Deborah Blake’s WICKEDLY DANGEROUS!

I’m so pleased to be hosting today my good friend Deborah Blake, who’s also hosting me today in honor of our new releases!

What you need to know about Deborah Blake:

• We almost share a birthday. Okay, so that’s probably more intriguing to me than to anyone else, but the long and short is that we’re both Tauruses. You know what that means—tough, bull-headed, direct and honest almost to a fault. Very earthy.
• She’s a really wonderful person and a good friend.
• She’s a practicing witch. PROFESSIONAL witch, as evidenced by all of the non-fiction she’s written on the subject or Llewellyn (THE WITCH’S BROOM, EVERYDAY WITCH BOOK OF RITUALS, WITCHCRAFT ON A SHOESTRING, THE EVERYDAY WITH A TO Z SPELLBOOK, etc.)
• She really does melt when you throw water on her, a la her ALS Ice Bucket Challenge!

• Oh yeah, and her debut paranormal romance novel WICKEDLY DANGEROUS debuted yesterday! (The same day as the print version of my Latter-Day Olympians novel RISE OF THE BLOOD, which I’m talking about over on her blog.)

But hey, you hear me babble on here all the time. Let’s hear about Deborah and the first in her new series from the lady directly!

LD: Deborah, what can you tell us about your series and the fascinating history you’ve drawn from?

DB: The series is based on the Russian fairy tales about Baba Yaga. She was an interesting character, in that she had considerably more depth than your average fairy tale witch. Although she was often depicted as scary and cruel, she was also known for helping worthy seekers. (And there is some indication that if you look further back in the mythology she had roots as a goddess of life and death and the elements. How cool is that?)

The Baba Yaga from the original tales was sometimes said to have sisters, or that there was more than one of them, so that made it easy for me to create a world where Baba Yaga was more of a job title than the name of one individual, allowing me to write three books with three different—but connected—protagonists. I also had fun updating both the Babas (who are now attractive and can kick butt, on top of doing powerful magic) and their classic symbols: the hut that traveled around on chicken legs is now an Airstream trailer in Wickedly Dangerous, and the mortar and pestle the old Baba Yaga used for transportation became a classic BMW motorcycle. Even Chudo-Yudo, the dragon who was her companion has changed his outward seeming, and is now disguised as a giant white pit bull. (And he seems to be turning into everyone’s favorite character as well.)

LD: In writing a witch character, how much have you been able to draw from your own experience and how much did you invent for your fictional world?

DB: Sadly, I can’t actually perform the kind of magic that the Baba Yagas can. (Or can I? Bwahahaha…) It was, in fact, a lot of fun to have a magical character that wasn’t limited by pesky little things like the laws of physics. I did use some of the ritual basics of modern witchcraft practice in both books (Wickedly Dangerous and Wickedly Wonderful), but most of the magic that the Baba’s use is pure fairy tale invention.

LD: Do you find there are a lot of misunderstandings and misrepresentations of Wiccan characters and of witches in fiction?

DB: Sure. Some of it is either due to confusion, religious propaganda, or malice, I suppose. But mostly, I think, people just don’t know any better. I actually taught a class for writers for a while called “Witchcraft for the Paranormal Author,” so writers could learn enough to get it right. It was a blast. Luckily, writing the Baba Yaga stories was a lot simpler, since they were fairy tale witches and not meant to be at all “true to life.”

LD: How much fun are you having with this series? Your heroine looks seriously tough.

DB: Damn, you caught me! I am having SO much fun with these characters. Barbara, especially, (the heroine of Wickedly Dangerous) was a fabulous character to write. Not only was she beautiful and powerful, she was seriously cranky—so I got to channel my inner growl a lot. Beka, the heroine of the second book in the series (Wickedly Wonderful), isn’t quite as powerful as Barbara, or nearly as cranky, but she does have a very cool collection of sharp pointy objects, like swords and knives. And, of course, they both have dragon-dogs as companions. Who wouldn’t like that?

LD: Are there any promotions your running or contests you’d like to highlight? Any giveaway you’d like to do here?

DB: Well, I’d love to give away a dragon…but since I seem to have misplaced my extra one, how about a signed copy of Wickedly Dangerous? I’ve also got an ongoing (for the next couple of days anyway) giveaway on my blog to celebrate the book release, so people should definitely go check that out. There is all sorts of fun swag, like a mug, a tote bag, and that sort of thing.

LD: And if people want to follow you and learn more about your fiction and fantasy, where would they go to find you?

DB: I’m all over the Interwebs. You can find me in the following places:

Website: http://deborahblakeauthor.com

Blog: http://deborahblake.blogspot.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/deborahblake

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deborah.blake

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20821001-wickedly-dangerous

Thanks for having me here—I can’t wait to read the next installment of the Latter-Day Olympians!

Thank you SO much for being here. I can’t wait to read WICKEDLY DANGEROUS and your Baba Yaga novella WICKEDLY MAGICAL!

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