The Midnight Brew Presents: Jennifer Armintrout

USA Today Bestselling Author Jennifer Armintrout became interested in the macabre at an early age. Raised in a large Roman Catholic family, she viewed too many funerals at a formative age. She lives in a small, rural community in Southwestern Michigan. The Midnight Moon Café is pleased to welcome author Jennifer Armintrout. MMC: Welcome to the Midnight Moon Café, Jennifer. When did you first become interested in writing paranormal romances? Jennifer: I started writing because I dropped out of college and I needed a job. A while before that, I had tried to write a contemporary romance, a chick-lit, and a Scottish historical. None of those worked, so I decided to write about monsters. It was kind of natural, considering I’ve always been interested in ghouls and goblins. MMC: Let's talk a little about world-building in the Blood Ties Series. How did you come up with your backstory for this series? And how does that setting affect your main characters? Jennifer: I was living in Grand Rapids, Michigan at the time, and it had some interesting locations, like Cyrus’s mansion, for example. I used to drive by that house and go, “Oh man, vampires have to live there.” So, choosing my setting was pretty easy. I didn’t want to set a book in, say, Portland, because people from Portland are going to know that I’m just talking about my ass, you know? That, and the fact that I wanted something interesting in a book to happen where I was, for once. As for other elements of the world, such as The Movement and The Sanguinarius, those are all based on things that really exist, in some way. The Sanguinarius is based off the medieval book for witch hunters, and the The Movement is a parody of an organization called The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement. In terms of my vampire “rules,” I wanted to get to vampires actually being monsters. There are so many books out there where the vampires are sexy and seductive or tortured and really, truly good inside. I wanted my characters to have real flaws, to have the potential to be good or bad no matter what side they’re on, and for my vampires to be real monsters. I think the fact that my settings are based on real places that I am familiar with lends a realism to the story that makes the fantastical more easy to believe, and it makes my characters more able to react realistically in their environment. I don’t want to sound like one of those authors who thinks their characters are alive somehow, but you really do have to make a world that your characters can believe in, so they’re not like, “Wait, why am I reacting this way, when I am clearly in a fiction story?” MMC: For those who are new to this series, can you tell us a bit about The Turning, Possession, and Ashes to Ashes. Jennifer: Sure. The Turning is about Dr. Carrie Ames, a doctor doing her residency in a hospital emergency room in Michigan. She gets attacked by a patient who is a vampire and ends up becoming one herself, so The Turning is all about her acclimating to vampire life. One of the realities of vampire life is the existence of some pretty bad guys, like The Soul Eater, who wreaks some havoc in Possession. Carrie is forced, in that book, to take command and make some decisions for herself and for her friends to fight against the Soul Eater, who is on this path to becoming a vampire god. In Ashes to Ashes, the Soul Eater is gaining more ground, and Carrie and her friends are put into even more danger and the whole story is resolved in All Souls’ Night. I don’t want to give too much away, so pardon my vagueness. MMC: How did you come up with the character of Dr. Carrie Ames? Jennifer: I don’t know. That’s not a good answer. I knew I wanted the first scene to take place in a hospital, I didn’t want her to be a nurse, because nurses have this little society in the hospital, like a little clique, and I wanted her to feel very alone and isolated in the beginning of the book, so I made her a doctor who wasn’t from the area. It all sort of unfolded from her isolation and the personality ticks that come from surviving medical school. MMC: What was the inspiration for your books? Jennifer: I worked in a hospital, in a position that was kind of like being an orderly, but they called it some bizarre name. Part of my job was taking deceased patients to the morgue, and I would wonder every time I went down there, “What if this person was a vampire or something and attacked me.” The fight scene I built in my head evolved into the series. MMC: What sort of research did you do to bring this story to life so wonderfully? Jennifer: I researched a little bit of the “vampire” subculture and mentality, the kids who drink each others’ blood and stuff, because I didn’t really understand what it was or what the appeal was. I use that subculture in my books a little. I also did a sort of pick-and-choose tour of vampire mythology from different cultures, picking up what I wanted to use in my vampires and discarding what I didn’t want. Other than that, I just kind of started writing. It doesn’t take as much research as, say, a historical romance or a detective story. MMC: All Souls Night is the fourth book in this series, which came out in June. How does this story continue your series? Jennifer: This is the big finale. It’s all over after this. Carrie and company have their final showdown against the Soul Eater, so, yeah. You can’t get very much more final than that. There are going to be zombies and werewolves just ripping each other apart in the climactic finale. Gore and buckets of blood and such. Dripping puss and rotting flesh and all the trimmings of a fine Christmas goose. MMC: What challenges have you faced in the process of writing “All Souls Night”? Jennifer: Ummm... actually sitting down and being able to make myself write, rather than screw around all day. I have a real hard time doing my job when I would much rather be surfing the internet or going out with friends or just watching reruns of America’s Next Top Model on VH1. Tyra Banks is like kryptonite to my writing. MMC: What attracts you about the paranormal characters you write about? Jennifer: I like vampires. I’ve always been aware of them or drawn to them or whatever you want to call it. It just seemed natural that I would write about them. There is a witch in my series, and witchcraft and magic, but I refuse to think of that as paranormal. I desperately want to believe that Samantha from Bewitched is really out there. I added in werewolves, to be honest, because it seemed natural to have them if all the other ghoulies are running around. And zombies pop up in All Souls’ Night. I guess all supernatural creepies are equally fascinating to me, until you get into all of that were-rat, were-cougar business. That just gets weird and confusing to me. MMC: Let's say you've just landed a movie deal, and you get to pick the actress who'll play the heroine from Blood Ties. Who would you pick and why? Jennifer: At the time I wrote the first book, I imagined Naomi Watts. They would probably cast someone younger, though. I guess I’d be happy with Kirsten Dunst. She seems like she would do a good job. As long as Gerard Butler is Nathan, I’ll be happy! They can cast anybody else they want! MMC: For those not familiar with your work, which book would you recommend to read first and why? The first one. My books are like a tv series, but not like Law and Order, where you can sit down and watch it and really enjoy an hour with no back story filled in. They’re more like Heroes or Lost, where if you miss the first episode you have no clue what is going on for the rest of the season. MMC: Are there any future releases? Jennifer: Yeah, I’m leaving the Blood Ties world and working on a fantasy trilogy that will be released in Fall of 2009. I think it’s September, October, and November that the books come out, but to be honest, I can never remember which three months they are. The ones toward the end of the year. MMC: Now to the fun questions. What's something that your readers may not know about you? Jennifer: I can walk on stilts. Trufax. MMC: Do you have a favorite food/beverage/music do you always have on hand while you're writing? Jennifer: I’m a big believer in drinking heavily during the last few chapters of the book. Some critics will say, “AH! That explains everything.” I’m pregnant right now, so I’m having a hard time finishing the book I’m currently working on, ‘cause I can’t drink. MMC: When not writing, how do you relax? Jennifer: I like to chill out and have barbecues and such with my friends, watch tv, get into fights on the internet. Play video games, that’ s a big one. I’m all up on the MarioKart for Wii right now. MMC: Do you have any obsessions? Collections? Jennifer: I collect Little Apple dolls, wigs, tacky unicorn knick-knacks and books, dear lord help me, books. MMC: Do you have a newsletter, blog, or website where fans can read about you and your books? Jennifer: Yeah, you can go to www.jenniferarmintrout.com and get links to my blog and info and all that jazz. Leave me blog comments, because comments make my day.