GUEST AUTHOR: Cathryn Brunet

Debut author, Cathryn Brunet, always dreamed of being a writer until one day she decided to stop dreaming and just do it. For support, she joined Romance Writers of Australia and Romance Writers of New Zealand and now numerous books, two novellas, numerous short stories and competitions later, Cathryn has achieved her dream of being published.

Her debut book, RITUAL PASSION, published in December 2009 with Samhain, is an erotic fantasy romance novella, and is available as an e-book.

A passion to appease the gods...or call down their vengeance.
The jungle-wrapped city of Challas is dying, crumbling under the weight of its corrupt priesthood and degenerate new gods. But an even greater threat looms on the horizon. Outside the city walls, a pestilence breeds. Unless stopped, it will crawl through the city's decaying streets and destory everyone.
Phalandria wants to see her magnificent city reborn and freed from the perversion of the priests who murdered her father. And she wants Massilis, the man who has stood by her side since childhood. The man who's developed into a magnificent, jungle-hardened warrior...and ignites her unquenchable desire. Although Massilis has always protected her, only once has he allowed his hunger for her to show.
Now the water oracle has called for Phalandria and Massilis to perform the Concubitia, a sexual rite to propitiate the gods. But the priests suspect a conspiracy and will do anything to protect themselves. And Phalandria realises that the priests are not the only ones sabotaging the ritual.
The man she loves has an agenda of his own.

(Click on RITUAL PASSION for an excerpt.) The novella is available from all e-book retailers and as a Kindle download from Amazon.

Cathryn writes also contemporary love stories, erotic novellas and short stories and lives in regional New South Wales, Australia. She's visiting today to share more about herself and tell us what's next on her agenda.

Author name and/or given name: Cathryn Brunet

Published genre/s: Erotic romance

Favourite Childhood Toy: My horse! I was horse mad from birth and nagged my parents endlessly for one. I hung around with friends I knew had ponies, read a bazillion horse books (Walter Farley's The Black Stallion series was my favourite), demanded my father, brother, aunts, uncles anyone who could still bend over that they play horsey with me, and sighed wistfully each time I came in contact with anything even remotely equine. I still do, come to think of it.

My dream was granted when I was twelve. Misty, as I romantically but unoriginally named her, was a gorgeous bay mare with a white star on her forehead and a wonderfully sweet disposition. I was love at first whinny.

Incredibly, she only died a year or so ago, aged 30. That's a long life for a horse but then she always was one of a kind.

Wow, a horse fan! I thought you might have tossed in The Silver Brumby series or Black Beauty amongst your favourite books as a kid! I bet you DID read them ;-) !

Greatest Vice: Being miss Fussy Britches or, as my darling beloved so charmingly calls it, Feral Cheryl. I can be very anal about things, from house cleaning to writing, and tend to get a bit twitchy when they're not exactly as I want.

Ohh, I can identify with this character flaw, Cathryn! I'm a stickler for spring cleaning when I get in a mood. And heaven help anyone who calls in and interrupts me when I'm on a roll! I've GOT to get it all done then, not an hour or two later after the visitor has left.

Book/s You're Reading Now: To put me in the mood for my latest work in progress I'm reading a non-fiction book by journalist and documentary maker Michael Wood called In Search of the Dark Ages. I love his enthusiasm for history, people and places. He makes even the driest subject entertaining.

But I'm also reading The Amber Spyglass which is the final book in Phillip Pulman's His Dark Materials trilogy.

Most intriguing place you've visited: Intriguing. Hmm, that's tricky. If you asked for the most beautiful or friendliest or which has the best food it'd be easy, but intriguing is a difficult one to answer. Perhaps Berlin. Because of the post-war building boom you get this fantastic collision of past and future. Modernist architecture runs alongside bullet scarred classical buildings and it feels as though there's a new story waiting to be told around every corner. It's a fascinating place. I hope to return one day.

A place you've yet to see: Petra in Jordan. But that's just one of a very long list of destinations. I adore travel and don't do enough of it!

Author/s in your genre who you enjoy reading: Denise Rossetti*. She uses such rich language!

I totally agree with you, Cathryn. Denise is a fabulous writer, her books are so absorbing. I adore her world-building.
(*For those who aren't familiar with Denise Rossetti, she's one of RWOz's wonderful paranormal authors)

Who or what influenced you to write in the genre you're now published in? I honestly don't know how to answer that. One day, as an experiment/writing exercise, I started writing in first person. For some reason the story turned out to be an erotica. Idon't know why!

But RITUAL PASSION has definite strains of the film Apocalypto.

That was a good film, one I've watched several times now. What a great comparison to draw - it helps define the "flavour" of RITUAL PASSION and certainly gives it an exotic feel.

When developing a story who tends to appear first in your mind, the hero or heroine, and why? The hero. I always have a picture of him well before the heroine. I'll daydream about him for weeks and end up developing a bit of a crush. Sad, I know. :-)

Rats, I should have also asked what techniques you use when planning a book, Cathryn. Collage? Journalling? etc. I'm always fascinated by how authors "see" their characters/scenes/worlds.

Writing Milestone/s: I think finishing a book is always a great milestone. Mind you, selling one is too!

Latest release/project: Anything to do with knights is bound to get my attention. It's the romantic in me. The reality is that they weren't all Sir Galahads but it's still great fun imagining them that way.

And I like the conflict in my ms, PUREHEART. The heroine is a creature of goodness and purity who, to defeat evil, is forced to join it only to discover she takes pleasure from the engagement. Whereas the hero is a violence-wrecked but utterly honourable soldier for whom doing the right thing means breaking all the principles he holds dear. Oh, and he's seriously sexy too!

They're great characters to write.

Ohh, PUREHEART sounds like another great story! The plot is intriguing but I feel for your characters! Torturing like that, shame on you ;-) ! I hope you're submitting it somewhere, Cathryn.

Thanks, so much for joining me today on my blog, Cathryn, it's been a hoot having you here!!!

Don't forget to visit her over at her website  - you can find out more about Cathryn at www.cathrynbrunet.com