Free-wheeling with AM Riley

FREE-WHEELING WITH AM RILEY

My guest today is AM Riley. Riley has been writing paranormals and murder mysteries with gay and lesbian characters for five years. She’s been published with Changeling Press, Torquere Press, Loose ID and will soon publish two contemporary gay murder mysteries with MLR Press.

She just released a ‘gay biker vice cop turns vampire’ m/m romance with Loose Id last month called “Immortality is the Suck”.
The blurb reads:
“Undercover Vice cop and former ATF agent, Adam Bertoni, has had a lot of bad nights, but this one takes the proverbial cake. First, a drug deal goes sour. Then, his ex-partner and sometimes fuck-buddy, Peter, gets to watch him bleed to death.
Adam doesn’t know which ticks him off more. That somebody set him up, or that he woke up undead.
Finding his death at the center of a sting that involves Outlaw Motorcycle gangs, the Mexican Mafia, and a lot of missing cash. Adam races to find the killer and clear his name. Because Peter may put up with a lot of Adam’s B.S., but he’ll never have relations with a suspect.
Former informants are dropping like flies. The gamut of Los Angeles lowlifes are sprouting fangs and super-human powers. And, Adam has to face a lot of things he’s been avoiding for a long time.
Immortality is just something he hadn’t planned on.”

With a blurb like that I was dying to know more about the author and the story behind the story so, here’s AM Riley free-wheeling about her writing and her life, which for Riley is really the same thing.
* * * * * *

RILEY:
The story behind the story:
How I came up with the vampire character for Immortality is the Suck is a good question.
I know a marine who became a cop, though not a vice cop. He retired and is now a writer. Anyway, he’s a vampire freak. So’m I and so is a co-worker. Short story long, my buddy came to visit when I was working graveyard on a show with my co-worker. A ghastly cable TV thing, as it happens, and we took frequent breaks to alleviate our despair. That night we started talking vampires. Then arguing vampires. It was a hysterical conversation and my friend the marine is always saying things are the suck. So, I said, “ Immortality is the suck.” And he said, ‘Yeah you should write that.’ And there you have it. It’s his fault.

The main character looks and sounds like my friend the ex-marine. I’ve always thought he’d make a great vampire.

The circumstances that led to the book opening actually happened, though, minus the vampire element. (At least, I don’t think there was a vampire element) The DEA and ATF busted over eighty Mongol’s last October here in Los Angeles, after a lengthy undercover operation involving several agents. My protagonist is my version of one of those agents.

The life:

I live in Los Angeles and I write paranormal as well as mysteries. Interestingly, I think, there are no characters in my books that aren’t people I know or have known. If they seem extreme or bizarre, that’s because most people are pretty danged strange if you bother to listen. Even my vampires are people I know (with fangs).

I write lesbian fiction as well, but most of the people who read my m/m books aren’t interested in lesbian romance or murder mysteries. I’ve been unsure about where to publicize my lesbian fiction, so I guess it will end up on my site, side by side with the other stuff I write.

Lets see... went to Art School, degree in Art History and Lit. That’s where I learned that there is no wrong way to make art. The only thing you can do wrong is copy someone else (there is a difference between copying and emulating. The key is authenticity.) I got into the film industry to pay the bills and sort of fell in love with an editing bay. All those lights and bopping needles and dials in a dark room! Four or more monitors humming away in digital harmony. It’s like the inside of a techno brain!

I’ve lived in Los Angeles for a long, long time. Before I worked in the film industry, (over ten years now. Gad.) I held the gamut of weird minimum wage jobs. I know people who have lived on the streets; I speak Calo -- it's a sort of slangy bastardized Spanish that you hear in Los Angeles. It's so common that you see it on the main broadcasting networks cop shows -- and a sort of bastardized Portuguese which I learned entirely hanging out in the dance clubs. ;~D

My best friend when I first moved here was a member of Avatar and I still have a soft spot for the old leathermen, even though they were sexist bastards sometimes. I wrote “The Elegant Corpse” because of him. I sent it to him to read and he sent it back with grammar corrections. : )

I think gender is the last frontier and that rape is a hate crime. I am first and foremost a feminist. I am currently writing a murder mystery featuring a transgendered PI, based on a truly inspiring individual who has been kind enough to talk to me about the political and personal aspects of being transgendered. I aspire to write anyone so that the reader can relate and root for him/her.

I am a single parent. My daughter rocks. I love pit bulls and so I am also in the midst of a murder mystery that features the horrific dog fighting industry that victimizes them. This one is paranormal.

Paranormal stories feel very much like Aesops fables to me. Or the Greek Myths. That larger than life, or just slightly surreal flavor makes them perfect vehicles for over-the-top moralizing. So I love writing them.

I have two books currently in edits at MLR Press -- “Death by Misfortune” which plays with a murder in the midst of a film production -- and “Son of a Gun” in which I kill off the fictionalized version of a few ex-relatives from Texas.

