Interview & Giveaway with Yasmine Galenorn

We’re super excited to have Yasmine Galenorn with us today at The Book Pushers. Yasmine is a NYT bestselling author with her Dark Urban Fantasy series called the Otherworld, which consists of:

1. Witchling (2006)
2. Changeling (2007)
3. Darkling (2007)
4. Dragon Wytch (2008)
5. Night Huntress (2009)
6. Demon Mistress (2009)
7. Bone Magic (2010)
7. The Shadow of Mist (anthology: Never After) (2009)
8. Harvest Hunting (2010)
9. Blood Wyne (2011)

Yesterday was Yasmine’s release date for her début book, Night Myst, in her new Indigo Court series. Our fellow bookpusher, E_booklover, said this about Night Myst, ‘…provides a whirlwind of intrigue, mystery, dark sensuality, and a remainder that nothing is exactly as it appears to be on the surface – especially when dealing with Vampires and Fae.’  If you want to read her review of Night Myst, click here.

We were given the chance to interview Yasmine, and we jumped on the chance :D.  Here are the results – enjoy!

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Book Pushers: We would like to give a very warm welcome to Yasmine Galenorn to The Book Pushers. Yasmine, welcome!

YG: Thank you, I’m happy to be here.

Book Pushers: Can you tell us a little bit about your new series Indigo Court, and what your first book in the series, Night Myst, is about?

YG: The world of the Indigo Court Series is a magical, mystical world—dark, sensual urban fantasy that lives in that realm between dusk and dawn, in the shadow that hides in the corner of your attic, in the nightmare you can’t quite remember when you wake up, but that leaves you with both desire and fear. It’s a world of vampires, Vampiric Fae, primal magic, and faint lights of hope in a dark forest.

Night Myst, the first book, explores the world of Cicely Waters, a witch. Cicely can control the wind and has bonded with an air elemental named Ulean. She’s in search of her aunt, who has been captured by the Indigo Court—a race of vampiric Fae led by the evil Queen Myst, the Mistress of Mayhem. In the tradition of good fairytales, Myst has also captured Cicely’s lover—Grieve, a Fae Prince, and Cicely has to win him back from a transformation he did not want to make. Filled with the magic of winter and wind, I’m hoping that Night Myst will capture my readers just as surely as Myst has captured Heather and Grieve.

Book Pushers: What made you decide to work on a separate series from your popular Otherworld series?

YG: I needed a little break here and there from the Sisters but was not/am not ready to end the series by any means. It always recharges me to jump between worlds and then I’m ready to come back to other old friends. I find that my mind works best when overloaded with ideas, I thrive on deadlines, and am very Type A. So it seemed natural to come up with another idea. And the idea for the Indigo Court series came about through a dream of a painting, of all things—a vivid, living painting in which I watched a young woman walk through a woodland filled with mystical creatures, and overshadowing the wood was a spidery snow queen. I knew the woman was looking for her aunt, and that the queen of the forest was going to try to stop her. Woke up, wrote it down, and now it’s a new series. ~smiles~ My mind works in mysterious ways.

Book Pushers: Do you think Indigo Court will attract a different audience than the Otherworld?

YG: I think it will be a similar audience, but I think the IC Series will appeal to more readers—the ones who like the darker vampire genre.

Book Pushers: Is it more challenging to switch from one world to another, and would you ever consider writing in another genre?

YG: I’ve written in two other genres before…three, in a sense. I wrote eight nonfiction metaphysical books. I wrote a paranormal mystery series, and a “plain” cozy mystery…trilogy. While I’m proud of all my work, I really wasn’t at home writing cozies of any kind—I am not a cozy person—and was thrilled when I broke out into urban fantasy. My heart and soul have always been steeped in fantasy and science fiction. I’m at home now, with what I write.

Book Pushers: In your Otherworld series – and the first book of the Indigo Court series – you show more of the darker side of… shall we say human nature, yet you include flashes of “light”.  Why did you decide to highlight the darker side instead of the sweetness and light?

YG: I am not a light-and-sweet type of person. I love delving into the dark side of life and human nature. It fascinates me even as it can repel me. I’ve never been one for writing light, and when I was writing the cozies I felt like my hands were tied because of the genre. Now, I am free to explore both light and shadow at will. Because light cannot exist without the shadow to balance it. And the shadow side has the power to mesmerize, and seduce—Urban Fantasy focusing on the sweet-and-light would be boring, it wouldn’t hold tension and wouldn’t explore the areas of the psyche that hide our shadow-selves and our nightmares and the creatures that exist just out of the periphery of our vision.

