In Australia, 2012 is the
National Year of Reading. What better way to celebrate this than by finding a new-to-you author or revisiting a favorite one?
This series of blog posts, entitled
The Paranormal DownUnder, aims to do just that!
Any of my regular readers know I'm passionate about introducing 'local' talent (aka authors from Australia & New Zealand). This time around I'm keen to feature those who write in this genre.
So, be prepared for a swag of authors & some blatant promotion of their books as they share their thoughts on the paranormal genre and why they find it so compelling.
Please welcome my first guest...
Louise Cusack is an international award winning fantasy author whose best-selling
Shadow Through Time trilogy was selected by the Doubleday book club as their ‘Editors Choice’. This series is now available as eBooks, published by Pan Macmillan’s digital imprint
Momentum Books.
In 2006 Louise presented the Queensland government’s Queensland Writing Showcase in New York, and in 2009 she was invited to attended the prestigious Crossover multi-media think tank sponsored by the South Australian Film Commission.
Louise also runs her own business
Writers: Working with Louise Cusack and has completed over 150 manuscript assessments and tutored more than 80 writing workshops.
You can find Louise on her
website and follow her on
Facebook,
Twitter and
Goodreads.
Louise, what compels you to write in the paranormal genre?
Since I first read ALICE IN WONDERLAND as a child I’ve been hooked on stranger in a strange land stories: novels like Frank Herbert’s DUNE, Edgar Rice Burroughs Barsoom series (recently made into the movie John Carter), Robert Heinlein’s STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND, Ursula le Guin’s LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS and Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series – all stories about a person who travels from one world into another.
That also seems to be the theme of my own work, and I’ve written fantasy worlds, contemporary fairytale, erotica and lost world adventures, but always it involves someone from our world going into a new world, or visa versa.
Is there something you'd like to write but have yet to attempt?
I’d love to write sci fi, but to me that’s the ‘best of the best’ and I’d like to give myself another decade of writing (I’ve already been writing for 2 decades) before I feel good enough to do it justice.
I grew up reading all the classics, Asimov, Heinlein, Arthur C Clarke, Bradbury, EE ‘Doc’ Smith, Simak, Wyndham and Pohl among others – borrowing them from my older brother’s bookcase and reading them under the mozzie net at night with a torch. Those books were beyond good, and they set the bar pretty high for me. I want to do them justice if I try to step into that arena myself.
Who are auto-buys for you in this genre? What makes their books so appealing to you?
Cassandra Clare. I am totally smitten with the character of Will Herondale. He’s so broken and so beautiful. It’s really masterful writing. And the Victorian setting is so evocative. As a result, I’m keen for book three of The Infernal Devices series to arrive.
Suzanne Collins is the other standout for me in recent years. I love the characters in The Hunger Games, Katniss’s strength and compassion, and the way she makes Peeta and Gale appealing in different ways, so the reader finds it hard to stick in one camp.
Guess I’m a sucker for a good love triangle!
Louise's Shadow Through Time series:
Book One: DESTINY OF THE LIGHT
Ennae is a parallel world joined to our own world by the Sacred Pool, a portal that can only be opened by one with the Guardian blood running through their veins. It is through this watery gateway that Khatrene leaves her modern-day life behind forever, drawn into a quest that will take her into the depths of the unknown.
Khatrene must fulfil her destiny as The Light, the woman whose child will unite the four elemental worlds. At each turn are real and imagined enemies who will do everything in their power to prevent her from fulfilling the prophecy, including the ethereal and erotic shadow woman, the enigmatic tattooed man, even her beloved brother Mihale.
Talis, her appointed Guardian, must help her through the dangerous terrain of Ennae, sacrificing everything to ensure her safety in a land where magic prevails and nothing is as it seems.
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