YA Urban Fantasy Author Parker Blue Revisits Get Lost in a Story

Get Lost in a Story Readers, I’m excited this morning.  Because today YA Urban Fantasy Author Parker Blue joins us to clue us in on a major secret she's been keeping regarding one of her lead characters in her Demon Underground Series. 

Everyone knows Shade is Val Shapiro's love interest, right? And that he's swirly one moment and hot the next.  Right?  But do you know everything about this enigmatic Shadow Demon?  You might want to fasten your seatbelts.  It's time to read Shade's story in Forget You. 

“Parker’s voice is edgy and smart. I smile as I read because this book takes me back to my Buffy days–yep, that kind of smart and sharp-edged humor. Love it." — The Bradford Bunch

“Above all, Bite Me is an entertaining, police procedural mystery with loads of action and witty banter. Val’s’ adventures take her into an unrealized world of the supernatural, whose depths she is only just beginning to understand. Engaging for readers of all ages, this new YA urban fantasy is recommended. I look forward to Parker Blue’s next ‘Demon Underground’ tale with Val, Dan and Fang. You will too.” SciFiGuy.

FORGET YOU. . .

Sixteen-year-old Shawn, "Shadow Boy," is the exact opposite of his sister, Sharra, whose nickname is "Sunshine Girl." While she  sees the joy and bright side of everything, Shawn sees the dark-side all too often. Feels the isolation forced on them by their father more sharply. And chafes under the constant discipline needed to hold their powers in check. When an argument with his father sparks Shawn's shadow demon half, his world implodes.

FORGET YOU is free now at:   

http://www.amazon.com/Forget-Demon-Underground-Series-ebook/dp/B00CA6Q7RC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1365567105&sr=8-1font-family:%22Calibri%22,%22sans-serif%22;color:#1F497D
 

 

DONNELL:  Parker, wow it’s been awhile.  We haven’t seen you since March, 2011   http://getlostinastory.blogspot.com/2011/03/get-lost-in-story-welcomes-parker-blue.html  It almost seems like you’ve gone underground with your characters.  Whatcha been up to?

PARKER BLUE:  What, you think I’ve been spending time hanging out in the Demon Underground?  I wish…would really like to meet a couple of my characters!  On second thought, maybe not.  They always get in way too much trouble.  Actually, I published another book in that series since you last interviewed me.  Where have you been?  :-)

DONNELL:  Around. ;) Val Shapiro is one kick-ass heroine, but her creator has a soft spot.  You’re big in the adoption business.  Can you tell us about that?

PARKER BLUE:  Just to set the readers straight, my adopted children are furry.  No, not werewolves—dogs.  I wouldn’t say I’m big in it, but National Mill Dog Rescue is.  Their mission is to find forever homes for breeding dogs past their prime who have been discarded by puppy mills (Grrr) and I’ve adopted three of them.  Abby, a Yorkie, only lived for a month after I took her home (cancer), but the other two are slowly learning how to be real dogs.  It’s heartbreaking sometimes how damaged they are.  Never adopt from a pet store, please!  

Daisy is a Maltese and Trixie is a Jack Russell terrier.  My third dog I adopted ten years ago from Dreampower before I knew about NMDR.  Her name is Mo, and she is the model for one of the characters in my book, Fang.  He looks exactly like her—imagine that!  

DONNELL:  They're great dogs and you're a terrific human to them.  I’ve had an opportunity to read FORGET YOU and I can’t wait to tell readers about it.  But I’ll leave that to you.  You’re such a world builder.  Do these ideas swamp you all at once, or do you have to work at them?

PARKER BLUE:  I usually have the idea for a character, and the world builds from there.  For example, for the first book of the series, Bite Me, I envisioned a vampire slayer who was part demon.  She’s young, so to give her conflict, I made her part succubus.  We all deal with lust at that age—both wanted and not—so I thought it would be interesting to explore that.  In this case, she almost killed someone when she came into her powers (BTW, I wrote the first book long before Lost Girl came on the air—GMTA!).  To add to her conflict, I had her parents kick her out of the house when she turned eighteen.  But she needed friends and a job, so I created the world of the Demon Underground and the Special Crimes Unit for that.  And Fang, of course. 

So, to answer your question, I do have to work at world-building, but ideas occasionally swamp me, too—especially when I’m in the bathtub or in the car.  Both places it’s difficult to write them down, of course.  I’m sure I’ve lost a lot of stunningly brilliant ideas for lack of a suitable recording device.  Murphy’s Law in action!

DONNELL:  FORGET YOU leads up to your upcoming release, DARE ME. There some exciting new twists to the Underground Series.  Can you share any of it, or do we have to cross our arms and stamp our feet?

PARKER BLUE:  Shade’s past comes back to haunt him and Val has to clean up the mess.  This one was fun because you get to see both Shade and Austin’s points of view as well as Val’s.

DONNELL:  Here’s a test for you.  If you had to choose your favorite character in the Demon Underground Series, who would it be?  

PARKER BLUE:  Easy test!  My favorite is everyone else’s favorite as well—Fang, the fiesty telepathic hellhound.  He’s soooo much fun to write ‘cause he allows me to get my snark on.  He says the things everyone else is thinking but is too PC to say.

DONNELL:  How much fun was it to reveal Shade’s past?  

PARKER BLUE:  I don’t know if fun is the right word.  Enlightening, maybe.  Some readers weren’t happy with how he acted in Make Me, so I wrote Forget You to explain his past so they’d understand where he was coming from.  I kind of discovered his secrets as I wrote it, and those secrets come out in my upcoming book, Dare Me.  Some things surprised me!  No, I’m not wacko—I’m a writer.  ‘Nuff said.  BTW, Forget You a short story, so it’ll be out in e-book form only, though may be included in an upcoming anthology.

DONNELL:  You’re working on something else for Bell Bridge Books, correct?  A novella, I believe.  Can you give readers a hint on what it’s about?

PARKER BLUE:  Funny you should ask.  Forget You may be reprinted in that anthology, tentatively titled The Big Book of Wicked, composed primarily of paranormal romances.  My novella is called Wicked Secrets and features a witch who has to convince a werewolf to turn her into a lyncanthrope before she dies of a deadly disease.  Fair warning—it’s darker than my Demon Underground series.  Not that I’m ever all that dark.  My friends Jodi Anderson, PJ Bishop, Karen Fox, Laura Hayden, and Evelyn Vaughn also have stories in it.

DONNELL:  Parker, thanks for joining us today.  Readers, I can’t wait for you to read FORGET YOU. I already have, and I promise you’ll love Shade more than ever.  And maybe we’ll have Parker back after her novella’s released.

 

In addition to reading Shade's story in Forget You for free at the link above, Parker will give away a book from her the Underground Series to one lucky commenter.  

PARKER BLUE'S QUESTION FOR READERS: When an author writes two different kinds of books, like light and dark, do you read both, or do you prefer to stick to one?

Facebook  http://www.facebook.com/ParkerBlueWrite .

Twitter @ParkerBlueWrite

Web Page etc.  http://www.parkerblue.net

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