Friday, December 4, 2020

Bok Spotlight/Giveaway: Hungry Business

 


Check out the new book by Maria DeBlassie, Hungry Business. Don't forget to enter the tour wide contest to win a Maria DeBlassie will be awarding a free ecopy of Hungry Business to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. The tour is sponsored by Goddess Fish Promotions and you can find all the tour stops HERE.

Talking with the author

Thanks for stopping by to talk a little about your writing! Let's jump right in. When did you begin writing and why?

 

Ive been writing for as long as I can remember, but it wasnt until I was in high school that I decided it wanted to be a Serious Writer. Reading was always a huge part of my life, so I think I just fell in love with the idea of telling stories.  I wrote every morning before school for twenty minutes a day, and longer in the summer—a habit I continue to this day!  I turned to blogging after finishing graduate school, and my first book, Everyday Enchantments, was born out of my daily musings on the things that made me happy from my blog.  Now, Im excited to be moving into fiction, my first writing love, with Hungry Business, a Gothic short story about searching for soul in a world thats forgotten the power of everyday magic.   

Do you have a favorite genre? Is it the same genre you prefer to write?

 

I love writing inspirational non-fiction, offering witchy tips and insights for people in search of a little more magic in their lives.  I also write cozy Gothic stories, urban fantasy, and romance.  I find they all nourish one another.  My non-fiction books on everyday magic help me craft the enchanting worlds in my fiction and my genre stories guide me deeper into everyday                          conjuring in my life beyond the written word.

Do certain themes and ideas tend to capture your writers imagination and fascinate you?

 

Absolutely!  I love writing about everyday magic and ordinary Gothic, those day in, day out happenings that remind us that the unseen world is just as real, just as important, as mundane life. They are, in fact, intricately connected. 

How do you balance long-term thinking vs. being nimble in today's market?

 

It’s important to be business savvy and read up on what’s going on the book world, both in indie and traditional markets.  But then you kind of have to throw it all out the window and write the story that needs to be written.  I find if I start trying to write to accommodate the market, the inspiration dries up.  My creative energy is mercurial like that.  It has its own way of doing things and wants to tell the stories that need telling in its own way and in its own time.  Long term, that means developing a body of work that will reach thoughtful readers who appreciate soulful stories.  

How do you find readers in today's market?

 

I’m a big believer in book magic. Stories are magic and your words will find the right audience.  Those who need your medicine will always find you.  Sure, I promote my books via blog tours, interviews, marketing and an active social media life and all that.   But it’s also important to remember that your stories know where they belong and who they want to speak to.  It’s a little woo-woo, I know, but writing is part of my magical practice as a bruja, and, as as such, follows its own path.

Do you come up with the hook first, or do you create characters first and then dig through until you find a hook?

 

Depends on the story!  Sometimes the hook finds me first, other times, I get to know characters and wonder what their struggles might be.  In the case of Hungry Business, I was struck by the hook—that dating is the zombie apocalypse of the soul.  Then the characters followed.  

How do you create your characters?

 

Sometimes they come to me in dreams, other times, they are parts of myself I want to explore more.  Or they’re sewn together from experiences, imaginings, and stray bits of thread and ink.

What's on the top of your TBR pile right now?

 

So many books!  I’m looking forward to reading Iron & Velvet by Alexis Hall, a queer occult detective novel; The Chocolate Kiss by Laura Florand, a romance about a Parisian kitchen witch;  and Tarot: No Questions Asked: Mastering the Art of Intuitive Reading by Theresa Reed, to deepen my own tarot practice…I could go on, but that’s a pretty decent look at the range of books I’m reading at any given time.

Tell me a little about the characters in Hungry Business.

 

The main protagonist in Hungry Business (which I am only just now realizing remains nameless in the short story—she’s certainly never revealed her name to me!), is searching love in all the wrong places.  She’s got a lot of heart and a lot of hope, but she’s struggling to stay true to herself in a world that wants her numb and soulless.  Of course, her struggles are unfolding against the backdrop of a supernatural pandemic, which complicates things.  But where there’s hope, there’s magic, something my protagonist learns by the end of the story.


Wheres the story set? How much influence did the setting have on the atmosphere/characters/development of the story?

