An Interview with Jeaniene Frost

By: Jocelyn Drake
July 26, 2010

Welcome to today’s interview with my special guest, the lovely and oh-so-talented Jeaniene Frost, the writer of the New York Times bestselling Night Huntress Series.  Ms. Frost has been gracious enough to put herself into my evil clutches for a brief period of time to answer a few questions in celebration of her upcoming release, Eternal Kiss of Darkness.

Eternal Kiss of Darkness is the second book in your Night Huntress series, meaning that you’ve stepped away from Bones and Cat to tell the story of other characters in your Night Huntress World.  Do you find it easier or more difficult to focus on characters other than Cat and Bones, whom you’ve spent more time with?  Do you find the switch refreshing or possibly daunting?

It was refreshing and daunting, actually. Five books into writing the Night Huntress series, I was very used to being in Cat’s point of view. Changing gears to tell a story through the viewpoint of a new heroine, whose personality is very different from Cat’s, was challenging – not to mention the change of writing through the point of view of a 4,500 year old Master vampire.

But I had Mencheres and Kira’s story in my head for a while before things lined up to where I could start writing it. So I was very excited to finally highlight the two of them in Eternal Kiss of Darkness, plus show the vampire world from the perspective of someone who’d literally been around since the time of the pyramids.  Mencheres has been such an unfathomable character in the Night Huntress series. Cat rarely knew what he was thinking, so by default, neither did readers. Writing through his point of view allowed me to show Mencheres without all his careful outer camouflage, and I think readers will be surprised by what a passionate, witty, complex person he is. Kira was also great to delve into. She’s so strong emotionally, which I didn’t know before I started writing her, and she’s not afraid to stand her ground even under incredible pressure. When I grow up, I want to be just like her

Can readers count on Eternal Kiss of Darkness to be as hot as the Cat and Bones stories that your fans salivate over?

It’s funny, because I never deliberately try to write a story as “hot”. I just try to reflect the interactions between my hero and heroine in the same unfiltered way as if I were a fly on the wall. Mencheres and Kira had a lot of chemistry together. They were both drawn to each other even when they were each trying to talk themselves out of it, so their scenes did end up to be very steamy – especially when they decided to damn the consequences and be together anyway. Also, Mencheres has a past that rival’s Bones’s as far as experience, and he can do things with his telekinesis that no one else can.

So I guess the short answer would be yes, it’s as hot as my Cat and Bones books, lol.

Could you give us some background on the world you created for the Night Huntress series?  What kind of creatures will readers find there?

The Night Huntress universe contains vampires who walk in the daylight and have no aversion to wooden stakes or crosses; ghouls who look just as human as you do, except their diet is a very different, heh; sentient and residual ghosts, some with powers that my characters are only just learning about; demons who come in both corporeal form or exist as entities that posses people, and dark magic that can manifest itself in dreams that kill or raising things from the grave that can scare even vampires.

And of course, there are humans, most of whom have no idea that they share the planet with all these creatures. When those two worlds collide, explosive things tend to happen.

As for your writing style, are you a plotter or a pantzer?  Do you outline ahead of time or do you write the story as it comes to you?

I’m mostly a pantser. I’ll usually start a book knowing these things: who the hero is, who the heroine is, who the villain is, the main threat that the villain represents, and a general idea of how it’s going to end. That might sound like a lot, but it’s really only the bare bones of a story. It’s how all these characters interact with each other, their response to all the perils thrown at them, their flaws, strengths, passions, and sacrifices that really makes a story, and I don’t know most of those things until I’m writing. I’ve had side characters pop up that I never intended to write, new subplots rear their head, and revelations about previous characters come out of nowhere to surprise me. All those things are part of the magic for me. I’ve often said that my subconscious can write a hell of a better book than my conscious plotting mind.

When sitting down to write a book is there one thing that you absolutely must have at your side to get you through the writing session?  Coffee?  Music?  Internet access to social networking sites?

My writing computer is a laptop that doesn’t even have internet access. It’s also downstairs, as far away from my internet computer as my small townhouse can manage. I know better than to be near the siren song of the ‘Net when I try to write. It’s so easy to get distracted by emails, blog comments, web surfing, instant messages, etc. I’ve also, in the past few years, used music to help center me into a story. Before I start a book, I’ll look up songs on iTunes that either have lyrics that remind me of certain scenes / characters, or have the tone, feel, and resonance that I’m going for with the book. Then while I’m writing, I’ll add and delete songs to that playlist, until by the end, I have about a dozen songs that I’ve replayed scores of times (much to my husband’s dismay) .  It really does help provide inspiration and push me through some tough writing spots.

As to the other, my husband has often commented that I should dedicate one of my books to coffee, Coke Zero, and Pringles, because I’ve yet to finish a novel without copious amounts of all three.

Jeaniene, you’ve been a fabulous sport for answering my questions and we love that you’ve stopped by for a visit.  Thank you so much for your time and your wonderful books, and congratulations on the release of Eternal Kiss of Darkness!

Thanks so much for taking the time to chat with me, Jocelynn, and congrats on the release of Wait For Dusk, the fifth novel in your Dark Days series. Vampire books rule! 

For a quick role reversal and a little cross promotional fun, check out Jeaniene’s interview of Jocelyn today on the Eos Blog.