AUTHOR INTERVIEWS: Stephanie Julian

Thanks so much for having me over for coffee, Sia, though I must admit I don’t drink it. So I’ve brought some hot chocolate. And Junior Mints.

I'm thrilled to have you visit Over Coffee again. I always have hot chocolate and teas. I remembered the Junior Mints from the last time you were here. :-) 

I’m really enjoyed reading What a Goddess Wants. You create such a fascinating world.

WHAT A GODDESS WANTS, the first book in my Forgotten Goddesses series.

This isn't your first book set in Etruscan mythology, though, is it?

When I first started writing WHAT A GODDESS WANTS, I was already deep into the two Etruscan series I've been writing for Ellora's Cave for the last three years. All of the books I've published, with the exception of SIZE MATTERS, have been set in this world. 


Actually, the world is the same one we live in; except there are whole communities of magic users normal people know nothing about.


The Etruscans are an ancient race of magic users including witches, werewolves, elves, fairies and deities. The first series I wrote, Magical Seduction, featured the elementals, the fairies and elves, and a witch. The second, Lucani Lovers, focuses on the lucani, the Etruscan werewolves.

Why Etruscans, rather than Greek or Roman?

I chose the Etruscans because there wasn't a lot of information known about this ancient race so I could play with the facts and twist them however I liked. I could take something that had a basis in fact and take it out of history and into the Twilight Zone.

But it also meant I was flying mostly blind. Unlike the Romans or the Greeks, I couldn’t look up a quick answer to anything.  Since I love to do research, this meant I ordered many, many, many books by Etruscan scholars, books not written for the casual reader. But in those 1,000-page tomes, I picked up lots of little tidbits that I could use in my stories.

Have you noticed that my goddesses wear red shoes most of the time? That’s one of those little bits I found in one of those books.

Most scholars believe that the Etruscans based their pantheon on the Greeks’ but, since none of those scholars can agree on where exactly the Etruscans came from or when, I chose to ignore that. Instead, I took what limited information I could find that didn’t mimic the Greek pantheon and expanded from there.

Let’s talk a bit about Tessa. Something I didn’t know and found intriguing is Tessa being a goddess with dual powers and duties.

Tessa in WHAT A GODDESS WANTS is the Etruscan Goddess of the Dawn. She used to lead the sun into the sky at the start of each day until that Roman bitch Aurora usurped her job. Tessa was pretty ticked off about that but she still had her duties as a Goddess of Childbirth. That’s another of those little tidbits I picked up.

Aurora cracks me up. I loved some of your secondary characters, like Sal, and I’d love to know more about him.

All of my Etruscan stories are linked; I was able to build a fairly large community with lots of characters who I love to revisit. For example, in WHAT A GODDESS WANTS, you’ll get to say hello to Salvatorus, who you might remember from SEDUCED BY MAGIC, SEDUCED BY TWO or EDGE OF MOONLIGHT.

You’ll also meet a new race of magical beings, the Cimmerians. Well, they’re not actually new. Robert E. Howard actually wrote about the Cimmerians in his Conan books. Yes, Conan was a Cimmerian, a fact Caligo, Tessa’s hero, grinds his teeth over constantly. Damn Arnold Schwarzenegger anyway.

I have so much fun playing in this world, creating a world within our world and revisiting characters throughout the stories.

And it shows in your stories, Stephanie. They’re fun to read. You said you have other series you’re writing. Anything new coming out in those series you’d like to tell us about?

As a matter of fact, I have another story in the Lucani Lovers series, GRACE IN MOONLIGHT, releasing July 20.

Thanks so much for having me over, Sia.

WHAT A GODDESS WANTS BY STEPHANIE JULIAN – IN STORES JULY 2011 

In his arms, her magic powers are on the rise…

Tessa, Etruscan Goddess of the Dawn, is desperately fighting off a malicious god, but her powers are weakening. She needs a hero and fast, because only sexual energy can give her strength. So she seeks out Caligo, whose sexual prowess is legendary…

 And she’s the only one who can bring him into the light…

Caligo is a fabled Cimmerian warrior determined to stay away from spoiled goddesses who trample heart after they've had their fun. But there’s something irresistibly hot and inviting about Tessa, and he knows he’s her only chance to escape the encroaching darkness…EXCERPT 

BUY: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, All Romance eBooks. 

