Full Blooded (41 page)

A Minnesota girl born and bred, Amanda Carlson graduated from the University of Minnesota with a double major in speech and hearing science and child development. After enjoying her time as a sign language interpreter, she decided to stay at home and write in earnest after her second child was born. She loves playing Scrabble, tropical beaches, and shopping trips to Ikea. She lives in Minneapolis with her husband and three kids. To find out more about the author, visit
www.amandacarlson.com
or on Twitter @AmandaCCarlson.

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Have you always been a writer?

Yes, ever since I can remember. I started writing in junior high, using my yearbook to add faces to my stories. Over the years, I’ve written humorous essays about my kids, articles for various publications, but did I consider myself a “writer” before the publication of this book? Not really. For me, it’s one of those validation milestones that has made all my other endeavors feel worthy. Now I feel like I can call myself a writer, and it feels damn good.

What do you do when you’re not writing?

I have three kids, so it’s safe to say when I’m not writing I’m trying my best to keep up with my motherly duties. I usually wrap my writing day when they get home from school, but my kids are understanding and give me extra time when I need it. Minneapolis is full of beautiful lakes and I love to walk with pals. By the end of the week I need to escape, so movies are a delicious treat. The more action-packed the better. I also love playing Scrabble—to a slightly unhealthy degree. There’s nothing better than flipping from my WIP to make a move on the Scrabble board. It clears my mind, and when I jump back, I’m ready to write again.

World building is such a big part of urban fantasy. How did you build your world in Full Blooded?

To me, world building is the best part of writing urban fantasy. Being able to invent the rules and bring readers into your universe is so much fun. I had a blast creating Full Blooded. The biggest question I started with was: Do humans know my characters exist? Once I decided their world was a secret, it shaped the book. For the individual characters, the imps, the witches, the vamps and wolves, I asked myself, how much magic do they have? How do they wield it? When all the details were fleshed out, the key was to open up the world in front of the reader and make sure they weren’t bogged down with too many details at once. Selene, the Lunar Goddess, is an actual Greek deity. I enjoyed working her into the story. There’s never a dull moment writing urban fantasy. I absolutely love this genre.

Why the “only female werewolf”? Where did the inspiration for Jessica come from?

All my books start out with a solid visual first scene, which plays out in my mind like a sequence from a movie. Jessica started in my mind with her shift, and once she was done, I knew she was completely “different” from all the other wolves. She stood out, but she also craved a strong family unit. As the books progress, you’ll see Jessica’s friends and family play a big role in her life. She made herself unique in that first scene—and people often fear what they don’t understand. Not so different from the wolves in my story. After that, everything fell into place and the story line unfolded.

How did the Cain Myth come to be?

Werewolves in my world are superstitious to an incredible degree. Jessica wasn’t supposed to exist, so to solidify the Pack’s fear, I felt they had to have something tangible. Preferably something they could hold on to and see. The Cain Myth was a great place to start … but be careful … all may not be what it seems.

How much of you are in your characters?

All of my characters come into my mind fully formed and stubborn. I can’t say any of them
are
me, but they are definitely a combination of the way I view the world. As a writer, I think most of the time we’re writing characters we’d love to sit down and have a drink with, rather than writing subconsciously about ourselves. At least that’s true for me. Jess may have a little bit of me infused in there somewhere, but really, she’s someone I just want to hang out with.

There are all different types of weres, witches, vampires, and more in your story. If you could be one supernatural creature, what would it be?

I’d love to be a shifter of some kind. Possibly one with wings so I could take myself to the beach at a moment’s notice. I have a deep weakness for sunshine and sand. Having magic abilities would also be interesting. Being able to conjure a spell anytime, anyplace would be incredible. The world would be a much different place with a little magic in it—and, I think, a lot more fun.

Rourke is a powerful character and so gorgeous. But so is James. Why did you pick Rourke for Jessica’s mate?

I love James. There are no two ways about it. But Jessica demanded something different. The standard-issue Pack member, even a strong, capable one, wasn’t going to suffice. She’s a one-of-a-kind wolf who needed an original mate. Rourke is amazing and sexy, and he’s completely devoted to her. Jessica hasn’t gotten to explore him … yet. But when she does, there will be no question in the reader’s mind of why he’s The One.

