A warm welcome to the next author joining us on the GRL Featured Blogger tour, Alexis Duran!

Butterflies and Klingons

Okay, it’s official. The butterflies have invaded. I’m exciting about attending GRL for the first time this year, but I’m also nervous about my role as featured author. Instead of hiding behind potted palms I have to go forth and…be interesting? Oh dear.

As I prepare to weather the anxiety attacks that occur anytime I push my comfort levels, I have to remind myself I’m no newbie to this conference thing. I have an extensive collection of nametags and lanyards to prove it and could probably make some sort of prayer flag display of them across my backyard. (Every time the plastic holders flap in the breeze, someone will fall in love with one my characters.)

To bolster myself, and maybe some of you out there biting your fingernails along with me, I’ve been working on a list of favorite retreat and conference memories that make me smile (even if they didn’t at the time).

1. Stumbling across Klingon Karaoke happening in the bar at a science fiction and fantasy con.
2. Meeting Elizabeth George, Terry Brooks, Susan Wiggs, Frank and Malachi McCourt, and Famous Amos (not all at once, although how cool of a cocktail party would that be?)
3. Dancing so hard my slip fell off in the middle of the dance floor.
4. Being part of a group who rallied around a despairing writer after she’d encountered the instructor from hell at a day-long retreat – by that night we had her smiling so much tears of laughter had replaced the tears of despair.
5. The first time someone I didn’t know asked me for an autograph.
6. The first time I dared to introduce myself as a writer because I’d worked up the courage to attend my first conference.
7. My first time as a presenter, terrified but thrilled to have suited up and shown up long enough to earn the right to offer fellow writers a few bits of my experience.

So that’s how I’m looking at this new adventure in San Diego, as a reward for all the hard work I put in this past year, and not as a test or an ordeal, but an exciting opportunity to grow and connect with readers as well as other writers. I hope the rest of you feel the same, no matter what your role or intention was when you took the leap and signed up.

Giveaway: I’m giving away a Ecopy of my newest release, Betwixt and Between. Share a favorite (or maybe a “thank-goodness-I can-look-back-and-laugh”) moment from a conference, con or retreat and I’ll have Dani randomly draw a winner from commenters.

Blurb for Edge of Night 1: Betwixt and Between:

Reporter Ian Evers, obsessed with magical creatures since childhood, never experiences satisfying proof that the magical realm actually exists until he falls into an entrapment spell set by a handsome but dangerous elf.  Barely escaping with his soul intact, Ian is able to undo the hex, but he can’t escape the very real infatuation he’s developed for the fierce, alluring elf.

Ezekiel Stormshadow is a svarta, a dark elf who serves the Queen of the dark realm. The realm of darkness needs the power of light to survive, and while hunting the last few magical beings on earth, Ezekiel discovers Ian, a light elf who’s unaware of his true nature and ripe for the plucking.  Their brief encounter awakens a great hunger in Ezekiel, and he’s determined to feast on the light elf’s power and body before the queen intervenes and claims Ian for herself.

Driven apart by the ancient imbalance between the dark and light realms, an evil queen starved for power, and their fear of each other, Ian and Ezekiel are relentlessly drawn together even though their union might destroy them both.

For review links and the first chapter: http://alexisduranblog.com/edge-of-night/

Loose Id buy link

Amazon buy link

ARe buy link

Connect with Alexis at:

http://alexisduranblog.com

http://twitter.com/AlexisSDuran

http://www.facebook.com/alexis.duran.18294

Question from Erica: Elves are a big thing in Iceland. We call them “the hidden people.” A lot of people believe in them and they’ve always been a big part of our folklore. Please tell us about the elves in your books. What are they like? Where did you get the inspiration for them?

Oh, I could talk for hours about elves. I can’t really say where my original inspiration for the elves in my head comes from, as they’ve been lurking up there for as long as I can remember. It’s probably safe to say my first inkling of elves came from the Czech and German fairy tale books my grandmother gave me when I was wee. Those stories were much darker and scarier than the fairy tale books produced these days. Later, Tolkien’s Lord of Rings books certainly had a huge influence.

When it came to writing To Catch a Threeve, I had the idea one of my heroes was an elf-like creature, but not quite fitting the “standard” image we share in western culture of the severe, statuesque, noble creature from a lofty realm. So I created the threeves, which might be considered poor cousins of the elves, part tree, part elf, part something entirely their own. They’re quite devious and don’t like humans much, so when my hero Bryn falls in love with one, it’s rather awkward.

The elves in Betwixt and Between are closer to the more classic image. The mythology I created around them was based on old Anglo-Saxon traditions regarding two races of elves; dark (Svartalfa) and light (Liosalfa). My heroes are ancient enemies, diametrically opposed in just about every way and so naturally they fall helplessly in love. I think in general I’m drawn to elves because they’re mysterious, powerful, often mischievous and let’s face it, pretty damn hot.

 

Question for Lane. If you could go on a road trip with one of your characters, who would go with and where would you go?