come to me as full blown characters the way my heros and heroines do – maybe because I do not admire them and am not open to their worming their way into my head, but they are definitely made up of what I consider the least attractive features of my fellow men and women – I just take a bunch of characteristics, shake them up in a jar and pull out the ones that will work the best for the bad guy I’m writing about at the time.

6. What is your latest release? Who is the hero, heroine and or the villain?

My latest release is Sisters of Prophecy, Ursula. This book, co-written with another Books We Love author, Gail Roughton is the fulfillment of a dream of mine.  I’m descended from Mother Shipton of 15^th century England.  She’s in the history books as a reputed prophetess who prophesied about all kinds of events hundreds of years before they happened.  Like the Civil war in the USA before America was even discovered and planes and submarines, all kinds of stuff like that.  All my life I wanted to write about her as a young woman, but I’m not a historical fiction author, and it wasn’t until Gail and I met up in Hawaii and started chatting about what if Mother Shipton appeared to Shipton descendants and had them carrying out certain tasks that needed to be done back in the 15^th Century, but the girls were modern and the timeframe of the book was contemporary, with little side jaunts back into the 15^th century.  The more we talked about it the more the story grew until we were both so excited we could hardly wait to get it written.  It’s definitely one of my favorites.

7. What are you working on now?

               I am working on another Kelly McWinter mystery.  This one, A Murder State of Mind, Deadly Lights  brings back some of my characters from my original Murder State of Mind series, Deadly Secrets, Deadly Betrayal and Deadly Consequences.

8. How can people find you?

               Website           http://bookswelove.net/authors/jude-pittman/#

               Blog                http://bwlpp.blogspot.ca/

               Twitter            @judepittman

               Facebook         https://www.facebook.com/judith.pittman.56