We are honored to announce that today on the blog we are featuring JEANIENE FROST!! Months ago when I got the email from her assistant that today we would be featuring her on the blog I was in the front yard. Jumping up and down and dancing a jig in the driveway got me a few odd stares, but I didn’t care LOL. Still feeling that happy excitement, I am elated to post this Q&A and know that all of our followers will enjoy hearing from Ms. Frost and reading some interesting info about her and her work. Oh, and you don’t want to miss out on the awesome giveaway!

Book one in the Night Prince series.
June 26th, 2012

  She’s a mortal with dark powers…

After a tragic accident scarred her body and destroyed her dreams, Leila never imagined that the worst was still to come: terrifying powers that let her channel electricity and learn a person’s darkest secrets through a single touch. Leila is doomed to a life of solitude…until creatures of the night kidnap her, forcing her to reach out with a telepathic distress call to the world’s most infamous vampire…

He’s the Prince of Night…

Vlad Tepesh inspired the greatest vampire legend of all—but whatever you do, don’t call him Dracula. Vlad’s ability to control fire makes him one of the most feared vampires in existence, but his enemies have found a new weapon against him – a beautiful mortal with powers to match his own. When Vlad and Leila meet, however, passion ignites between them, threatening to consume them both. It will take everything that they are to stop an enemy intent on bringing them down in flames.

Read the first 20% http://tinyurl.com/6sj2f53

Also available in hardcover through Rhapsody Book Club http://www.rhapsodybookclub.com/pages/product/productDetail.jsp?skuId=1075503913&YTID=CME20120605RBCNewArrivalsT1&YCODE=0

For downloadable wallpaper of the cover and stepback, go http://jeanienefrost.com/wallpapers/

Check out some of Jeaniene's other fantastic books http://jeanienefrost.com/

1. At the RT Convention in Chicago you talked a little about your ferrets. Would you tell our followers about them and how this was incorporated into your books?

J.F. About a decade ago, I had several ferrets. They’re wonderful pets but very prone to cancer and other illnesses because of inbreeding. Anyway, a ferret’s eyes will glow green if you shine light on them in the dark. When I started writing my debut novel, I incorporated that glowing green eye effect for my vampires, only I made it something that a vampire controlled at will.

2. Since some of ONCE BURNED takes place at Vlad’s castle in Romania- how much research did you do on his homeland?
J.F. Not nearly as much as I wanted to! I would have loved to travel to Romania and visit the Royal Court, Castle Poenari, and other famous attractions, but time/money/deadlines made that impossible. So I did my research online through various resources like travel sites, official Romania sites, amateur YouTube videos, maps, etc. I’m sure I missed some details by not visiting Romania personally, but if I only wrote about places I’d personally been to, my books would be set in a very narrow geography.
  
3. "Premature inflamulation," he replied. "Happens sometimes. Very embarrassing, I don't like to talk about it" is by far my favorite line in a book ever- Do you laugh out loud at some of your writing or want to go back and add/change things thinking other people just might not get it?
J.F. I’ve been known to giggle at my keyboard while writing. My husband now knows to ignore such things. I got a kick out writing that line, and it wasn’t something I’d planned on. Most of the dialog in my books is written organically, so to quote Charlaine Harris, I don’t sit at my keyboard and say, “All right, I’m going to be HILARIOUS today.” There are times when some readers don’t “get” the jokes in my books, but humor is subjective so that doesn’t bother me. There’s only so much I can stress about.

4. Through the editing process, has there ever been a scene that you absolutely stood firm on and refused to delete because you felt so strongly about it?
J.F.  Fortunately, I have a great editor, so she rarely asks me to delete a scene unless there’s a good reason for it to go (it slows down pacing, it’s nonsensical, repetitive, etc). But speaking of humor and standing firm, in Destined for an Early Grave, my editor did have a “Are you sure you want to do that?” note where my ultra-formal-speaking character, Mencheres, replies to my heroine with, “The sh*t’s gonna splatter, start buggin’, yo” in response to her telling him to talk like he lives in the twenty-first century. My editor was concerned that it might have been too extreme and therefore not funny. I liked it and thought it was something my character would say - Mencheres has hidden depths, as hopefully his book Eternal Kiss of Darkness showed - so I kept it in. Most readers found it funny, though I’m sure some scratched their heads at it.

5. We have heard you like lots of book shelves. Did you ever get a room in your house fixed with book shelves from ceiling to floor the way you wanted?
J.F. Not floor to ceiling (you should’ve seen the crazy high quote I got from a carpenter for that!) but I do have shelves all over one wall in my office, and more standing shelves downstairs in another room. And yet I still have books on the floor. I should cull my book collection, but I love them so much. To parrot Gollum from The Lord of the Rings, they’re my precious.

