Today I'm excited to share an interview with Angela Fiddler. I'll just fluff the pillows and get the house ready. *ding dong* She's here. Hello Angela and thank you for visiting today. Come in and make yourself at home. Tell us a little about yourself. I write about snarky power-imbalances where the good guys almost always win in the end. Thanks! It sounds like you have an interesting life. *wonders how I can get a super power* Now on to some personal questions. If you could go back in time to when you were seven years old, what wisdom or advice would you pass on to yourself? Oh, god. At seven? That was a dark time for me. I started writing at eleven just to do something with all the chaos that was my home life. I would tell her it’s going to take a long time to get from where you are to where you want to be, but every single obstacle that seems to be knocking you off your feet is really just a course correction to put you back on the right path. Learn from everything. For what are you grateful? I’m grateful to have had writing as a pressure valve in my life. The more crazy real life got, the more I could withdraw into my imagination. I’m grateful for my wife, who met me at the end of the craziness and provided a safe harbor for me to get my legs back under me. I’m grateful for my friends who support me and my cat who sits with me when I write. If a zombie virus took over the world, how many days do you think you could last before you were infected? And what would you do to postpone the inevitable? I have a two story house, and ax and a ladder. The zombie handbook suggests chopping the staircase to your second floor and keep your backyard highly defensable. I think I could survive a small outbreak, but any large world ending zombie event wouldn’t be something I’d want to survive. I have no desire to watch humanity’s downfall from a front row seat. What television sitcom is most like your family? Why? Early seasons of the Big Bang Theory. The first thing I asked my wife this morning was “Do you know how the Trojan War started? It’s a trick question.” What’s your favorite thing to do to relax? I write. Writing to me is my job, passion and hobby, all rolled into one. I would just write though, no rewriting, no promotion, no paperwork, just straight creation. Let’s find out a little bit about you as an author. Did you always want to be an author? Ever since I learned where books came from I wanted to write. I wrote my first fantasy trilogy in the seventh grade. The story I wrote in grade six made me realize that you had to write books about people because horse stories where the horse is the POV is limiting. What authors had an impact on you growing up and as an adult? As a child, Mercedes Lackey’s The Last Herald Mage changed my life. I didn’t know point of view characters could be gay until I picked up Magic Price. It is horribly purple and schlocky, but I loved every word. S. M. Stirling wrote the first female POV that felt real to me. As an adult, I love Neil Gaiman, James Lee Burke and Sharyn McCrumb. Do you have any “must haves” with you while you’re writing? I write in a big comfy chair with my laptop balanced on my legs and my cat curled up in my arms. I like sucking on hard candies while I write. Other than that, I could write anywhere. How did you decide to write a paranormal story? (Do you feel passionate about that age?) Real life is certainly interesting enough with all the forces that can work against two people trying to make a life for themselves, but I love escapism. Giving the world a special secret that only select few know about gives so many more challenges two people who just want to love each other have to overcome in order to be together. What have you learned the most from being in the writing business? Work pays off and no one can do it for you. I used to write a book, clean it up as best I could without making any structural changes in order to preserve the first draft. Then I realized that by the time I get to the end of the book, the beginning of the book is out of focus and not as driven as the second half. Going back and rewriting the book from the beginning so that the end of the story is the end goal from the first page is the difference between a book that has promise and a book that works. It’s not something you can ever learn from getting critiqued and workshopped, since no one knows your world better than you. You know what’s needed and what’s filler. If you don’t put that work in to make each story the very best it can be, no one will. The only person you are competing with in your career is yourself. Tell us about your latest release: (blurb, excerpt, cover) Keeping a sex demon happy and well fucked is always the safest option, even if you have your own relationship issues. When saving the world on a regular basis, a happy home is very important. Cy’s job as an apocalypse stopper isn’t an easy one at the best of times, but with the help of his weird family, he survives. Sure, he sneaks out every once and a while to watch August his sex demon feed, but he loves and is committed to Patrick, his fae prince lover, even if it means giving up the anal penetrative sex he loves and Patrick has issues with. All adult relationships are based on compromise. It's just