Interview with Author Skyla Dawn Cameron!

I have a wonderful author guest here today!  Skyla Dawn Cameron!  Some of you may recognize her name as I recently read and reviewed her book Bloodlines.  And yes I thoroughly enjoyed it!  You really do need to go get this one.  Oh, did you miss my review?  Well, you can go there to read it by CLICKING HERE.

Hello Skyla!  Thank you so much for agreeing to the interview.

M:  Okay, so I'm a fan of Nathan's.  You caught me at first with Jamie as I enjoyed his banter with Zara.  Fun.  But Nate is my man.  I have to ask, you may want to pass on this question, but I just have to ask.  I'm worried for our lovely Nathan.

SDC:  Mmm, as he’s a character of mine, yes, you should be worried, LOL. I’m especially mean to characters I love, and I adore him.

M:  Will we see Nate again?

SDC:  I have a real fascination with characters who are absent from the narrative but play a huge role and influence the story regardless (Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier is my favourite example of this). The repercussions from the end of Bloodlines will be felt heavily, revisited again in later books. He will be seen again...in some capacity.

M:  You've mentioned you recently got to reconnect with the main star of the book, Zara Lain, as you revamped the book some.  How was it chatting with Zara again?

SDC:  You know that friend you knew so well but haven’t seen in a lot of years, and you worry that when you meet for coffee again, it’ll be weird and awkward? And then the two of you sit down together and it’s like nothing has changed? That’s writing Zara.

M:  Every time I thought the characters came to a low point, you dug their hole deeper.  Did you take great pleasure in creating this?  Is this what makes you an Evil Writer?

SDC:  My favourite game to play while writing is, “What is the worst that can happen?” And then I go with whatever I come up with because once the terrible possibilities are in my head, I can’t let them go.

The reader can tell if you pull your punches; the reader can tell if you hold anything back. A book will read as fake if you don’t stay true and go as dark as it needs to be. I also feel that defeating the bad guy/happy-ish endings, etc, just don’t feel right unless they’ve been earned. When the reader really, truly believes I might kill the lot of them and wonders, “Oh my god, how the hell are they going to get out of this one?” I feel I’ve done my job.

M:  Vampirism has a different spin on it in your Demons of Oblivion series.  I liked this.  It gave me something new to look into and think on in the way of Vampires.  They have a stasis type period and it's more of a demonic parasite.  Can you share on this creation?

SDC:  The parasite thing came up because I was wondering what made a human into a vampire? What changed their biology? For me, any parts of the vampire myths I kept had to come from some sort of logic; I just don’t do well with “well, it’s magic.” The demonic parasite and its attributes—the sunlight allergy (which I sympathize with, as I also get very sick from the sun), staking through the heart, etc—came from that.

The stasis vampires go through for a period of roughly ten years purely came from plot necessity. I needed there to be a reason for a long period of time between when Ana (Zara as a human) was killed and awoke as a vampire to justify...um...what she does when she awakens. That is to say, her first meal had to have some significance, which required me to find a way for time to pass.

M:  The Ending... I loved it!  You challenged the character and my trust in the character.  What kind of response do you think will come from it?

SDC:  Thank you so much!

Usually I hear about threats to throw the book across the room or beat me to death—or if it’s someone I talk to in person, they get this sort of gleeful, excited smile when they recount their reaction. All these responses please me immensely. Above all, I want to entertain, and I’m honoured to hear from readers who felt I delivered.

M:  There is magic ever present in this world as well.  Will we get more of the magic side in future books?

SDC:  Yes. Not so much in the second, but the third has a quarter demon narrator, who obviously has powers. The fourth and fifth books, definitely. 

M:  Speaking of future books, the next two books will be of another characters point of view and our friend Zara will make visits in the books.  Then Zara will be the main point of view in fourth book.  How did you come to doing different point of views?

SDC:  It was so long ago, I honestly don’t remember how I decided. I do know that I never wanted to write the same book twice—I always want to try something new and push my limits—so...I came up with a demon hunting nun who doesn’t swear for the sequel. What can I say—I like a challenge. I also like the idea of characters all existing in the same world with their lives intersecting (incidentally, there’s a character Zara briefly speaks to in Bloodlines named Toby—he’s in my short story “Whiskey Sour” in Bad-Ass Faeries 2: Just Plain Bad).

Technically speaking, Zara will be back a little sooner rather than later as a narrator, as I’m going to write a Zara-centric short story to include with the Mundania-exclusive ebooks and paperbacks in the second book, Hunter. Much like Thrall at the end of Bloodlines expanded the scope of things and revealed some bits of information that Zara didn’t know, the short with Hunter will change the perspective on the events in that book as well.

I remember the brief conversation with Toby.  I'll have to look into reading this book as well, for his short story.


M:  Okay, a couple of fun questions for you... One question I ask in my interviews, if you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go?

SDC:  I always wanted to go to Japan, though I’d have to brush up on my language skills because the only phrases are remember are from some J-pop songs. I also really want to go to Haiti as I have an interest in Afro-Caribbean religions, cultures, and practices.

M:  Favorite Season?

SDC:  Autumn. That point where, for about a month (in Ontario) when it’s cool but not cold during the day and the nights have a warm breeze. Also, my birthday is in September and I like presents.

M:  Favorite Color?

SDC:  A cold, crisp royal blue.

M:  Favorite childhood fictional creature?

SDC:  I remember being partial to zombies. I used to make my Barbie princess defeat legions of zombies. But back then, I believed in damn near everything—I wanted to be a cryptozoologist and look for lake monsters and stuff.

M:  And now as an adult, favorite fictional creature?

SDC:  I do like werewolves—always have. The wolf is part of my animal totem and I tend to prefer weres.

M:  Favorite Word? (any word at all)

SDC:  Can I say “fuck”? LOL. It really is a great word—so versatile. It can be a verb, a noun, an adjective; it can be combined to make lots of other fun words (like my favourite, “fucktard”). It’s a fantastic word. 

M:  Thank you Skyla for doing this great interview!  I do wish you all the best in Words and Pages.

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Read an Excerpt from Bloodlines, HERE.

Would you like to make the rounds here on the wonderful world in Internet to look in on Skyla?  Well, she has many sites.

Skyla's site and blog

Evil League of Evil Writers blog

Twitter

You can purchase Bloodlines on many sites, in print or ebook formats.

BUT, please keep in mind if you order an ebook you will need to know this.  The short story Thrall is only available on ebooks purchased from Mundania Press's site.  You can find Mundania Press HERE.

AND if you purchase through Mundania Press you can use this Code to get a 10% discount:  BLOODLINES10

Amazon Paperback ~ Amazon Kindle

Amazon.co.uk Paperback ~ Kindle UK
Kindle Germany
Book Depository
B&N
Chapters.ca
IndieBound
Powells
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