Q+A with Sarah Beth Durst, Author of CONJURED and GIVEAWAY

Hello everyone,
We hope you are all doing well in this fine Thursday! Today, we welcome back author Sarah Beth Durst on this here blog. We love Sarah's books! She writes these amazing standalone reads that are always so different and unique--from fairy tale retellings to trickster gods to hilarious were-unicorns.

Sarah's new book Conjured, which came out on Tuesday, is no different. I'm sure you've seen the awesome cover around but here it is again...

Eve has a new home, a new face, and a new name—but no memories of her past. She’s been told that she's in a witness protection program. That she escaped a dangerous magic-wielding serial killer who still hunts her. The only thing she knows for sure is that there is something horrifying in her memories the people hiding her want to access—and there is nothing they won’t say—or do—to her to get her to remember.

At night she dreams of a tattered carnival tent and buttons being sewn into her skin. But during the day, she shelves books at the local library, trying to not let anyone know that she can do things—things like change the color of her eyes or walk through walls. When she does use her strange powers, she blacks out and is drawn into terrifying visions, returning to find that days or weeks have passed—and she’s lost all short-term memories. Eve must find out who and what she really is before the killer finds her—but the truth may be more dangerous than anyone could have ever imagined.

Hi Sarah! Welcome back to our blog! Please tell us a little bit about your creative process when you wrote CONJURED and how is it different from your other novels?

Thanks for having me here!

Writing CONJURED felt a bit like jumping into a car to drive to the store and then realizing that the store is on Mars and the car has rocket engines and you're hurtling upwards at 100mph while technicolor pterodactyls fly past the window... In other words, it was a wild ride.

The process went a little like this: "You can't do that, Sarah. Stories don't do that. Leave the pov alone, and walk away from that verb. That's not how... Ooh, wait, maybe I could do that. No, no, really, I shouldn't. But it's cool. And it works. And I like it. Do it, do it, do it!" I think I broke about a hundred writing rules in this book. It was fun and also more than a little scary... which I hope is a decent description of the book itself.

CONJURED is by far my creepiest, wildest novel to date. Vastly different in tone and setting from my epic desert fantasy VESEEL, my vampire and were-unicorn comedy DRINK SLAY LOVE, my fractured fairy tales INTO THE WILD and OUT OF THE WILD, etc. But it's also still me.

Actually, I think that's the true key to my creative process: I have to like it. No -- I have to love it. Every broken rule, every turn in the road, every choice has to pass the same litmus test: "Does it work, and do I love it?"

We're very curious about Eve, the main character in CONJURED. Please complete the following sentences about Eve:

Eve is... a blank slate. She doesn't remember who she is or where she came from or why she has bizarre powers. She's been told she's in the paranormal witness protection program and that she escaped a magic-wielding serial killer who still hunts her.
Eve likes... a boy named Zach who works in the library, has zero magic, and can't seem to stop talking.
Eve dislikes... how every time she uses her powers, she blacks out and is drawn into terrifying visions.
Eve dreams of... a carnival tent of tattered red and buttons being sewn into her skin.

We know that your first adult novel, THE LOST, comes out in November. Will you be focusing on your adult novels for a little while or do you have another YA novel in the works? If you do, can you tell us a little about it?

Yes, I have another YA novel in the works! But I can't talk about it yet. Sorry! I can tell you that I am definitely not switching my focus. I plan to do both YA and adult and simply write twice as many novels. :)

One lovely thing that I've discovered about writing: it gets easier. Sure, it's never easy, and some days you feel like you're trying to shove your brain through a colander. But you learn your own writing process. You learn what works and doesn't work for you, and because of that, you can become more efficient... which means, more books!

By the way, there has actually been a change to the pub date for THE LOST. The publication schedule for the trilogy was recently re-worked such that the three books could come out in more rapid succession. THE LOST, THE MISSING, and THE FOUND are now scheduled to be released in June 2014, December 2014, and April 2015. More about this here: http://sarahbethdurst.blogspot.com/2013/08/big-changes-afoot-for-lost-trilogy.html

This or That lightning round--you must choose one or the other and you cannot explain your answer:
Early bird or night owl? Early bird masquerading as a night owl
E-books or physical books? Physical books
Cookies or cake? Cookies
Coffee or tea? Coffee ice cream
Mac or PC? PC
Writing space: Quiet or with background noise? Background noise

Thanks so much for interviewing me!

*****

A big thank you to Sarah for answering our questions. Guys, Conjured is already out in your favorite bookstore and public library.