6. In honor of your grandmother you decided to use the name Kathleen in your work. Have you used any other names (or characteristics) for characters that were special to your heart? 
J.F.  In Eternal Kiss of Darkness, my heroine’s little sister has Cystic Fibrosis. That was inspired by my very good friend, Chrissy, who died of CF when she was twenty-two. In Eternal Kiss, there’s a happy ending for my heroine’s sister, who is saved from dying of her disease by vampire blood. I wish there had been something to save my friend back then, and all the people who have/had CF.
Also, in a less sentimental fashion, the villain of Destined for an Early Grave was partially inspired by domestic violence abusers. A long time ago, a relative of mine was in an abusive relationship. There were times when we were afraid that he would kill her. She eventually left him, but I’ll never forget those nights where I’d repeatedly pray that nothing horrible would happen to her. Gregor, my villain in Destined, is a textbook example of an abuser, minus the vampiric abilities, of course. Abusers aren’t awful all of the time. They usually start out as quite charming, and then they slowly peel away the support network of family, friends, loved ones, and most importantly, self-esteem from the target of their abuse. Gregor attempted to do that to my heroine, and (spoiler warning!) in the end, she blew his head off. I had a lot of grim satisfaction writing that scene.

7. How did you come to love roaming around through cemeteries? 
J.F. I can’t point to any one incident. I just think they’re pretty. Older or historical cemeteries are similar to outdoor parks, in my opinion.

8. Is there any character that hasn’t been changed in some form (like Cooper *hint hint*) that you would like to alter, or has there ever been a character in the past that you didn’t want to change or felt they weren’t ready for a change but the story in your head forced it to happen?
J.F. Actually, when I started writing One Foot in the Grave, I had no intentions of turning Dave into a ghoul. When I wrote the scene where he died, I thought he was dead dead. It was only while I was writing the end of One Foot where Bones was talking to Cat about Dave’s death that I realized he could be raised as a ghoul. Then I realized that Cat would absolutely try for it to save her friend. So Dave was an accidental ghoul, you could say J.   

9. You have said Ian won’t be getting his own book any time soon but will he be showing up in upcoming books for us?
J.F. I expect Ian to be in the next couple Cat and Bones books, but as I haven’t written them yet, I can’t swear to it. I do hope that Ian grows up enough to get his own story one day. I know his history and why he is the way he is, and I’d like to share it with readers. We’ll see!

10. Vlad is without a doubt a character everyone is in love with, so for him to have his own series, it is extremely exciting. Did you transfer any of the “real” Dracula’s traits into your Vlad?
J.F.  The “real” Dracula, yes, by which I mean the historical version of Vlad the Impaler. Not Bram Stoker’s version of Dracula (no offense meant to The Great One, of course). When I researched Vlad, I found it interesting that there were different historical accounts of him. One paints him as the cruel tyrant we’re all so familiar with, and many of those accounts were based from early German writings. The Russian and Romanian accounts of Vlad were very different, showing him as no crueler than other leaders of his era and hailing him as a staunch defender of his country against repeated invasion attempts. Vlad was even credited with being one of the few rulers who promoted peasants and “commoners” into positions of power instead of rich nobles, which was shocking for his day. Many Romanians still consider Vlad to be a national hero. That ruthless-with-a-reason version of Vlad is the one I drew the most from for his character, but with my own twists, of course.

11. Does your husband read your books? While you are writing the story or once it is completed?
J.F. My husband isn’t a big reader. Instead, he exercises for enjoyment – which I cannot understand, lol. He has read some of the books, but I told him beforehand that I never wanted to hear his opinion because he can’t win. If he’d say that he liked a book, I’d think he was just being kind. If he’d say that he didn’t like a book, he’d sleep on the couch for a week! ;-). But in all seriousness, he is incredibly supportive, and he has to hear everything three times: When I complain to him about something that isn’t working with a character/plot point, then when I call my author friend Melissa to talk about the same thing, and then when I call my friend Ilona to talk about the same thing.

12. The cover for ONCE BURNED is completely different than any of your previous book covers. Did you have any input toward this exceptionally yummy cover and are you “for” not having Leila on the front, letting Vlad take all our attention (like he wouldn’t anyway, I can hardly take my eyes off him)? J.F. When I talked to my editor about the cover, we agreed that we wanted only Vlad on it so readers could tell from one glance that it wasn’t a Night Huntress novel (which only features my heroine on the cover) and that it also wasn’t a Night Huntress World novel (which only features couples on the cover). That’s whyall the covers for the Night Prince series will feature Vlad on the front and then a couple on the stepback (inside cover image).
I also had several specific requests that probably made my art director reach for a flask: I wanted the model for Vlad to have that stubbled/shadowed look on his jaw, to have scars on his chest, to have long dark hair, and to have a really cut since Vlad’sbuild is described more like Michael Fassbender’sversus, say, Gerard Butler’s. I think they came through on all the above. While the model isn’t quite how I picture Vlad – and yes, readers will find out in Once Burned that Vlad has chest hair, too, which the model doesn’t - I’m thrilled with how the cover turned out.

Nalini Singh, Charlaine Harris and Jeaniene Frost

One of the "Three Crazy Chick's" favorite moments at the RT Convention 2012


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