This is where fact and fiction blur

The Souls of Witches follows a demon with a dark past and a witch that must challenge her assumption of soul mates after one passionate night. What were some sources that informed this novels development?

I’m not sure what you mean by sources. The characters always come to me fully formed in my mind so beyond knowing what their strengths and limitations are, I just set the stage and let the book play out. But as I was working on Souls of Witches, I did realize I had inadvertently echoed a previous book of mine, Surrendered Darkly. In that book there is the question of if you can fall in love with someone from your past after they’ve broke your heart. I say The Souls of Witches is an echo of that previous book because Rowan and Lars have sex in the beginning of the book, go their separate ways, and then find themselves thrown back together by circumstances or fate. So how do you now create a relationship from what was the definition of a one-night stand with a virtual stranger? Each book puts the cart before the horse and deals with the question of “now what” and “can this really work”.

As to sources, many years ago I went to a witches ball in Atlanta, Georgia. Much of what I put in those chapters occurred on that night. But not all. This is where fact and fiction blur. I also have personal knowledge of witchcraft, the holidays that are celebrated, and an intimate knowledge of kitchen witchery, hedge witchery, and what it’s like to work in a café. Concerning Lars, I had already laid out in book 3, The Dreams of Demons, what the limitations and demands a demon character would possess. Strict adherence to those world-building rules played a large part in the direction this love story took.

What were some challenges you set for yourself as a writer with this book?

I thought my biggest challenge was going to be creating a solid relationship between two characters that didn’t hinge strictly on their sexual chemistry, but it turned out that it was far more difficult to accurately portray Rowan’s magick and power as a witch, specifically a kitchen witch. You see, all of the supernatural characters that are represented in the fictional Pale are, of course, products of my imagination. The gods, demigods, werewolves, demons, shifters, and fae are based on myths. But witches actually do exist in our modern-day world. I’m one of them and have been for the past 30 years. I’ve also known other witches, all of whom get a little tired of the way witches as a group are portrayed in books and Hollywood. So when I decided to create this series, I was determined to represent witches in a realistic way even though this is fiction and all the other supernatural characters would likely dominate the series. Witches are human. They love nature. They have varying gifts and talents. Some are odd. Some are mean. And, the way each witch expresses magick in the world is different. With Rowan, I wanted to inform the reader as to how a kitchen witch experiences magick along with creating a cool love story. Describing energy, the taste and feel of it on the tongue and skin, turned out to be a difficult dilemma for me. I think after many attempts and edits, I came reasonably close.

I enjoyed Lars and Rowan’s relationship. What were some ideas you wanted to explore with their relationship?

This book’s plot, more than any other in the Legends of the Pale Series, was driven by the two main characters. Each of their arcs is a little different, Lars’s journey of self-awareness being the greater, but both Rowan and Lars had to overcome internal struggles and definitions of who they thought they were in order to gain a happy ending for the reader. Lars had to confront his past, learn who his mother really was, and in doing so accept that his father wasn’t the monster he’d always believed him to be. Rowan had to reexamine her life choices, learn to lower her protective walls, and accept that though she is a mere kitchen witch that she’s also powerful. Powerful enough to control Lars, a being who undisputedly sits at the top levels of the Pale’s supernatural hierarchy. And without giving away how she does it, Rowan also had to be the one to rescue Lars and their future together.

So the shorter answer to the above question is that in order to find true happiness and acceptance with someone else, we have to examine our own baggage.

This is the fourth book in the Legends of the Pale series. Will you continue the series, or are will you be focusing on different stories?

Yes, I love this series and have several more book ideas in the works. Because each is a stand-alone novel, I’m not tied to following just a few characters. Instead I have the entire universe of the Pale in which to play. I’m currently working on The Tears of Dragons and The Heart of Monsters. I hope to release one of them by the end of this year.

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