My Review 

Stephanie Julian is the author of three erotic romance series with Ellora’s Cave. She is a member of RWA and Valley Forge Romance Writers and is a freelance entertainment and lifestyle feature writer. Stephanie lives in eastern Pennsylvania, where she is working on the next two books in the Forgotten Goddesses Series: How to Worship a Goddess (December 2011) and Goddess in the Middle (July 2012). For more information, please visit www.stephaniejulian.com.

To Tommy, With Love

My guest today is, Charlee Boyett-Compo, the creator of the Reapers™, badass Alpha male shapeshifters with black hair and amber eyes that turn blood red when they are angry. Handsome, deadly men with tortured souls and the only thing that can tame them is the female destined to be their mate. Only she can save her warrior from himself.

• Reapers™ can be found in several series: DemonWind™ (futuristic assassins), WesternWind™ (whip-wielding, six-gun shooting lawmen of the Old West), WindVerse™ (intergalatic warriors), and BlackWind™ (contemporary fighters of evil). The WesternWind™ werewolf Reaper™ series has been Charlee's bestselling series since 2005.
  

Her stories are of love and passion and happy ever after endings--but the characters work hard for the HEA. In my opinion, to write believable love and passion, once must first experience it.

I'm honored Charlee was willing to share her own love story with me. This blog's Valentine's dedication is to Tommy, the love of her life.

I am the proud and humble owner of five large scrapbooks, the first of which was started in December of 1965. On the first page of that first scrapbook is a Christmas card from that year. Each page of those scrapbooks holds Valentine’s Day, Easter, Mother’s Day, Birthday, Anniversary and Christmas cards. There are 252 such cards plus dozens of others. There was never a year missed. There was never an occasion missed. The other cards are Get Well, Congratulations, or simply a verse that was appropriate when the card was given. In all, there are over 300 colorful cards. The last card, however, can’t be placed in the scrapbook because it’s a musical card and it holds a very special place in my heart.

On April 18, 2009 I became a widow. My husband of 43 years…my most precious Tommy whom my readers knew as Buddha Belly…passed away quietly after a brief two month devastation caused by lung cancer. Not a smoker, the cause of his death was determined officially by the Veterans Administration as a direct result of exposure to Agent Orange when he served duty in Vietnam. No matter the cause, he was gone and with him my life changed with that one last breath he drew into his embattled lungs.

Out of the blue, the illness had struck. They doctors tell me he was dying before he even knew he was sick. That’s the brutality of cancer. He was diagnosed on February 18th. As I sat in our bedroom that afternoon…crying, terrified, numb…I looked at the Valentine’s Day card he’d given me a few days earlier. It would be the last gift he ever gave me.

It was a musical card. On the front is says: “If I had nothing else but our love”… On the inside, it finishes with “I would still have everything I need”. As you open the card, the song plays: “I would give you my heart until the end of time. You’re all I need: my love, my valentine”. He signed it as he had every card he’d ever given me: “With all my love, Tompe” and the date February 14, 2009. He had no way of knowing that his end of time was rushing out to take him.

Tom was a staunch supporter of my writing. He encouraged me from the very beginning. He had faith in me when I had no faith in myself. He cajoled me to query time after time after time…even when it seemed no one would ever take a chance on me. He was the first to read each and every thing I wrote. He bragged about me to anyone who would listen…and some who really didn’t want to. He carried my business cards, promotional postcards, and bookmarks with him everywhere he went. He handed them to his clients, to anyone he saw reading a book. He was there for me at every book signing I ever had. He went to every convention. He was my self-proclaimed agent and promoter. His pride in me could be seen in his beautiful hazel eyes…the corneas from which were the only things salvageable at his death. It makes me proud that those gleaming eyes now help others to see, to read.