Book Pushers: Both of your series tend to be on the sensual side. By sensual, I am not just thinking sexual, but also with the colors, tastes, smells, and sensations experienced by your characters.  I know that those senses, for me, helped draw me into your world. Is there a reason you decided to concentrate on the senses, or is it a natural part of the fae world?

YG: For one thing, it is a natural part of the Fae world—a series about Fae/half-Fae that wasn’t sensual wouldn’t seem true to me. But also, that’s just the way I write and in the UF genre, I’m allowed the freedom to explore all those sensations. I am a sensual person by nature, and it comes out in my writing. I live in a vibrant area, the environment here is rich with color and smell and texture—and setting, to me, has always been a form of character—setting just speaks visually and with scent and touch and taste.

Book Pushers: The Urban Fantasy genre is getting bigger and bigger every year with new authors cropping up. Who are your favourite authors of the genre, and are there any new authors that you enjoy and would recommend?

YG: Personally, my favorite authors in the genre are: Charlaine Harris (I LOVE the Sookie Stackhouse series and I also like the True Blood TV series made off of the books). I really enjoy Patricia Briggs’ Mercedes Thompson series. I’m a fan of Jim Butcher and the Dresden Files. I also like two YA Series a lot: Rachel Caine’s Morganville Vampire Series, and PC & Kristin Cast’s House of Night Series. I don’t have much time to read so tend to stick to my favorites—and I read widely, not just in the UF genre.

Book Pushers: One of the common tropes in Urban Fantasy lately seems to be the love triangle.  In your Otherworld series you slightly touched on it, but due to the Fae culture in your worldbuilding, that did not become a major plot point.  Why did you decide to avoid that and what do you think of love triangles as a major plot device?

YG: Because it never came up for the characters. Camille is polyamorous and her husbands are willing to share. Delilah—well, I have plans for her and you’ll see those play out in HARVEST HUNTING. Menolly is emotionally attached to women but now and then likes to play with men. A love triangle wouldn’t have fit my characters in the Otherworld Series. And if a plot device isn’t true to the characters, it won’t ring true to the readers.

I have nothing against the love triangle trope—but at some point it needs to resolve. Either the character has to choose—one, the other, or both. If the triangle is allowed to play out too long, readers—me included—get irritated. I think Patricia Briggs did an excellent job in her Mercy Thompson series of resolving it before everybody got irritated, but she left it to play out long enough to strike up the tension. (The Sam-Adam-Mercy triangle).

Book Pushers: I know with Urban Fantasy there isn’t a requirement for a Happily Ever After (HEA) or even a Happy For Now (HFN), but given everything you put your characters through – and their painful growth – do you have a happy ending in mind for them?

YG: I hope they come to a happy ending, but I can’t give blanket promises because the ending hasn’t happened yet. ~grins~ So I certainly have hope, but don’t know. And yes, my characters have to earn their prizes, they have to earn their happiness and no growth comes without pain. I think that’s why my readers identify with them so much—the characters aren’t just superheroes in disguise. They bleed, suffer, cry, and have their little joys and triumphs.

Book Pushers: Do you have a clear plan about the ending for both series, and do you have any new projects lined up?

YG: No, and possibly. I do have a vision for how the OW series will end—but that won’t be for a little while yet. The Indigo Court Series has just started so no, I don’t see the end of that one yet and don’t know how things will play out. And yes, I have plans for a future series but that I am keeping under wraps for now. Meanwhile I pen novellas on the side, and I have lots of ideas for standalone books but there’s no time—absolutely no time—to write them now.

Book Pushers: If you could have the ultimate universe, what worlds would you combine from books, TV or even film?

YG: Lord of the Rings, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Vampire Lestat, and Conan the Barbarian. How’s that for convoluted??? ~grins~ Don’t ask me how—I don’t have time to figure it out.

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Thanks to the wonderful people at Berkley, we also have a cracking giveaway. On offer is three copies of Demon Mistress, the 6th title in the Otherworld series by Yasmine. The awesomeness does not stop here!

Yasmine will be popping over to the blog a few times today to answer some reader questions. So to enter, all you have to do is comment or ask Yasmine a question in the comment section.

The Demon Mistress giveaway is open to US/Canada only. And it’s will be open until Monday, 5th July.

BUT! On the weekend, we’ll be giving away two copies of Night Myst via the Book Depository, which will be open to wherever the Book Depository ships to.

Big thanks again to Yasmine!

Giveaway is now closed!