The Crossroads Blog Tour (Day 2)

Welcome to day 2 of The Crossroads Blog Tour and today I'm featuring Lucienne Diver, author of Vamped (2009) and ReVamped (September, 2010).


How did you come up with the idea for Vamped and how many books will there be in the series?

Usually, characters come to me before concepts. My heroine, Gina, burst into my mind fully formed, a darling diva going through her own personal version of hell…an eternity without tanning options, no reflection with which to check her hair and make-up and no more tolerance for her beloved mochachinos. Her very first thought was to turn her own stylist, start an entourage, and, basically, tailor eternity to her liking. It wasn’t a storyline, it was a start. Once my writers group informed me in no uncertain terms that my little vignette wanted desperately to be a novel, I had to find something for my heroine to do, like battle a vixen vampiress who wants to dig her claws into Gina’s newfound boy toy, stop a council coup and save her classmates from fashion disasters and other fates worse than death. ReVamped was just released in September, and there are at least two more books in the series forthcoming, Fangtastic and Fangtabulous.


What can we expect from the sequel?

[Spoiler Alert! If you haven’t read Vamped, you may want to skip this question.]
At the end of Vamped, Gina and her gang have been found by the Feds and made an offer they can’t refuse. In ReVamped, they get their first mission. Gina is tormented again, this time by being sent undercover as a goth girl…no color palette to speak of, more chains than a bike rack, and don’t even get her started on the shoes…. She’s going to have to learn to fit in, even if that means acknowledging that goths are people too. But as she gets closer to the truth behind what’s messing with the town’s magical energies, she worries that she’ll end up condemning rather than clearing her new-found friends.


Are you writing anything else at the moment or have any ideas in the pipeline? Will they be paranormal in nature?

I’m torn! I’ve recently turned in Fangtastic and have a few months before I need to start Fangtabulous and there are a few different ideas vying for my attention. One is dark, suspenseful and not at all paranormal, the other is a middle-grade boy book with what I hope is a wonderful hook. I wish I could clone myself so that I could answer both calls.


About your writing style, are you a pantser or an outliner? What would your one bit of writing advice be?

I’m definitely a pantser. I always have a general idea of where I’m going, but I tend to only plot a few chapters ahead. That’s because by the time I get to the last point that I’ve plotted, my characters have generally taken things in a whole new direction and anything beyond that point is mute. I’m so glad my publisher lets me submit fairly brief synopses so that I have wiggle room on the details!

I’m not sure who to credit for the quote “Only writing is writing,” but it’s so true. Plotting, researching, brainstorming, etc...they’re all part of the process, but only writing is writing. Set yourself time to write every day. Keep it sacred. The only way you finish a novel is by actually getting the words down on the page and by giving yourself permission to get it wrong. There’s no such thing as perfection, and the idea that something has to be perfect before it’s placed will freeze you up. That’s what revision is for. (And that’s why I outsmart my inner-editor by waking up at 6 a.m. every morning to write; she’s totally no good before 8 a.m. and copious amounts of caffeine.) My motto is “Get it down, then get it right.”


What’s your favourite thing about Halloween?

Costumes! I love stepping outside myself and playing a role for awhile. Of course, the candy is a very close second.


Favourite scary movie?

I loved Scream, mostly, I think, because it totally mocked horror film conventions while still being a solid story in and of itself. Favorite cheesy horror film: Cheerleader Camp.


If you could be any supernatural creature, what would you be and why?

A sorceress. Then, as long as I mastered the skills, I could have everything at my beck and call…shifting, invisibility, teleportation….


Thank you to Lucienne for a great interview. To find out more about Lucienne and her books click here to visit her website. Check out the GoodReads descriptions for Vamped here and ReVamped here.

Each day of The Crossroads Tour, a new question will be revealed on The Crossroad Blog Tour main page and each day the answer to that question will be found within one of the 16 different blog posts by Crossroads Tour authors. Your job is to get the question, read the blog posts, and collect all 16 answers by the end of the tour, on Halloween. Click here to get today's question and links.