UFI welcomes Jenn Bennett Author of Kindling the Moon. Thanks for Joining us!!
Your bio says your an award winning visual artist. Could you tell my readers who are not aware of what that is, what that is and share something you created?
Visual arts include sculpture, drawing, design, printmaking—as opposed to "performing arts," like dance. But it's really just a fancy way of saying that I paint and draw. I have a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting, and worked on my master's degree at L.S.U. Most of my artwork is oil on canvas and centers on the human figure, portraits, and dream-like/esoteric settings. I was trained classically—not on computer—but I've managed to tool around on Adobe CS and teach myself bits and pieces. All the artwork on my site is mine, as well as the promo designs for Kindling the Moon.
What was your favorite place to visit while traveling in Europe?
I was born in Frankfurt am main, and lived in a small spa town called Bad Nauheim, known for its salt springs (and for the US army base where Elvis was stationed). Every summer we went camping in the Netherlands, which my brother and I considered to be the bees-knees. As an adult, I've done a lot of traveling in the Far East for business: China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. I have a small crush on Hong Kong. It's an amazing, vibrant city; you could explore it for weeks and never see everything.
How would you pitch Kindling the Moon to someone who has never heard of it before?
It's an offbeat urban fantasy that takes place in a universe where magic is real and humans unwittingly live alongside Earthbound demons occupying human bodies. My protagonist has an unusual birthright and is considered royalty among ceremonial magicians, but only a few people know she's alive. I could recite the blurb from the back cover, but what you really need to know is that Kindling the Moon contains the following: an occult mystery, an awesome demon-patronized tiki bar, a badass library filled with priceless occult books, a hot photographer with terrible interpersonal skills, a charmingly geektastic teenage boy, a creepy local Hellfire Club, an unconventional romance, and one hedgehog.
Can you tell us a little bit about the world that Kindling the Moon is set in?
My protagonist, Arcadia Bell, is the daughter of two infamous occultists who were falsely accused of murdering rival magicians. When Arcadia was seventeen, she and her parents faked their deaths to avoid the law, and went their separate ways. Arcadia's been living under assumed names for seven years. She now co-owns a tiki bar in northern California with her best friend, a Hong Kong ex-at named Kar Yee. Not only is Arcadia a talented magician who can conjure Æthyric demons from another plane, she has a gift that allows her to identify Earthbound demons (who look perfectly human to most people). Because of this, she's defied her occult order's stance of All-Demons-Are-Enemies (to be controlled or used by magicians) and finds herself with more Earthbound friends than human ones.
Which character was your favorite to write about? What about the hardest to write about?
My hero, an Earthbound demon named Lon Butler, was probably the hardest to write: he's in his 40s, divorced, a famous photographer, but he's also terrible with words and some of his actions/responses are…awkward. He's not your typical leather-bound, uber-alpha urban fantasy love interest. Lon has a teenage son, Jupiter, who was my favorite character to write. "Jupe" is polar-opposite of his father: boisterous, chatty, over-enthusiastic, and endearingly cocky.
Do you have any certain routines you must follow as you write?
I write in a cozy home office in complete silence, and usually after midnight. When I'm in the middle of writing a book, my schedule tends to slide into a nocturnal rhythm. Once I'm finished with a project, it takes me a couple of weeks to dig myself out and flip back to a daytime schedule.
What are some of your Favorite books or Authors in the Urban Fantasy/Paranormal Genres?
Kim Harrison's Hollows characters are charming and I love how they've grown and changed over the years. I like how Karen Chance can write crazy action scenes, and I love Jim Butcher's dry humor. Caroyln Crane's Disillusionists books blew me away. In the paranormal romance camp, I like Nalini Singh, Mejean Brook, and Ava Gray because they're all a little different.
What Other Projects can we look forward to reading from you?
The second book in the Arcadia Bell world comes out April 2012. I just finished a quirky paranormal young adult book, and I've currently got another supernatural/suspense young adult project in the pipeline, as well as a dark paranormal romance.
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Author Bio: Jenn Bennett is an award-winning visual artist-turned-urban fantasy author. Born in Germany, she’s lived and traveled extensively throughout Europe, the U.S., and the Far East. She believes rebellion is an under-appreciated art form, has conjured more demons than you’ve had hot lunches, and likes her fairy tales like she likes her coffee: dark. She currently lives near Atlanta with her film-geek husband and two very bad pugs.
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Find Jenn and her books
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Kindling the Moon
Arcadia Bell #1
June 28, 2011
A new urban fantasy series about a magician and daughter of accused serial killers who must clear their names—or pay for their crimes with her life.
Being the spawn of two infamous occultists (and alleged murderers) isn’t easy, but freewheeling magician Arcadia “Cady” Bell knows how to make the best of a crummy situation. After hiding out for seven years, she’s carved an incognito niche for herself slinging drinks at the demon-friendly Tambuku Tiki Lounge.
But she receives an ultimatum when unexpected surveillance footage of her notorious parents surfaces: either prove their innocence or surrender herself. Unfortunately, the only witness to the crimes was an elusive Æthyric demon, and Cady has no idea how to find it. She teams up with Lon Butler, an enigmatic demonologist with a special talent for sexual spells and an arcane library of priceless stolen grimoires. Their research soon escalates into a storm of conflict involving missing police evidence, the decadent Hellfire Club, a ruthless bounty hunter, and a powerful occult society that operates way outside the law. If Cady can’t clear her family name soon, she’ll be forced to sacrifice her own life . . . and no amount of running will save her this time.
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Visual arts include sculpture, drawing, design, printmaking—as opposed to "performing arts," like dance. But it's really just a fancy way of saying that I paint and draw. I have a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting, and worked on my master's degree at L.S.U. Most of my artwork is oil on canvas and centers on the human figure, portraits, and dream-like/esoteric settings. I was trained classically—not on computer—but I've managed to tool around on Adobe CS and teach myself bits and pieces. All the artwork on my site is mine, as well as the promo designs for Kindling the Moon.
