First, I want to thank Jenna for being not only the funniest author I have had the chance to “interview” but being such a great person. I won Jenna’s summer book giveaway in the summer, just as my kitty was diagnosed with diabetes, Jenna read about it on my blog and has been with me ever since. She has been truly wonderful, so much so she’s now Auntie Jenna to my Seamus and I am so lucky to count her as one of my friends. As you can tell, she’s hilarious too. So thanks Jenna, lots of love.

Pixie: Any plans for Halloween Jenna?

Jenna: Yes, I’m going in costume to my favorite watering hole on Saturday night. I’ve got an awesome flapper dress that UPS brought today and I had the best time dancing around the living room in all that fringe! Now, I’m not a big fan of skirts and dresses– partly because I’m so pale, but mostly because I just know that at least once in my life I am going to walk out of a public restroom with my skirt tucked into the back of my panties– but I am in love with this dress and I can’t wait to get on the dance floor in it! I’m debating whether or not I’m brave enough to put some temporary red in my hair and go as Cin from book four (which I’m working on now and is set against the backdrop of a vampire speakeasy during the Roaring 20s). I’ve gone red before, though, and it doesn’t always come out like I want it to. And, let’s face it, walking around with hair the color of an eggplant is a little cooler at 18 than it is at 34!

Pixie: What was your favorite Halloween costume as a kid? I can tell you mine & I’ll even post a picture for your amusement. I must have been 7 or 8; at the hype of the California Raisin’s…my oldest sister made me a California Raisin. She stuffed me, and painted my face purple. I was the coolest kid around, or so I thought. Of course the one picture I have of it, I can’t find…so you are stuck with Pixie Vampire.

Jenna: Well, since we’re sharing pictures of our favorite costume, I’ll send you mine. It would have to be my mousie costume that my mom made for me when I was in preschool. It was so cute! (Love you, mom!) That’s me and my cousin in the picture and I’m holding my tail because he kept stepping on it. I was also a ballerina a lot because I could reuse the outfits from my dance recitals. They were just too pretty to only get to wear once!

Pixie: Let’s talk Candy. Favorite Halloween Candy? I still love me some Candy Corn. (drool)

Jenna: Reece’s cups! I think chocolate and peanut butter have to be the best combination in the world. I also love tootsie rolls and smarties.

Pixie: What movie still scares the pants off of you? I still get the creeps when I see the Exorcist & the Japanese movie Ju On: The Grudge scared me something fierce.

Jenna: Oh, I am so not a fan of scary movies! I think I watched a bit of one of the Grudge movies once and I was mostly just confused. Though I do remember Raider of the Lost Ark scaring the crap out of me as a kid! I do find that books are often scarier than movies because your imagination can run wild with a book. I’m not into scary books anymore than I am scary movies, but there have been a few that have creeped me out. I read Dean Koontz’s Phantoms when I was in high school. I vividly remember laying on my bed one night, reading– and my room had one wall of floor to ceiling windows right next to the bed– and I got to the part of the story where the giant moth is banging on the windows of whatever building they were hiding in and suddenly this huge Luna moth starts slamming into my window! The book and I both went straight up in the air and I ran screaming for my mom!!

Pixie: Favorite Vampires in TV & Film? I already know who you’re going to say, so I am going to agree with you. I trust your Vampire Judgment.

Jenna: Oh, yes, you know I’m a Spike girl! I even have a barn cat named Spike. And, no, I didn’t name him. Actually, my dad did because even as a kitten it was obvious that he was the Big Bad. And no cat was more aptly named. He’s a pale blondish orange color with a very angular face and he even does the Head Tilt! But back to TV Spike– other than the obvious hotness, I enjoyed Spike’s irreverent humor. I always looked forward to whatever would come out of his mouth next! He was just such a hoot and I don’t understand why the writers felt he had to have a soul to be with Buffy. I mean, come on, I’ve dated guys who actually had souls (I assume) who weren’t as good to me as evil Spike was to Buffy! But soulful Spike had some really great writing too and I thoroughly enjoyed both versions of him. Beyond Buffy… hmmmm… I thought Ben Cross did a great Barnabas Collins. The Twilight boys don’t do a lot for me (but New Moon Jacob is quite the honey, isn’t he?). So far I’m enjoying Damon on The Vampire Diaries. He has that snarky humor I love but I hope they hurry up and give him some substance soon. Right now he’s sort of walking that line where not even being incredibly yummy can redeem him from being nothing more than a serial killer. I do look forward to seeing where they go with his character.

