SUotM Interview: Darynda Jones

We have the wonderful, witty Darynda Jones here with us today talking to us about our favorite grim reaper, Charley Davidson.  Help me in welcoming Darynda to Cocktails and Books!

 

Cocktails and Books:  We’re very excited to have Darynda Jones with us today.  Darynda, tell us about yourself.

Darynda Jones:  Thank you so much for having me! I’m a full-time writer and an amateur sleuth. Just kidding. I can’t even solve a crossword puzzle. But I am the author of the Charley Davidson series. I’ve been writing for about nine years, now, but I consider myself a lifelong lover of writing. I first started writing when I was five with a piece of paper that floated by on the wind and a stick. I wrote stories throughout my childhood, forcing family members and others to endure their reading, but I never considered writing as a career until I was in high school. My best friend and I spent our senior year together, writing our books. We would go to the local Tastee Freeze, sit in a corner booth for hours and write to our heart’s contents. We had loads of fun doing that, and it kept us out of trouble (well, some of it, anyway).

Out of high school, I met and married my husband, Danny. We were in a rock band together for many years and we enjoyed it, but he was the musician, not me. My talents lie elsewhere. For example, my best “creative” streak came when I had my two sons, the Mighty, Mighty Jones boys. I am biased, but they are amazing. While they were both young, I went back to school and received my Bachelor’s Degree in American Sign Language Interpreting. I followed that by working as an interpreter for many years and taught ASL and interpreting at a local college.

I didn’t pursue writing again until after obtaining my degree. At the time, I felt that I needed to do the ASL thing for my oldest son who was born Deaf, but I couldn’t shake the writing bug. I realized that I really loved writing, and I felt it really loved me back; so, I began to seriously pursue writing as my career. And boy am I glad I did!

 

Cocktails and Books:  Tell us about Charley, in a 140 words or less.

Darynda Jones:  Charley was born the grim reaper, although not the cloak and scythe type. Instead, she is a bright light, beckoning the departed who were left behind for one reason or another to pass through her to the afterworld. There are certain passed individuals who have unfinished business and will call on Charley to help them finish a task before they go. These individuals are usually murder victims and want Charley to find their murderers.

Charley works as an Albuquerque P.I. Her father was an APD detective, as is her uncle now. She has the ability to communicate with the departed and has been helping her father and uncle solve cases since she was five. While crime solving seems natural for her, following rules is not. Therefore, she became a private investigator. It helps explain her meddling.

Cocktails and Books:  With everything that Charley has on her plate, where does she get her inner strength from?

Darynda Jones:  I developed her character to purposely stand on her convictions and ideas of what is right and wrong. I chose for her to have inner strength. How do I justify her being strong? The people around her have depended on her practically her whole life. Her story involves two grown men solving their problems for them. From the age of five, no less. She lost a bit of her childhood being involved in such grownup problem solving. Not to mention an attack she endured at a young age. You couple those factors along with a superior knowledge about death and her responsibility for people’s souls, you get crushed or you grow strong. She grew strong.

Cocktails and Books:  When we last saw Reyes, he was a tad bit upset with Dear Charley.  Do you think he’ll ever be able to understand Charley’s point of view and why she did what she did?

Darynda Jones:  I think he understands Charley’s point of view and why she did what she did. He’s an intimidating “beast”; yet, he’s highly intelligent. I think he’s frustrated by his inability to work his influence on her, even when he becomes scary and intimidating; she will not back down and bull headedly refuses to listen to any sort of reason. He simply has to face the reality that is required in any given face-to-face interaction with Charley. He doesn’t have to like it, but he has to face it.

Cocktails and Books:  Any significance to shoes being on two of the three covers in the series?

Darynda Jones:  You can tell a lot about a person by the shoes they wear. For instance, I am almost always in my sneakers because they’re comfortable, yet I love, love, love girly shoes and high heels. I don’t wear them, but I love them. The shoes on the covers make sense to me. Though Charley may not actually wear those particular shoes in the story, they fit her personality, and at least one of us deserves to wear awesome shoes and get away with it.

Cocktails and Books:  When did your interest in writing start?

Darynda Jones:  It’s been there for as long as I can remember. Some of my earliest memories as a child involve me telling stories, enacting plays that I wrote, “reading” my stories to family and friends. That behavior went on throughout my whole childhood, and I really didn’t think it was something you could do as a career. I loved creating stories, and I enjoyed it, immensely, but it wasn’t until high school that I found out writing could be a career choice. It’s like a bell went off in my head when I was told that. There wasn’t much else I wanted to do, other than be a rock goddess. Though I did consider dog grooming once. I’m just not fond of the smell of wet dogs.


Cocktails and Books:  Who most influenced you?
Darynda Jones:  I fell in love with Kathleen Woodiwiss when I was younger.  I was so moved by her books, especially Ashes in the Wind, The Flame and the Flower, The Wolf and the Dove. They were so good.  I still consider her one of my all time favorites. Judith McNaught was another author I admired and read as well as Johanna Lindsey. I think those three authors instilled within me a love for romance novels and witnessed to me how an author can compel a reader into another world and place, one where she longed to live. I decided I wanted to do that when I became an author.

Cocktails and Books:  What are you reading right now?
Darynda Jones:  I have started Divergent by Veronica Roth. I am currently getting very into Laura Wright. Her e-novella, Eternal Blood, came out in January and Eternal Captive released yesterday (2/7/12). I cannot wait to dive in!

Cocktails and Books:  What’s coming next for you?

Darynda Jones:  I am currently working on Fourth Grave. I have a deadline coming at me like a runaway freight train. Then I’ll have copy edits for a YA I have coming out in the fall. Book five of the Charley Davidson series and books 2 & 3 of the YA series will need to be written, etc. There’s a lot of work to get done, but that’s how I like it. I am doing what I have always wanted to do; so, you will hear no complaints from me.

I want to thank Shannon & Cocktails and Books for having me on your blog, and I want to thank your readers. I’ve enjoyed visiting with you, and I appreciate you very much.