Immortal Wounds follows a woman with magical abilities who travels back in time after witnessing her mother and husband’s death by a vampire claiming to be her father. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

Well, I have to confess that Immortal Wounds began because I got a bad case of FOMO (fear of missing out!). One evening during my night writer’s group many of the authors had started new stories, all of them about vampires. I was currently writing a crime thriller but thought “Hey! I LOVE vampires too!” I am definitely a “Twihard”, a loyal follower of Anne Rice, and who doesn’t love Dracula! At the time, I was also hugely obsessed with the series, Outlander, which was my definite inspiration for time travel. I immediately filed the thriller away and began a new story.

History intrigues me, particularly the times of the witch trials in both Europe and America and the suppression of women. I also find fascinating the idea of supernatural abilities, and how fear can force a (logical) belief when there is no viable explanation. I immersed myself in books like The Discovery of Witches, Practical Magic, and Hester, along with several other fiction books that contained excerpts of real diary entries from women who were accused of witchcraft. Then having no idea what I was doing I took a deep breath and started writing a story that entangled bloodline witches with my most favorite supernatural creature, the vampire.

How long did it take you to imagine, draft, and write the world your characters live in?

Once I got started on Immortal Wounds I would say it took about two years from the first rough draft to publication. My imagination went crazy with my story idea, but it was actually a 75,000-word manuscript I wrote two years prior, under a different title, and whose plot points came to me in a dream that brought the world of Immortal Wounds to life. When I finished writing that earlier manuscript I realized that the story had ended, but yet the whole story had not been told. Being a new writer it took me a few weeks to figure out that what I needed to do was write was the beginning, Immortal Wounds.

What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?

Family, individual strength and resiliency, naivety, and fate were the most important themes I hoped to portray. I strongly believe that these themes impact real life and our response to situations within each of them is what makes us who we are.

What is the next book that you are working on and when can your fans expect it to be out?

Luckily for fans, there is no wait! A Prophecy Awakened, book two in the Immortal Wounds trilogy, was released June 13, 2024. And while it does pick up where Immortal Wounds left off, there are also some new (amazing) characters that take the reader through the middle part of the story.

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After witnessing the brutal deaths of her mother and husband, Isobel overhears a confession from one of the murderers, a ruthless vampire who claims to be her father. For fear that she and her unborn daughter’s death could come next, Isobel uses the only magic she possesses and summons a portal to take her two hundred years into the past to revisit an ancestor in Scotland who she believes may know the truth of her parentage. However, in her haste, Isobel lands in the wrong century. Before she realizes her mistake, she stumbles upon a family: a ferocious Highland warrior and his two sisters, one of whom is a witch with secrets of her own who instantly draws Isobel in.

Isobel could not have prepared herself for what she discovers during her stay: the vampire who claimed to be her father, alive three hundred years in the past! With the help of Meg, the youngest sibling, and Mariam, both women’s ancestor, Isobel finds herself belonging in a world she never dreamed of—one entangled with vampires and webbed with revenge, curses, and a prophecy that has dictated all of their lives for the last four hundred years. Did Isobel make an error in landing in the wrong time, or was it part of her destiny?

Original source: https://literarytitan.com/2024/09/14/strength-and-resiliency/