Pixie: I know you went to Dragon Con this year, where almost everyone is dressed up. What’s been your favorite costume at this year’s Dragon Con? Have you dressed up?

Jenna: I did dress up for Dragon*Con once. My best friend Jennifer and I spent the weekend down there in 2006. I had an angel costume complete with corset, wings, and a big crinoline skirt. I have to say that experience taught me several things: One, never wear wings to a crowded convention. People are always running into your wings and knocking you around. Two, there’s a reason why women weren’t dirty dancing before the 20th century. You just cannot get your groove on in a corset! Nothing moves! We ended up at the Buffy Prom and Jennifer had a lovely time dancing but it took me about one song before I was ready to go up to the room and trade my costume for a pair of jeans and a tank top. And three, big poofy skirts made of yards of crinoline sound like a great idea… until you have to pee. Use your imagination on that one! As far as favorite costumes I’ve seen, this year there was a group of beautiful girls dressed up in these fabulous dresses with the most amazing hats. Now, I’m a big-time hat girl and I just fell in love with their costumes! The pink one is probably my favorite costume of Dragon*Con. My other favorites were these two girls I somehow ended up in a photo op with during the 2006 convention. They were dressed in the most incredible demon costumes and someone asked me to stand with them in my angel costume for a picture. They looked amazing, even though I did feel like they might eat me at any moment! The picture is fuzzy because it was dark and my batteries were dying, but I had such a blast with these girls. It was a little intimidating because they were so fierce-looking and so very tall! They do have on platform boots, but to give you an idea of how tall they were– I’m 5’5 and wearing 3 1/2 inch heels.

Pixie: What scares you the most? I have an irrational fear of certain birds. Pigeons, Seagulls and Turkeys. At the cottage this summer, we had a wild turkey on our property, when I heard it make that noise…I was gone, I wanted no part in it. They’re such ugly creatures; thankfully they taste better than they look.

Jenna: You’re so funny! I’ll see your birds and raise you Queen Anne furniture. You know the stuff with the claw feet? And it doesn’t even have to have claw feet… even curved legs freak me out. Ever since I saw Disney’s Beauty and the Beast I just know that that type of furniture gets up and dances around the minute my back is turned. I won’t have it in the house. It’s just creepy. And tin foil squicks me out. If I have to use it someone else has to handle it for me because it gives me the willies. And I hate bats and vermin. They will make me run and scream like a girl. Beyond that, it’s just the usual stuff… any of my Top Five Ways Not To Die: falling from a great height, being buried alive, being burned alive, being mauled and drowning.

Pixie: Have you ever had an encounter with something you couldn’t explain?