Will we ever find out what Rourke really is?

Absolutely! But don’t get your hopes up too soon.

What’s next for Jessica and Rourke?

Jessica and Rourke are in for some extreme adventures together. But first Jessica has to fight an evil Goddess to get him back, and if that’s not bad enough, trouble manifests itself in a whole new form—one that Jess and Rourke had no idea was coming …

if you enjoyed

FULL BLOODED

look out for

UNCLEAN SPIRITS

by

M. L. N. Hanover

I flew into Denver on the second of August, three days before my twenty-third birthday. I had an overnight bag packed with three changes of clothes, the leather backpack I used for a purse, the jacket my last boyfriend hadn’t had the guts to come pick up from my apartment (it still smelled like him), my three-year-old laptop wrapped in a blanket, and a phone number for Uncle Eric’s lawyer. The area around the baggage carousel was thick with families and friends hugging one another and saying how long it had been and how much everyone had grown or shrunk or whatever. The wide metal blades weren’t about to offer up anything of mine, so I was just looking through the crowd for my alleged ride and trying not to make eye contact.

It took me a while to find him at the back of the crowd, his head shifting from side to side, looking for me. He had a legal pad in his hand with my name in handwritten letters—‘Jayne Heller.’ He was younger than I’d expected, maybe midthirties, and cuter. I shouldered my way through the happy mass of people, mentally applauding Uncle Eric’s taste.

‘You’d be Aubrey?’ I said.

‘Jayné,’ he said, pronouncing it
Jane
. It’s actually zha-
nay
, but that was a fight I’d given up. ‘Good. Great. I’m glad to meet you. Can I help you with your bags?’

‘Pretty much covered on that one,’ I said. ‘Thanks, though.’

He looked surprised, then shrugged it off.

‘Right. I’m parked over on the first level. Let me at least get that one for you.’

I surrendered my three changes of clothes and followed.

‘You’re going to be staying at Eric’s place?’ Aubrey asked over his shoulder. ‘I have the keys. The lawyer said it would be okay to give them to you.’

‘Keys to the kingdom,’ I said, then, ‘Yes. I thought I’d save the money on a hotel. Doesn’t make sense not to, right?’

‘Right,’ Aubrey said with a smile that wanted badly to be comfortable but wasn’t.

I couldn’t blame the guy for being nervous. Christ only knew what Eric had told him about the family. Even the broad stroke of ‘My brother and sister-in-law don’t talk to me’ would have been enough to make the guy tentative. Much less the full-on gay-hating, patriarch-in-the-house, know-your-place episode of
Jerry Springer
that had been my childhood. Calling Uncle Eric the black sheep of the family was like saying the surface of the sun was warmish. Or that I’d been a little tiny disappointment to them.

Aubrey drove a minivan, which was kind of cute. After he slung my lonely little bag into the back, we climbed in and drove out. The happy crowd of families and friends fell away behind us. I leaned against the window and looked up into the clear night sky. The moon was about halfway down from full. There weren’t many stars.

‘So,’ Aubrey said. ‘I’m sorry. About Eric. Were you two close?’

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Or … maybe. I don’t know. Not close like he called me up to tell me about his day. He’d check in on me, make sure things weren’t too weird at home. He’d just show up sometimes, take me out to lunch or for ice cream or something cheesy like that. We always had to keep under my dad’s radar, so I figure he’d have come by more often if he could.’

Aubrey gunned the minivan, pulling us onto the highway.

‘He protected me,’ I said, soft enough that I didn’t think Aubrey would hear me, but he did.

‘From what?’

‘Myself,’ I said.

Here’s the story. In the middle of high school, I spent about six months hanging out with the bad kids. On my sixteenth birthday, I got very,
very
drunk and woke up two days later in a hotel room with half a tattoo on my back and wearing someone else’s clothes. Eric had been there for me. He told my dad that I’d gotten the flu and helped me figure out how to keep anyone from ever seeing the ink.

