Today I’m pleased to welcome to my blog author of Sanctuary’s Fiend, Andrew Lynch.

As you may be aware if you’re following the SPFBO competition or my updates I’ve recently cut my first three books (oh, how I hate to cut any books) and unfortunately Sanctuary’s Fiend was part of that first batch. But, I would like to stress that Sanctuary’s Fiend was an easy and entertaining read, I own that I’m not the target audience and, more than that, I don’t just see the SPFBO as a competition with one winner.  I like to think that all the authors who enter the competition are winners, maybe not for the elusive No.1 spot, but in bringing awareness not only to their own books but to the huge self published market that’s out there.  I’ve taken part in this competition since it began and my perception of self published books has definitely changed as a result.  Hopefully that will be the same for other readers.  So, all that aside please check out my interview with the lovely Mr Lynch:

Heya Lynn, thanks for being crazy enough to read 30 books! I know I couldn’t do it. Me? Well, I work for the government in one of those “kill you if I told you” kind of places, and I love easy to read, funny fantasy. I value a book that makes me laugh over a book that makes me cry any day of the week, and I think that’s really the best way to go into any of my books, and especially Sanctuary’s Fiend. I didn’t set out to change anyone’s view on life, I just wanted to make people laugh and enjoy being in the head of a teenage vampire for a while. It’s popcorn fiction!

What was the inspiration for Sanctuary’s Fiend, was it a lightbulb moment of clarity or more a small kernel of an idea that grew.

It was definitely a kernel that grew. I had just finished writing my sword and sorcery fantasy, Demi Heroes, and I wanted something lighter and easier, and when I was deciding what exactly that should be, I went back to my roots. I grew up on videogame fantasy and Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Writing Sanctuary’s Fiend was just me exploring “what if buffy was a vampire and her best friend was a mute kid that lured sailors to their deaths?”.

Do you have an overall plan for the series?  do you have an ending in mind and a set number of books or is this going to be more of an organic process that will grow?

Keeping with the Buffy vibe, I wanted to create a “monster of the week” feeling. Each book would be its own self contained novel, but there would also be an overarching plot pulling the faithful readers through. Again, I was aiming for popcorn reading. “Missed a few books in the series? No biggie, you’ll figure it out!”. That said, I did have the overarching plot roughly squared away in my head, and I personally have no interest in a permanently running series. Also, the finale of popcorn reading is the best part to write, and getting to write an entire book as a finale? Don’t want to miss out on that!

Would you say that your characters take over and run around in your head when you’re writing about them? I read a couple of authors recently who wrote small part characters only then to have those characters demand more time.  How do you and your characters get along and are any of them proving to be more pushy than you expected?

Such a romantic notion! My characters tend to stay in line in the broad strokes of things. If they need to be dead, or grow a third arm in the final act of the book, they’ll make it happen. HOW they make it happen? Well, I love finding that part out along with the reader! 

(What can I say – I have romantic notions :D)

Sanctuary’s Fiend is UF with a bunch of fantasy creatures living amongst regular human beings.  You mention in the blurb that your young protagonist is starting to develop her own appetites – how easy do you think it will be as the story progresses to keep these two worlds separate.

Oh it won’t be possible at all! What fun would that be? No, no, no, we’re going to smash those two worlds together and the fallout will fundamentally change the landscape of Sanctuary. Of course, there are the supernatural secret police that have worked for centuries to stop exactly that from happening, so they may have a few things to say about my plans.

Why did you decide to go down the route of self publishing and is there any particular advice that you’d like to share with others?

I enjoy the freedom and the sense of accomplishment that comes with doing everything entirely by yourself. And, in all honesty, I needed to write a bad book (The one BEFORE Sanctuary’s Fiend!), make all the mistakes, and learn from them. Self publishing let me do that and still feel accomplished. With traditional publishing, I would have spent a year on a book, hit a stone wall, and given up. This way, I have a finished book that people can buy, and that in itself gave me what I needed to go back to the drawing board and write a GOOD book. Sanctuary’s Fiend is exactly that!

Advice for others: you have to be bad to be good.

Is there any particular aspect that you found difficult about writing a character of the opposite sex.

I actually find writing a female character much easier than writing a male one. When I’m writing a male, inevitably they are me. They will have my sense of humour, my taste in clothes etc. I struggle to deviate too far from that when writing a POV character. But when I’m writing a female POV? I can completely divorce what I’m writing from myself, and let the character truly be whoever that character is supposed to be. (What an interesting answer – I never really thought of it like that before :D)

Finally, on a lighter note:

If you could go back in time would you give yourself any particular advice?

Easy one! START NOW! I waited till I was 27 to start writing. I’m pretty sure If I’d started when I was 18, I’d be ruling the world right now. Instead I lost over a decade!

What happy memory would you use when casting a patronus charm and what would your patronus animal be?

Umm, are you implying that I’m not supposed to be walking through life in a miasma of apathy?

And I’d be a Puma, obviously!

Can you tell me your earliest childhood read that had an impact on you

This is actually a really easy question. It would have to be the series of books that I remember reading in middle school called Spooksville. It was like an off-brand Goosebumps by an author called Christopher Pike. I even graduated to his adult novels (they’d by YA these days, but YA didn’t exist then as a category). Without those, I doubt I’d be a reader at all!

Andrew – thanks so much for taking part in the interview and the competition and all the best for Sanctuary’s Fiend.  I look forward to seeing what adventures Rel will be involved in next.

More information about Andrew’s book is below.

 Sanctuary’s Fiend by A. Lynch

Rel is your average 16 year old high school student. She just wants to hang out with her friends, scrape by in class, and avoid the mean girls.

Her best friend is a siren, the girl who just joined the class is a ghost, and her adoptive parents are succubi that simply don’t understand her – the rest of Sanctuary doesn’t get any less weird!

As she tries to be normal and tell the boy she likes how she feels about him, she experiences a case of sudden onset vampirism.
Let’s see how that works out for Rel, shall we?

Goodread’s author page

Website: http://www.lynchwriting.com