that most don’t require fucking a sex demon to keep him alive and non-murder-y at the same time as you're trying to quit your job to save the world on your own time. August slipped into the pressed plastic bench and immediately spruced up the joint. People around him sat up straighter, and the food off the grill started looking like the pictures of the items on the menu board. “Pancakes? What is this, some desperate cry for help?” “I see your confusion. That call this morning was a desperate cry for help. These are just simple carb abominations,” I said. I stabbed my plastic fork into the pancake again. “I told you, my--” “You’ve always taken my calls before, regardless of where you were tied up. I changed my ringtone for you.” “I would have come if I could.” “Is that another sexual reference?” I asked. “No. I really would have gone.” “You picked a shitty day not to come when your hands were tied,” I said bitterly. “You always make do.” August picked up the white coffee cup and sniffed the lid, but then made a long face and put it back. “You didn’t tell me you got dosed.” “I hadn’t been when we talked,” I said. “Who dosed you, Boss?” August asked in a tone that suggested he knew but didn’t want to say. “That isn’t important.” “If someone dosed me with a charm without my permission, it would be important.” August’s eyes were burning red from the inside. He hadn’t glowed in a while. I took the white cup and gave him the McCrappy one that had come with my meal. “Step down. I just have to spend a day being honest with myself. There’s no actual torture involved.” “Patrick dosed you,” August said and then looked down. His lips pulled back in a snarl, but he covered it with his hand. “If you had picked me up when I asked, none of this would have happened.” “I would have just bought you another day. You haven’t been alone with him for more than twenty minutes, and he’s worried about the two of you.” August had a way of saying he and him that left no doubt as to whom he was speaking about, though he didn’t often use Patrick’s name. I stood up, brought my tray to the garbage, and tossed everything but the dosed coffee away. “What did he get you with?” “Truth serum. I knew he did something. Couldn’t just accuse him straight up.” “Why not?” “It would have shown a lack of trust.” “But he did something to it!” “I wasn’t supposed to know about it!” “You’re a crazy fucker if you’d rather drink something dosed to prove a point you didn’t believe to begin with.” “He didn’t know I didn’t believe in it.” “So what are you going to do?” “Go home, try to get some sleep. Be in before noon to debrief.” “I meant about him.” “Patrick? Why would I do anything about Patrick? He has permission to feed me noxious substances. That’s what being in a relationship is all about. Letting someone do something to you that you wouldn’t let anyone else do.” August stopped. “I’m no expert in human mating rituals that go beyond the actual mating rituals themselves, but I think you need a better working definition of a relationship, Boss.” “I don’t want a better working definition.” “No, you don’t want a better relationship. You want your picket-fence future with a guy you picked up in a game of chicken with your boss.” “I tell you too many things about my life,” I said, going outside. My boyfriend drove a red two-seater, and my sex demon a dark blue one. Both of the cars were in the six digits, but Patrick’s started in the mid-300s while August had more of an entry-level ridiculously expensive automobile. I was the only one with a job I had to pay taxes on. My car was twenty years old and could seat five. Well, could have if it hadn’t been melted. “You can’t help it,” August said, unlocking the door a moment before my hand came down on the handle. “You’re a masochist.” “And you’re a control freak,” I snapped back. August smiled. It was his sex-demon smile that made his eyes burn red and fire spark from the shadows of his face. The sun had risen an hour ago. There should be no way he could turn half his face dark, but he could. “You control my sublease. If you want me to be a control freak, what does that say about you?” How did you decide on your story plot? I plot organically. I put a character with a need or want that is not being met in an interesting world with an interesting problem on page one, and then I decide each day that I write what the scene I’m working on is supposed to do to fit into the plot as a whole. I have a vague idea of how the story is going to end, but leave myself open for the wisdom of the shower or a long walk to adjust the plan as needed. How did you choose your characters names and location for your story? I’m character driven, so before I begin the story, I usually have a very good idea of what this character wants. When you start a book, you’re making a promise to your reader that the main character is going to be worth sticking around to the end. I work exclusively with wounded protagonists that are damaged in some way, but they’re damaged to the point where they want to start getting better. Their internal journey usually echoes the external problem in some way. And I try to set my stories in cities I know well. Right now, everything I write is based out of either Calgary or Victoria. Do you have a