TWILIGHT THURSDAY

Please welcome author, Melisse Aires, in the Moonlight today. Melisse is the author of several books, including Tiger Juice, Christmas Wizardy Wishing Rights and coming in 2010, Cybot Awakened.

Melisse can be found at the following place:

Blog: http://melisseaires.blogspot.com/
Website: http://www.melisseaires.com/

Now, let's learn more about Melisse and her books...

1. Do you have any favorite Thanksgiving movie or program that you enjoy watching every year?

The only one that comes to mind is the old Waltons’ Thanksgiving!

2. What, if any, Thanksgiving traditions (decorating, gathering with friends and family for a meal, etc.) do you have?

I always make pumpkin pie with my mother’s recipe, which has less cloves and more nutmeg than most pumpkin pie recipes. No other pumpkin pie tastes quite right.

3. What was your most memorable Thanksgiving and why?

My first Thanksgiving away from home my freshman year of college is memorable. Four kids and I took off in a little old car, over McDonald’s Pass in Montana, and up a twisty two lane highway through a wooded lake area called the Seeley Swan. Gorgeous country, but not fun for winter driving. Two hundred miles in a horrible blizzard with icy roads. We crept home at 30 miles an hour. We were so glad to get home!

The following year my dad came to get me, and we landed in a ditch for 6 hours—one tow truck for the 200 mile stretch, and several cars already in the ditch. After we got to town we went out to dinner at the nicest restaurant!

4. Which do you choose: white or dark turkey, white potatoes or yams, green beans or corn, bread rolls or crescent rolls?

White, yams AND cream cheese mashed potatoes, corn casserole, bread rolls made with mashed potatoes.

5. What, in your opinion, was the oddest food served at a Thanksgiving dinner you’ve attended?

Don’t care for oysters in the stuffing.

6. Tell us 3 things you are thankful for this year, please.

1 My husband, who is diabetic, is in better health this year than in the past two years. 2 My three teen daughters are fun and responsible. 3 We have our jobs and home and are weathering the financial downturn.

7. Just for fun, if you could be among any of the original members of that first Thanksgiving, who would it be, the Pilgrims or the Wampanoag (Native Americans)?

Wampanoag!

Why?

They were in tune with their world.

8. Considering that feast, what do you think that first harvest celebration meal would be?

Roasted venison


Now, let’s get to your writing:

9. Why paranormal and futuristic? What’s the draw?

I’ve always loved speculative fiction—sci fi, fantasy, paranormal. I love the element of ‘What if?’ when plotting a story.

10. If you could describe your writing with a word or phrase, what would it be? Hope What do you want readers to take with them when they've finished reading your story?

That good people have good lives.

11. Have you ever written Thanksgiving into your stories?

No

Why or why not?

I’m not sure. I have written Christmas stories.

12. Who decides what you write about, you or your muse? What kind of influence do you have over your story, or is the muse always the one basting the turkey?

The muse sends me the initial idea and characters, the set up. The remainder of the plot is a mix of muse and my decisions.

13. Have you ever based a character on a real-life person?If so, why? Was it simply to immortalize them or was there more to it than that? If you can, tell us the name of that person, please! We’re all curious here!

No, but I plan to use my nephew’s wife’s hair. She has the most gorgeous, waist length, wavy dark auburn hair.

14. What character did you have the most fun creating and why?

I love all my characters as I work with them. Fantasy characters are always fun.

15. If you had the opportunity to meet just one of your characters in real life, who would it be and why?

Daniel, High Wizard of the Earth—he’s an amazing wizard and all around nice guy. Which of your characters would you never want to meet under any circumstance and why? Kaphan, a famine demon, who would kill me.

BLURB:

Darlene is a devoted single mother of a certain age. She has built her life around her son, but now he is growing up too fast. One night she sees an ominous IM message and heads to a party to drag her son home. She finds Brian near death, and is attacked by a vampire.

Vare, head of his vampire clan, routinely dusts rogue vampires in his territory. He rescues Darlene, and something about the heartbroken mother compels him to transform her son. In return, Darlene feeds him, unleashing a passionate bond.

They come from such different worlds, should they pursue their feelings for each other?

EXCERPT:

A vampire? Darlene stared in confusion at the teeth. They looked so real. So deadly. She tried to kick and squirm away, but the woman just smirked at her and tightened the grip of the steel-like hands around Darlene's neck, cutting off all breath. The dim light of the room went darker.

Suddenly, the woman's grip evaporated and Darlene fell hard to the floor. The woman turned grey, and crumbled to the floor into a pile of fine dust.

Darlene gasped for breath, her throat aching as well as the rest of her body from the sudden fall to the concrete floor. She stared up at a man who stood where the vampire woman had been. He was tall and broad shouldered, dressed in a long sleeved black knit shirt and black jeans. Blond, wavy hair, cut close around the ears, framed an impossibly handsome face with high cheekbones, a square jaw, and full lips. His eyes were bright blue visible even in the dim light, long lashed and tilted upwards similar to a cat. His presence seemed as bizarre as the vampire woman. Darlene shook her head and tried to pull herself together.

“Leave,” he ordered in a hard voice.

“My son! I need to call 911.” Her voice came out in a harsh croak, her throat hurt when she talked. She got up on her knees and reached for her cell but a sharp kick from the man sent it flying across the room. She collapsed onto the floor and moaned, realizing he must be another one. A vampire. She crawled onto the bed and embraced her son, weeping. At least we’ll die together.

The blond man brushed her out of the way and examined Brian. “Too late,” he said in the same hard tone.

“No!” She cried in horror at his words but she knew he was right. She could see the twin puncture holes over Brian’s jugular. She swayed, almost falling off the bed. “He's my son! He’s only seventeen,” she pleaded, needing to stay with Brian.

The man grabbed her with strength she recognized as inhuman, and one hard hand on her jaw forced her to look into his face for a long moment. “I can give him life, but it won't be the same,” he finally spoke. “It won't be human life. It is too late for that. The boy will have to live with me. Or he'll turn into a monster like the woman I just dusted. Is this what you want? He will be a vampire.”

Hope, pure and sharp, filled her. She looked into the man’s hard blue eyes, and thought she saw a flicker of compassion deep in the depths. “I want Brian alive! I don't care what you have to do.”