Since his death, I have been in a state of flux. Depressed, moody, unable to concentrate for long at a time, I start a project but quickly lose interest. There’s no one to share it with now so it’s not as important as it once was. A new review holds no thrill because I can’t show it to the love of my life, my soul mate.

For the longest time I couldn’t make myself sit still long enough to put words to screen. I turned down requests to review my books. I turned down interview requests and opportunities to be on internet radio. I shrugged off promotion of any kind. Basically, I was shooting myself in the foot professionally but I really didn’t care.

How does a writer write with a broken heart? When there is only numbness and aching depression and the direction has gone from her life, what road looks interesting enough to venture down? From what well can she bring up the waters of creation when she fears her very soul has withered on the vine?

Having a pushy editor didn’t help. If anything, her goading only made me dig my heels deeper into the mud of my own disinterest. I know she meant well but her opinion in the grand scheme of things was nothing more than a single drop into that murky well of emotions I was experiencing. I ignored her as I ignored everything else around me.

So how do you deal with a tragic event that stops cold the ability with which you were graced? How do you go from apathy to engrossing interest when all you want to do is curl into a fetal position and whimper?

I can tell you it isn’t easy. It gives you an entirely different perception of the term writer’s block.

For years I’ve always answered the question of whether or not I believed in writer’s block by maintaining that it was nothing more than an interruption in the natural flow of creativity. Writer’s block is the ringing of the doorbell, the trill of the telephone, the dog wanting in/the cat wanting out, the demand of a significant other or a parent or a child to be cared for. Such interruptions take the writer out of the here and now of invention. It knocks them off course.

It took me eight months before I finally sat down at the computer and called up the book I’d been working on when Tommy got sick. I read through the 80+ pages, saw they needed a little extra oomph to them. So I took one chapter at a time and added a clarification here, a little dialogue there. I went back over that same chapter four or five more times until it ‘spoke’ to me in the voice I was so accustomed to hearing when I wrote. When I was satisfied that chapter was the best it could be, as well edited as was possible for me to make it, I moved on to the next chapter.

By the time I finished with the last chapter I had written, the fire was once again in my soul and the story was beginning to unfold in my mind’s eye. I felt the difference within me. I was writing again. I was doing what Tommy always said I was born to do. I was creating characters and dialogue, building onto the world I had created in the nine other books of that series. I was fleshing out my hero and adding depth to my villainess. I was making my heroine a strong, sexy woman who was not too stupid to live.

As my fingers flew over the keyboard, I swear to you I could hear Tommy cheering me on in the background. He is the reason I returned to writing. He would have expected no less of me and so for him….

I write.

Everything is for him.

What do you do to get back on track with writing or with life after emotional upheavals?





Charlee Boyett-Comp is a prolific author of over 60 full length books in her Reapers series. The first Reaper™ novel, BLOODWIND, was written in 1996 and was released by Dark Star Publications in 1998. Prime Reaper Kamerone Cree, the black-clad warrior known as the Iceman, started a franchise for me and my Reapers™ can be found in several series: DemonWind™ (futuristic assassins), WesternWind™ (whip-wielding, six-gun shooting lawmen of the Old West), WindVerse™ (intergalatic warriors), and BlackWind™ (contemporary fighters of evil). The WesternWind™ werewolf Reaper™ series has been her bestselling series since 2005.

"I hope you'll try one of my signature Reaper™ novels soon."

You can visit with Charlee on her website. She has several background pages on each series.

Writing Happy Endings—The Beauty of Romance.

I know I’ve mentioned, a time or two, that I love a good romance. One of the reasons I do is the happy ending. The fun is seeing what the characters go through to get that happy ending—sometimes parroting life, at times holding love as something worth fighting for. Life is full of horrific happenings. Love is strong and I happen to think it’s one of the strongest and most enduring qualities. It survives being poor, wars, sickness, and even death. It holds hands with hope and the belief the world isn’t so bad if you have love and share love.