 

The story is set in a city that is in the midst of a supernatural pandemic.  Zombies are real, only nobody knows what’s causing people to turn. It’s something that starts on the inside and spreads outward, so it’s not contagious in the typical sense, but people can’t figure out what makes one person turn and not another.  Much like what we’re experiencing in our own real-life pandemic, this story shows that when the world seems dark and dreary, the only solution is to turn inward, back to soul, to our inner life.  Then the magic happens. 

If you had to write your memoir in five words, what would you write?

 

How about six words?  Fictional character trapped in writer’s body.

How often does your muse distract you from day to day minutiae?

 

The minutiae is my muse!  I love everyday life, corny as it sounds.  The magic of a Monday, the quiet bliss of an afternoon cup of tea, the illicit joy of reading late into the night…these are the simple pleasures that make life wonderful.  Its easy to overlook them, get swept up in our to-do lists, but when we pause and take in the beauty around us, we remember to be more than that to-do list. We glean wisdom in the whispering trees and the synchronous happenings that punctuate our day.  We remember to             dream.  And that kind of ordinary joy is pure magic that inspires my writing. 

What do readers have to look forward to in the future from you?

 

Readers can enjoy more cozy Gothic short stories in the coming year, plus my second book, Practically Pagan ~ An Alternative Guide to Everyday Magic, which will be release September 24, 2021. The title says it all: it’s a practical guide to conjuring a more magical life!




GENRE: Gothic, Horror (Cozy)

The book is $0.99 during the tour 

Amazon buy link: https://www.amazon.com/Hungry-Business-Short-Maria-DeBlassie-ebook/dp/B08L48MVHD

 

From the multi-award-winning author of Everyday Enchantments: Musings on Ordinary Magic & Daily Conjurings comes a cozy Gothic short story about searching for connection in a world that's forgotten the power of everyday magic. 

Looking for love can be deadly... 

You know how it goes.  You go out, hoping to meet someone.  You wade through your fair share of brainless automatons, lifeless bodies, and ravenous undead good at passing as human.   

The more you go out, the less hope you feel and the colder your body gets.  But you keep at it.  All you need is one beating heart to match your own before yours stops pumping altogether.  How hard can it be to find one living, breathing human in a city full of bodies?  

Dating.  

It's hungry business. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Excerpt Two:

 

This one looks a little better, you think optimistically.

 

You sit across from each other at the dinner table.  The white tablecloth is as smooth and unblemished as his collared shirt.  He has dressed for the occasion, taking care to hide the evidence of his affliction as best he can (though truly there is only so much he can do with a missing ear and half a brain).  Still, the tuxedo and carefully applied makeup are enough to create the illusion of pumping blood beneath his pallid, blush-stained cheeks—in the right light. Which is another reason why you chose this place.  Candlelight can hide a multitude of sins.        

 

His manners are studied and smooth, as if he has spent a lot of time practicing more human-like movements and behavior. You admire a man who makes that kind of effort.  He watches you as much as you do him, as if he is trying to remember what it was like to be alive. When you reach for your wine glass, so does he—only his thick decaying fingers almost crush the stem, whereas your nimble live ones carefully bring the dark red liquid to your mouth. You try not to notice how he stares at your lips—stained now from the wine—wondering, perhaps, how you taste.

 

GIVEAWAY: 

Maria DeBlassie will be awarding a free ecopy of Hungry Business to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway



Maria DeBlassie, Ph.D. is a native New Mexican mestiza blogger, award-winning writer, and award-winning educator living in the Land of Enchantment. Her first book, Everyday Enchantments: Musings on Ordinary Magic & Daily Conjurings (Moon Books 2018), and her ongoing blog, Enchantment Learning & Living are about everyday magic, ordinary gothic, and the life of a kitchen witch. When she is not practicing her own brand of brujeria, she’s reading, teaching, and writing about bodice rippers and things that go bump in the night.  She is forever looking for magic in her life and somehow always finding more than she thought was there. Find out more about Maria and conjuring everyday magic at www.mariadeblassie.com.

 

Social Media Links:

 

https://linktr.ee/mdeblassie

 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7rY-gLkSH-w8uuVyrhVALA

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/17535853.Maria_DeBlassie

https://www.facebook.com/EnchantmentLL

https://twitter.com/EnchantmentLL

https://www.pinterest.com/mdeblassieell

 



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