favorite scene? Why? As much as the book is about overthrowing an unfair system and the main character’s cunning plan to free his best friend, I love the quiet moments between the characters where they get to be themselves. Cy may stop apocolypses as his job, he has a real life that is just as important beyond his duties. It’s the quiet moments he has with the people he loves that I enjoy. Cy doesn’t have a lot of power in a world full of fae princes, but no one can lie to him. When his lover turns the tables and makes it so Cy can’t lie when they sit down and have The Talk About Where This Relationship Is Going, Cy’s mental gymnastics to keep what he wants private private while still following the letter of the law of the potion he swallowed is adorable. He honestly loves his lover and wants the relationship to grow, but he has a lot of baggage about his job and what he thinks he deserves. Do you have a character that you identify with? Who and why? I identify with both Cy. He had a crappy life before he met his partner but didn’t know to how to want more out of living. Let our readers know how they can get a hold of you… I blog about stuff at www.angelafiddler.com and can be reached on twitter @Angela_Fiddler Is there anything else that you want to share… feel free!! The Care and Feeding of Sex Demons is a standalone book that is the first book in a series, but if you want to know how Cy gets the sex demon in the first place, you can pick up Cy Gets a Sex Demon. I was quite surprised that no one changed the working title of these books into something more presentable. That’s usually the first thing the publishers do. Both books are available on Amazon. Thanks for stopping by! Please come back again! *walks Angela to the door* All of you should check out her book below!! Title: The Care and Feeding of Sex Demons Author: Angela Fiddler Publisher: Loose Id Pages: 180 Language: English Genre: Paranormal Erotica Format: eBook Purchase at AMAZON Keeping a sex demon happy and sexually satisfied is always the safest option, even if Cy has his own relationship issues. When saving the world on a regular basis, a happy home is important, especially when mixing human, fae princes and a starving sex demon. Book Excerpt: When rotten fish and bile smell of the ambergris met… well, you know what sulfur smells like, the whole sky lit as fragrantly as it did brightly. Just like the old days. Evil came in different flavors but it all smelled badly. I was ready for whatever came out of that cloud. But the only threat was a different kind of bad smell. My agents replaced three quarters of the whale vomit with earwax at the source to cut costs. We didn’t know it would also save the world. My boyfriend, Patrick, had insisted the bad guys would now the difference and that I was risking my life to make the switch, but the person picking up the ambergris from my agent hadn’t known what it was supposed to look or smell like either. I wasn’t even supposed to be here. My brilliant planning was supposed to have helped out my team, not me, personally. After the sky fizzled out, the warlock had exploded in a billion, billion...billion? I had no idea. I wasn't a physicist, I was an apocalypse stopper. Calculating how many photons contained within whatever warlock the Internet coughed up this week wasn’t in my job description. No scientist would ever read my paperwork. I was retired from active duty. I was only supposed to administrate the real apocalypse stoppers. I'd been out scouting for possible altar locations when the world-ending had started early. The exploded warlock had been as surprised as I was until he had been unmade. And he took my company car with him. When the apocalypse had started, my first thought had been oh, good. Patrick was going to kill me. The cow walking along side me looked as though nature has squared off her body. If cartoon physics were correct her cross-sections would look like T-bone steaks. The highway I walked beside stretched on ribbons, rolling over the endless hills in the high country. The cow had been following me for a while just on the other side of the barbed wire fence. Three hours of constant adrenaline had left my fine-reasoning skills somewhat stripped, but I was fairly sure it wasn’t a threat. It reached the end of the fenced in field and regurgitated some cud. I wanted breakfast, too. My back hurt, my shins ached, and the dried mud on the legs of my suit added twenty pounds to each step. My boss had even forced me to wear dress shoes to the stupid meet-and-greet that had turned into a scream-and-run. Another red car appeared in the distance, but I didn’t get my hopes up. Because the high powers above loved to mock my life choices, the last three cars that appeared in the past hour had all been small, two-seaters, and red. It bobbed up and down on the ribbons. I had a blister on the back of my foot. I wanted to stop walking, but that would almost guarantee the car wasn’t Patrick’s. On the last rise, the turn signals came on, and the car started slowing down. Patrick had a meeting with one of the major charm-makers in town. He’d been worried about it for weeks, but once the rogue warlock who was sourcing his hanged-man pancreas through craigslist had run out of his ambergris, the