My guest today is Romance author Stephanie Julian. She shares why she likes happy endings. Pull up a chair and join in the discussion.

There is coffee, tea, and yes, now a nice pot of hot chocolate, plenty of scones and muffins. *sliding a crystal bowl of Junior mints near Stephanie. We can’t have withdrawal pangs, Steph, lol!

Thanks for having me, Sia. Do you mind if I bring hot chocolate? I don’t do coffee. Or tea or alcohol (though I love Fuzzy Navels and Mojitos). I don’t smoke either but I do have a wicked addiction to Junior Mints.

And romance.

I’ve been a romance reader all my life, since I first discovered Harlequins in the mid 70s. I think I was eight or ten. I was a pretty precocious reader, graduating to Bertrice Small and Rosemary Rogers by the time I was twelve.

I also read a lot of fantasy, including Tolkien, Eddings and Brooks, and every Stephen King. But even as I enjoyed those stories, I was always looking for more romantic elements. And was vaguely disappointed when a book didn’t have enough romance.

At college, I majored in English. I loved Shakespeare but of course I was the one who wanted to rewrite the ending of “Romeo and Juliet.” The greatest love story of all time and they both die? What the hell? Yes, it’s an amazing written work but I’ll stick with “As You Like It,” thank you very much.

That preference for a Happily Ever After is why I write romance. People who don’t understand or look down on the genre don’t fully understand the appeal.

Why do you want to read a book where you know the ending? That question is one you hear a lot from people who read books where all the major characters die at the end, usually in horrible fashion.

I read romance because I like to believe that life isn’t always so dire. That there is hope and love does triumph even when your world is crumbling down.

Pollyanna much? Maybe. But isn’t that the beauty of romance?

When Rhett Butler walks out of Tara and away from Scarlet, I knew one day she’d follow him and win him back. Same goes for Ilsa and Rick in “Casablanca.” Actually, I just finished working on a ménage so maybe Ilsa and Rick and Victor… Maybe not. But Ilsa and Rick are meant to be together, even if they have to wait until Victor dies heroically liberating death camps.

In my Magical Seduction series for Ellora’s Cave, an entire society of Etruscan magical users has hidden itself in our society, clinging to their old ways while trying to fit into modern life. They still retain their magic; they worship deities (who just happen to be living among us, as well) and fight to keep themselves and their families safe in a world that, if they were exposed, probably wouldn’t look too kindly on them.

Some of them have horns, wings and pointy ears and can change into wolves and other animals. But these stories are first and foremost romances and the central story is always two (or three) people falling in love amid turmoil, suspense and conflict.

How they overcome their obstacles to live Happily Ever After is the best part for me. Yes, writing the sex scenes is fun and exciting but having the story unfold before my eyes is even better. I’m not a detailed plotter. I have a general idea of the story before I start but I typically just start to write when I finally have the main characters in my head.

I had a leg up on that plot for “Seduced by Danger,” the sixth book in the series, just released from EC. It’s a continuation of the story told in “Seduced by Chaos.” I knew Michael and Cara before I started their book and I knew where their journey would take them.

They were going to have a pretty rocky road but, at the end, they would come through and be stronger for it. Together.

And isn’t that what we all want?

***

Stephanie Julian is an avid reader, who used to have a book-a-day habit. Then she realized she not only wanted to read books but write them, too. Romance has always been her first love, the sexier the better. Hot men, strong women and a heaping helping of magic dominate (and she does mean dominate) her blazing hot stories.

When she's not writing, she's, well... she's certainly not cleaning. And she only cooks when her guys complain that they're hungry. Otherwise, she's got her fingers on a keyboard, her butt in a chair and her head in the stars.

For other books in the Magical Seduction series by Stepanie Julian, visit Ellora's Cave http://www.ellorascave.com/

This and other titles in the series are available now.

STEPHANIE IS OFFERING A PRIZE TO

ONE LUCKY COMMENTOR TODAY:

SHADOW MAGIC (on the left) Featuring Seduced by Magic and Seduced in Shadow, books one and two of the Magical Seduction Series.