I realized I’d gone silent. Aubrey was looking over at me.

‘Eric was always swooping in just when everything was about to get out of control,’ I said. ‘Putting in the cooling rods.’

‘Yeah,’ Aubrey said. ‘That sounds like him.’

Aubrey smiled at the highway. It seemed he wasn’t thinking about it, so the smile looked real. I could see why Eric would have gone for him. Short, curly hair the color of honey. Broad shoulders. What my mother would have called a kind mouth. I hoped that he’d made Eric happy.

‘I just want you to know,’ I said, ‘it’s okay with me that he was gay.’

Aubrey started.

‘He was gay?’

‘Um,’ I said. ‘He wasn’t?’

‘He never told me.’

‘Oh,’ I said, mentally recalculating. ‘Maybe he wasn’t. I assumed … I mean, I just thought since my dad wouldn’t talk about him … my dad’s kind of old-school. Where
school
means
testament
. He never really got into that love-thy-neighbor-as-thyself part.’

‘I know the type,’ he said. The smile was actually pointed at me now, and it seemed genuine.

‘There was this big falling-out about three years ago,’ I said. ‘Uncle Eric had called the house, which he almost never did. Dad went out around dinnertime and came back looking deeply pissed off. After that … things were weird. I just assumed …’

I didn’t tell Aubrey that Dad had gathered us all in the living room—me, Mom, my older brother Jay, and Curtis the young one—and said that we weren’t to have anything to do with Uncle Eric anymore. Not any of us. Not ever. He was a pervert and an abomination before God.

Mom had gone sheet-white. The boys just nodded and looked grave. I’d wanted to stand up for him, to say that Uncle Eric was family, and that Dad was being totally unfair and hypocritical. I didn’t, though. It wasn’t a fight I could win.

But Aubrey knew him well enough to have a set of spare keys, and he didn’t think Eric was gay. Maybe Dad had meant something else. I tried to think what exactly had made me think it was that, but I couldn’t come up with anything solid.

Aubrey pulled his minivan off the highway, then through a maze of twisty little streets. One-story bungalows with neatly kept yards snuggled up against each other. About half the picture windows had open curtains; it was like driving past museum dioramas of the American Family. Here was one with an old couple sitting under a cut glass chandelier. One with the backs of two sofa-bound heads and a wall-size Bruce Willis looking troubled and heroic. One with two early-teenage boys, twins to look at them, chasing each other. And then we made a quick dogleg and pulled into a carport beside a brick house. Same lawn, same architecture. No lights, no one in the windows.

‘Thanks,’ I said, reaching around in the seat to grab my bag.

‘Do you want … I mean, I can show you around a little. If you want.’

‘I think I’m just going to grab a shower and order in a pizza or something,’ I said. ‘Decompress. You know.’

‘Okay,’ he said, fishing in his pocket. He came out with a leather fob with two keys and passed it over to me. I took it. The leather was soft and warm. ‘If you need anything, you have my number?’

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Thanks for the lift.’

‘If there’s anything I can do …’

I popped open the door. The dome light came on.

‘I’ll let you know,’ I said. ‘Promise.’

‘Your uncle,’ Aubrey said. Then, ‘Your uncle was a very special man.’

‘I know,’ I said.

He seemed like he wanted to say something else, but instead he just made me promise again that I’d call him if I needed help.

There wasn’t much mail in the box—ads and a water bill. I tucked it under my arm while I struggled with the lock. When I finally got the door open, I stumbled in, my bag bumping behind me.

A dim atrium. A darker living room before me. The kitchen door to my left, ajar. A hall to my right, heading back to bedrooms and bathrooms and closets.

‘Hey,’ I said to nothing and no one. ‘I’m home.’

I never would have said it to anyone, but my uncle had been killed at the perfect time. I hated myself for even thinking that, but it was true. If I hadn’t gotten the call from his lawyer, if I hadn’t been able to come here, I would have been reduced to couch surfing with people I knew peripherally from college. I wasn’t welcome at home right now. I hadn’t registered for the next semester at ASU, which technically made me a college dropout.