You can find AM on her website:
http://www.amriley.net/

I want to thank AM Riley for sharing with me today. It isn't only her daughter who rocks. I think she does, too!

Guest Blogger Treva Harte ~ Multi-talented Multi-tasker

I know it says Tuesday, but I wanted to make sure that we got an early start!

I'd like to welcome Treva Harte, Editor-in-Chief and one of TPTB at Loose Id and author of award winning m/m romance and other erotic romances with a paranormal twist.

Treva Harte lives near a city with many, many attorneys. Thanks to Loose Id and her writing, she can be a recovering attorney and now spends her time writing, editing, raising adolescents, taking care of an elderly mother and dealing with a hyperactive husband (who says he's just very energetic). She is also co-owner and Editor-in-Chief of the e-publishing companyLoose Id.
She and her husband both like writing in whatever time they have left, so they often fight over—sorry, since he is still a practicing attorney they NEGOTIATE—keyboard time. No wonder Treva’s particular brand of sensual romance is a bit offbeat and usually mixed with fantasy.
Treva is multi-published with several e-publishers in print and e-book, a member of RWA, WRW and PAN, and winner of the CAPA 2003 award in the “Erotic Fantasy Romance” category.

JB: First, thanks so much for taking time out from what must be an insane schedule to join me here. That leads straight into my first question: As EiC and owner of a large and growing e-book publisher, what made you decide to continue writing and how the heck do you manage to do all this?

TH: And thank you for letting me have this interview. My writing is what keeps me hovering on the fine line that separates the sane from insane. Or if it hasn’t, no one has dared to tell me yet. When all else fails in my life I go and create another world and let out the problems in a hopefully creative way.

How do I manage all this? Um, mostly if I don’t think about how much I do, things go much better. Until February of this year I was working my law job, writing and being EiC along with taking care of the family—and they require much maintenance. I can juggle a lot but I really was pretty much at the end of my rope…or maybe out of balls, if we want to keep the original cliché going and add a nasty innuendo. In comparison my life is now easy. I can allow myself a half hour walk every day to keep me going. This is luxury.

Mostly I just sit down every morning, figure out what needs to be done, when it needs to be done and then do it. If an emergency hits or there is too much, then whatever I can’t do waits until the next day. And if it slips my mind, I have people who can whack me and remind me I forgot to do something. Really, how else can you do anything?

JB: Although you have written other erotic genres, most of your books involve LGBT relationships and your most popular series involves werewolves. Why LGBT in particular and why paranormal?

TH: To be honest, I have only one story that is purely LGBT and that was a very short story called Hunted Down in my Alpha werewolf series. My other recent stories tend to have many pairings and relationships between many characters, including between men, a man and a woman, men and a woman, weres and non-weres…

Paranormal frees me to look at human relationships in different ways. Ditto LGBT. I’m always interested in the conflict within what is or what will become a loving relationship and using the two elements you mention certainly can change how you look at the nature of the conflict. Besides, it’s kinda hot.

JB: I always hate being asked the question who is your favorite hero or heroine in your books, so let me rephrase the question : Briefly, what do you like most about each of your heroes?

TH: Hmmmm. Someone once told me what my heroines are like and I was fine with that. Now I’m trying to think of what characteristics all my heroes have so I can figure out what I like about them.

I think most recently what I like about them is that they have very strong emotions that they don’t necessarily talk about but they learn to deal with as the story progresses.

JB: Putting your publisher's hat on, do you see any genre's popularity dying? And any guess for the next flavor of the month?

I’d have to talk purely as an epublisher because I can guess at what mainstream print publishers are struggling with and those tend not to be our issues.

High fantasy may not be losing popularity but it tends to not do well at Loose Id. I have some ideas about what stories may become more popular now that the economy is tough, but I eagerly await whatever the next hot trend will be. I do think that readers dealing harder times will be looking for different books than when things were good – whether that means escape fantasies a la Depression-era movies or more true-to-life stories with a HEA or something else.

If I really knew what would be popular next I would be making a ton more money than I do now. Loose Id is going to be open to changes in reader expectations.

JB: Are you working on any more werewolf stories right now?

TH: Indeed. I have another WIP to follow up on my last story. It’s tentatively titled Heal. However I may need to take a break from that because I’m discussing doing a story as part of another series for early next year. It will probably have nothing to do with weres and would likely be a contemporary.

JB: Are all your stories with Loose Id?

TH: No. I have two other publishers (thanks, Changeling Press and Liquid Silver Books!) I am currently with and I was published elsewhere before Loose Id came on the scene.

JB: Anything more you'd like to share with us?

TH: If you want to read about what I’m talking about in epublishing you can check with the blog I have with Margaret Riley of Changeling Press called Loose Change:
http://treva2007.livejournal.com/

If you want to know what I am doing with my writing you can check my newsletter:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TrevaHarte

And I’ll be hanging out at Gaylaxicon in Bethesda next weekend. Several Loose Id authors will be there so if you are, too, be sure to say hello.