Please
enjoy this interview with Frederick Lee Brooke, author of the
genre-bending mystery
Zombie Candy. Then
read on to learn how you can win huge prizes as part of this blog
tour, including $550 in Amazon gift cards, a Kindle Fire, and 5
autographed copies of the book.
1. What was the
inspiration behind your novel, Zombie
Candy?
There was a famous golfer whose wife
chased him out of the house with a golf club in the middle of the
night a couple of years ago. It was funny that she attacked her
husband with his own weapon of choice. I got to thinking what must be
going through a woman's mind in that situation? I thought it would be
interesting to explore the thought processes of a woman who discovers
that her husband is a serial cheater. After the denial comes anger,
but there is also a phase of grief. There's guilt. Maybe she blames
herself, rightly or wrongly. Candace oscillates between wanting
revenge and wanting her husband back, and as the novel winds up she
makes discoveries about herself that I thought a woman in her
situation would be likely to make.
2. Do you
think Zombie Candy will appeal to true
zombie fans?
What's a true zombie fan? I don't want
to give anything away, but any active zombie fan who participates in
zombie walks, goes to festivals, etc. will love Zombie
Candy. That being said, this is a book that has elements
of mystery, horror and romance all in one. It had quite a few early
readers, fans of all different genres, and the consensus is that it
really works.
3. The book contains some
of Candace's favorite recipes. Why?
I confess, I love to cook, and it's
such an important part of my life, it just felt natural to have
Candace want to share her recipes. We are all vulnerable to being
attacked through our taste buds. I like reading about cooking, and I
love watching cooking shows on TV. I feel like I'm learning something
and tasting it at the same time. It felt right for this to be really
important for Candace. At the same time, her husband Larry is so
incredibly lacking in appreciation of her talents, not just the
cooking itself, but organizing complex meals and directing the
preparation of them by her class of twelve people. These are amazing
skills, and Larry is blind to them. I thought marriages are sometimes
like that, where people get to a point where they are totally
ignorant of what their partner is great at.
4. There is a no-cilantro
label on the back cover of the book. What is the significance of
it?
Candace is a gourmet cook, and her
cheating husband Larry insists on covering all his food with
cilantro. This is one of those minor points of contention in a
marriage that flares up and becomes important, like a trigger. I
thought it was funny. And it seems a lot of people really do have
strong feelings about cilantro, either for or against. When I was
searching for a good graphic I came across pages on the internet
like
ihatecilantro.com and
facebook.com/i-hate-cilantro.
5. After starting out in
Chicago, why did you decide to set the story in Tuscany?
I've been fortunate enough to travel to
Italy forty or fifty times in my life, sometimes for a two-week
vacation, sometimes just for a very short trip. I absolutely love it
there, from the food to the language to the beauty of the countryside
and the architecture. In Zombie Candy, Candace
realizes at a certain point that she has to get Larry out of his
comfort zone. This is a guy who travelled all over the country every
week for his work, and cheated on Candace with waitresses, flight
attendants, whoever. He can adapt just about anywhere. But in Tuscany
Larry discovers two things: 1) it's not so easy to find a willing
waitress or flight attendant to spend the night with him; and 2)
there are zombies here.
6. How would you describe the way you
work as a writer?
I guess I'm a bit of a chameleon, able
to adapt pretty well to circumstances around me. My wife and I have
three boys and they are not quiet. I can do most revision with
significant background noise and interruptions. Only when I'm writing
a first draft or doing some serious planning work do I need peace and
quiet. Then I'll often take a walk in the forest anyway. It helps a
lot to be adaptable. If I had to put off writing every time someone
asked me to cook dinner or help them with their homework, my book
would never have been finished. For me, being able to jump right back
in has been the key to being able to finish big projects.
7. Did you always want to
be a writer?
I was an early reader and this led to
curiosity about writing stories. My sister and I wrote stories during
long car trips. In high school and then in college I dreamed of
writing novels, but I only started writing short stories after
graduating from college. That writing phase lasted about five years,
and I learned a lot about writing, but life got in the way, with
marriage and job and career and kids. Only when my kids were halfway
grown and my career reached a certain level of success did I find a
way to return to writing. Now I'm fulfilling a lifelong dream.
8. What process do you go
through to define your characters?
I start with an image of them as
basically good or basically evil, and put them into a context or a
situation, and then just basically make sure there is plenty of
conflict. My characters are never perfectly white or black. I think
we're drawn to weaknesses. We want to watch them mess up, and see how
they'll extricate themselves. Of course, sometimes all my planning
goes out the window. It's a cliche to say that characters surprise
you with their actions, but they do. They're defined by what they do
and what they say. I did some acting in high school and have always
loved the theater, and knowing what it means to be in character helps
me be in character when I'm writing dialogue. My books are fairly
dialogue-driven. What the characters say reveals what they are
thinking and feeling.
9. What writing advice
did you receive that was most beneficial to you?
I had to learn to love conflict. The
conflict is the story. The conflict shows the true colors of your
characters. I grew up in the suburbs in a family where we avoided
conflict at all costs. We talked like diplomats. So embracing
conflict has been something I had to learn.
10. You're an indie
author. Any thoughts on the divide between independent publishing and
traditional publishing?
I think the market will sort itself
out, but it's going to take time. Good books will find their way into
readers' hands somehow, whether in printed or electronic form. We
need our stories every day. We can't live without stories. For me
personally, independent publishing has been the perfect solution. I
found an excellent editor who professionally edited my manuscript. I
like the idea that I can control the timing of the publication of my
books. If my first book, Doing Max Vinyl, had
been traditionally published in April 2011 instead of the way I did
it, it probably would have hit the remainder tables by Thanksgiving,
and it would be out of print now. I think Zombie Candy
might spark some interest in Doing Max Vinyl, so
it's a benefit to readers as well as to me that it continues to be
available, rather than going out of print and being forgotten.
E-books are clearly here to stay, because the consumers (readers) and
providers (authors) are the big winners. The only losers are the
bookstores, publishing companies, agents and others who refuse to
adapt.
As
part of this special promotional extravaganza sponsored by Novel
Publicity, the price of the
Zombie Candy eBook
edition is just 99 cents this week. What’s more, by purchasing this
fantastic book at an incredibly low price, you can enter to win many
awesome prizes.
The prizes include $550 in
Amazon gift cards, a Kindle Fire, and 5 autographed copies of the
book.
All the info you need to win one of
these amazing prizes is
RIGHT HERE. Remember, winning
is as easy as clicking a button or leaving a blog comment--easy to
enter; easy to win!
To win the
prizes:
- Purchase your copy of Zombie
Candy for just 99 cents
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- Visit today’s featured
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About the book:
Weaving elements of mystery, horror and romance in a hilarious romp
that starts in Chicago and ends in a quaint medieval town in
sun-drenched Tuscany,
Zombie Candy is a
genre-hopping knee-slapper of a novel.
Get it
on Amazon.
About the author:
Frederick Lee Brooke has worked as an English teacher,
language school manager and small business owner and has travelled
extensively in Tuscany, the setting of part of
Zombie
Candy. Visit
Fred on his website, Twitter, Facebook, or GoodReads.
