Featured Interview With Joleene Naylor
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
I was raised in south west Iowa in a little town of tumbled down buildings and faded memories, surrounded by cornfields, soybeans, the song of crickets in summer, and the stillness of snow in winter. After seventeen years away, I’m back. I live with my husband, random members of my immediate family, and a Noah’s ark worth of pets in a crooked DIY-reno Victorian house in Villisca, only a few blocks from the infamous axe murder house. Someday the place will look great, until then I’m living with peeling wallpaper and drywall dust.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
My mother is a writer and poet, and both parents are voracious readers, so writing and reading have been a part of what I consider “normal life” since I was a toddler. When I was six, I learned that not everyone had stacks of paper in their house and I couldn’t figure out what they did for fun if they weren’t writing or drawing (you can tell I wasn’t much of a baseball player). I wrote my first novel at twelve, and then promptly threw it away because it had adult themes that embarrassed me. It’s a good thing I’ve gotten over that or I couldn’t publish my vampire series!
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
My favorite genre is fantasy (everything from high fantasy to YA fantasy romance) with sci-fi and horror tied for second and historical romance in third place. Honestly I like a good romance, no matter what genre I’m reading. What can I say? I’m a romantic at heart.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
Masque of the Vampire – to be released April 1, 2016 – is the eighth book in the Amaranthine series and, though it has plenty of blood, action, and vampires, it is inspired by the classic British mystery: a guest at a well-to-do days-long party ends up dead. Who killed them? Why? Only, instead of a dead guest I have a series of child murders, a mysterious locked door in the attic, a phantom stalker, and a cast of suspicious immortal characters. It’s a paranormal who-done-it with a dose of disturbing.
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