Jenna: Other than ex-boyfriends?? Sure! Unlike Queen Anne furniture, the paranormal has never really freaked me out. My late grandmother made an art form out of unintentionally buying haunted houses, so when I was growing up it wasn’t a big deal to see rocking chairs rock by themselves or doors rattle for no reason. The day my grandmother passed away I was sitting at my desk and all of a sudden I was surrounded by the smell of her perfume… and nothing in my house has that scent! I think she still hangs out with us on occasion. She loved wind chimes and my mother has a small birdhouse wind chime hanging in her kitchen that will often start swaying and chiming for no reason. We just say “Hey Nonnie!” like its the most natural thing in the world. And then there’s the running joke with my family and friends that I have “superpowers.” For example, one clear, wind-free day I was out in the pasture checking on one of my ewes who had arthritis. Annabelle seemed to think I should have brought her a treat and she loved Sweet Gum leaves but none of the trees nearby had branches that I could reach. I explained this to her and not 20 seconds later there was a loud crack and a giant branch filled with leaves fell out of one of the trees right in front of us! Things like that happen to me all the time. My favorite story of the unexplained, though, occurred on a trip to Scotland with my mom. We were staying at the Glenfinnan House Hotel, which dates to the mid-eighteenth century. Mom had gone to bed and the hotel was quiet. In those old houses you can certainly hear every creak of a floorboard so I know what happened later wasn’t due to someone walking around upstairs. I took a shower, hanging my nightgown up on the metal towel rack to steam the wrinkles out of it. I had very short hair back then that only looked good if it was hot rolled and I’d brought the wrong type of adapter to be able to use my rollers so I was forced to buy some foam rollers and sleep in them. (And what a pain that was, literally and figuratively!) I was standing in front of the mirror, down to my last roller, which I was having a hard time getting wrapped around the very short hair at the nape of my neck. After about my third attempt I heard the very loud clanging of metal behind me and I turned to see the empty hanger swaying on the towel rack like someone had been shaking it! I was a little freaked out but I kept my cool and said very calmly, “Don’t get your knickers in a twist. I’m almost done.” I finished up and turned out the lights (and when it gets dark out in the middle of nowhere in Scotland, it gets dark) and crawled into bed. I laid there and watched the doorway to the bathroom and I swear I saw a tall, thin, fuzzy, white shape exit the bathroom, go around the corner and through the door!

Pixie: If Cin were to dress up, what would she be?

Jenna: Hmmm… I’m not sure what costume Cin would wear. Do you think vampires dress up as humans for Halloween? I could definitely see her and Michael as Antony and Cleopatra.

Pixie: Can you tell us about Bound by Sin?

Jenna: Bound by Sin (out December 29th) is set in 1862 Savannah, during the Civil War. Cin must go to America to rescue Raina’s daughter Claire, who was kidnapped from her season in London. Between the interference of gods, goddesses, and the overwhelming dark magic that permeates the villain’s island plantation, Cin finds this task to be quite a bit more daunting than she originally thought. Bound by Sin has a bit of a different feel to it than the other books; I think it’s very fresh. It’s very character-driven and, in fact, my editor firmly believes there are too many secondary characters in it, but I loved them all too much to axe them! I’ll give you a snippet that wasn’t in the teaser at the back of Grave Sins. I hadn’t finished Bound by Sin yet when Grave Sins went to press and the paragraph at the beginning of the books is, oddly enough, the last thing I write. So this is the first time you’ll read it anywhere:

There is darkness inside all of us, though mine is more dangerous than most. Still, we all have it— that part of our soul that is irreparably damaged by the very trials and tribulations of life. We are what we are because of it, or perhaps in spite of it. Some use it as a shield to hide behind, others as an excuse to do unconscionable things. But, truly, the darkness is simply a piece of the whole, neither good nor evil unless you make it so. It took a witch, a war, and a voodoo queen to teach me that.

I also have a short story in the upcoming Mammoth Book of Irish Romance, releasing in January of 2010. The editor asked me for a story with an Irish setting and, though I’m overrun with Scots, the only Irishman I have is the High King of the Vampires. I hadn’t planned on telling his story quite yet, but the opportunity to do so just fell in my lap and I couldn’t pass it up. This is a different sort of romance and I hope readers will respond well to it. If you read the story in the Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance, you know that the High King and Morrigan have quite a contentious love-hate relationship. It was a challenge to make a romantic story out of that, but I just adore the way it turned out. It’s a bit more angsty than romancey, but it has a very real feel to it for me. I hope readers will enjoy it! (And we finally get a taste of what, exactly, Morrigan has been plotting this whole time…)

Thank you so much, Natasha, for inviting me to guest blog. I hope I didn’t talk too much! May you and your readers (and mine) have a wonderful and safe Halloween!!

Vist Jenna on her website