hell-fire had stopped. The warlock had brought a full truck’s worth of sulfur, but without enough of the catalyst ambergris, it fizzed out before summoning even a hell-puppy, forget a hell-beast. Exploding into subatomic particles was an easier death than having a summoned-but-not-contained denizen of hell munching on parts of you from a watching-your-own-death happen perspective. We had a lot of specific terms in our business. We used a lot of dashes. Patrick and I had been together for five years, and yet when I asked him if I had woken him up just before dawn before his biggest meeting of the year, he lied and told me he’d been awake the whole time. I wouldn’t have lied to him. Patrick slowed down, but didn’t stop, so neither did I. He didn’t unroll the window until I couldn’t pretend my shoes weren’t hurting my feet which every step. “Get in the car, Cy,” Patrick said. He drove on another couple feet and stopped, so I still had to limp to get in. He didn’t even wait for me to do up my seatbelt before he pulled the sports car into a U-turn. I’d been on a single lane highway, but the tiny car had no problem completing the circle on the road with its tiny wheel base. The silence was worse than the million questions he had every right to ask me. He didn’t ask. I wanted to crack a window to let some of the tension out, but it wouldn’t actually affect the air pressure. Neighborhoods surged beyond the city limits like massive muffin tops. Some groups subdivisions were love handles by now. Calgary needed a bigger edge to contain everything inside of it. “Have you eaten?” Patrick asked. “I’ll grab something at the house.” “I’m not dropping you off at the house. I have to be in at the university in twenty minutes. There’s a C-train station there.” My feet were killing me. I just wanted to go home, and I’d bought the fucking car. I put my head against the back of the seat. “I’ll get a cab.” Patrick exhaled, sharply. I hadn’t meant anything at all by wanting to hire a car to take me home. “What wrong?” “You promised me you were going to be in a supervisory position. In what role is the supervisor supposed to be involved in a standard apocalypse prevention attempt? You have minions. They should have singed eyebrows right now, not you.” I reached up to touch my face. Mud flaked off. I would get the car detailed, but I didn’t really have the time, which meant Patrick would have to get it done for me, which meant he was cleaning up after my mess again. We’d just had that talk. So that meant he’d do it for me. I wondered if it had occurred to him not to answer the phone when I called. “It was just supposed to be a dry run. He just recited his incantations better than most. As far as we knew—" “Do not sit there and tell me that you have a clue as to what your boss knows. It’s far more like Ms. Gwen to know it was supposed to be tonight all along than it is that this was all just a misunderstanding.” Patrick swung into a fast-food restaurant parking lot. “You normally call your demon when you get into shit and you don’t want me to know about it. Was he not picking up?” I flushed. August was my sex demon. He’d been given to me at the end of a successful job back when Patrick and I had two separate addresses. It had been after the house fire so technically I had an address, but no place to live. Patrick had bright red hair. When I met him, his arms and legs had been too long for his body in a way that I found adorable. He moved with coils of energy. In the past five years he’d left his early twenties behind and he finished filling out all the way. Now everything looked in perfect proportion. “I got you coffee,” Patrick said, motioning to the white coffee container in the two-cup holder. It hadn’t been sipped from either.” Alarm bells went off. “What, do you think I poisoned it?” “No,” I said truthfully. But he would have had to do something to it, or he would have sipped on it on the way out of the city. Patrick hated mornings. He grabbed it and took a big swallow. “Happy?” About the Book: Keeping a sex demon happy and sexually satisfied is always the safest option, even if Cy has his own relationship issues. When saving the world on a regular basis, a happy home is important, especially when mixing human, fae princes and a starving sex demon. Purchase your copy at AMAZON Purchase your copy at Loose ID Discuss this book in our PUYB Virtual Book Club at Goodreads by clicking HERE ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Care and Feeding of Sex Demons Tour Page: http://www.pumpupyourbook.com/2014/01/14/virtual-book-tour-pump-up-your-book-presents-the-care-and-feeding-of-sex-demons-virtual-book-publicity-tour/ About the Author: Angela Fiddler wrote her first erotic novel as a birthday present to a friend who had requested kneeling and vampires. While the vampires come and go in the story, the kneeling remains. Angela likes smut, dark humor and stories that mix erotica with raw emotion. She talks about writing and her characters at www.angelafiddler.com. Her latest book is the paranormal erotica, The Care and Feeding of Sex Demons. Connect & Socialize with Angela! Comments are closed.
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October 2023
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