Each day of The Crossroads Tour, a new question will be revealed on The Crossroad Blog Tour main page and each day the answer to that question will be found within one of the 16 different blog posts by Crossroads Tour authors. Your job is to get the question, read the blog posts, and collect all 16 answers by the end of the tour, on Halloween. Go HERE to get today's question and links.
Today's guest for the Crossroads Tour is author Angie Frazier. Her debut YA novel Everlasting was released in June of 2010. A little piece of trivia....Angie and I attended the same college (though not at the same time) in New Hampshire (Keene State). I am so excited to be able to support a fellow alumni.
Did you have a book that you read either in Middle School or High School that scared you the most? What was it and what about it scared you?
Oh man, all of Stephen King’s books scared the living bleep out of me. Probably the one that scared me the most was Pet Sematery—the book managed to scare me more than the movie.
Did you have a paranormal experience that prompted you in writing the story that you did?
As a kid, I lived in a house in Louisiana that was supposedly built over an old burial ground. I was five or six and I had awful nightmares all of the time--even now they give me goosebumps when I think of them. And yes, there were ghosts. My parents even saw them. So, you could say I’ve been curious about the paranormal ever since.
Where did you get the idea for your story? Did you use a real life situation and put a twist on it?
No, honestly I have just always been a little obsessed with death and resurrection and eternal life. This
was my way to explore it a little further in my own way.
Did you have a favorite paranormal/horror story writer as a child/teen that you wanted to emulate? If so, who and why?
I wasn’t trying to emulate anyone really. I respect and admire a lot of writers. When it comes to horror, Stephen King takes the cake in my opinion. But he also captures a human element that makes the story he’s telling that much richer.
What kind of research did you do for your story and did you run into anything weird while you were doing research?
Most of my research revolved around historical details of the time period and place. The best research was the superstitions of the sailors at that time. I especially love the eerie folklore of Fiddler’s Green, the afterlife for sailors where there is endless mirth, a fiddle always playing, dancers—and all of it happening nine miles from the gates of Hell.
What helps you to create characters that people will feel passionate about either in liking them or disliking them?
I think crafting a character with depth is the most difficult task for me. I’m very plot driven as a
writer. For characters worth caring about, I like giving them flaws, wants, dreams, regrets, and secrets they want to keep hidden. It’s hard, because a character someone loves will be a character someone else couldn’t understand or “get.”
If you could have a supernatural power or gift what would it be?
To follow her on Twitter: @angie_frazier
The talented Vania of VLC Productions created the book trailer for Everlasting. So lovely.
