A Marvelous Interview with Kai

Kai is a good friend of mine that I meant through Twitter. She is a whole hearted amazing person with her novel coming out tomorrow! The book helps you dive into a marvelous world or murder, rebellious teens, a rule bending detective and a dead doctor. This is a gritty noir that will grab your attention from the first page to the end. Kai took time out of her busy day to answer a few questions that I had for her. Keep reading to learn more about the novel. 

1) What inspired Blaze? Is he a character that you have had in your mind for a long time or is he one that just popped up? 

Blaze sort of popped up during my planning stages for NaNoWriMo 2012 because I wanted to try my hand at writing Noir. He's been living in my head ever since (and subsequently driving me crazy!) I've written a few short pieces for him previously and he has a tie-in serial that actually enhances the world of the books running on my blog (which you can find at www.theraggedyauthor.com/serial-blaze-tuesday if you just wanna catch up!) Though, it isn't necessary to read the serials before you snag the book.

2) What is the number one thing that brought about this novel?

I'd never written crime or noir before and I really wanted to try it and I didn't have much else going on for NaNo '12. It was a whim, to be completely honest. And it's seemed to have worked out.

3) What is the biggest inspiration for this story? Did it stay your inspiration throughout the entire novel? 

When I was first looking for something for Blaze to be about, I started thinking about settings. I wanted to shove Blaze into a "near future" scenario without going totally urban fantasy. So then I started thinking about the who and the why and the murder and stuff (as you do.) The Clockwork implants were inspired mostly because I'm a punk at heart - I mean, I have a rainbow mohawk, my sister had piercings, I wanna get tattoos. So what if that was 'normal'? How would rebellious kids rebel against the Man later? That's where the inspiration started. From there, I built it up by asking how can I make this worse for the people who get these mods done? What if they're acceptable in a medical way, but then people get addicted... and so on. It stayed for the first book, and then evolved into something that I can't talk about because I'll ruin the plot of the next book!

4) How do you think that the readers will get emotionally connected to the story? What will pull them into the book? 

I really hope that Blaze pulls readers in. He's a very "everyman" kind of character. He's not a genius, he's definitely no Sherlock Holmes. He's rough and tumble and gritty and sarcastic and somehow, I hope, very genuine and loveable. I mean, I love him, I hope that sort of shows through in the writing. Blaze cares a lot more than he probably should. He tries not to show that he's sensitive, but I think it comes through in his relationships with his partner, and the people he surrounds himself with. I mean, he became a private eye because he was sick of the corruption in the police force, and he takes the case because of selfish motivations, but then realizes that there's a lot more good he can do if he sees it through to the end. 

5) This is a very gritty novel. You introduce a two sided complexity to give readers to think, is this doctor Terry Jones, in the right or wrong. How did you come up with that? 

I wanted the murder of Doctor Jones to come off as a horrible act. I wanted people to be enraged that this guy who was supposed to be doing charity work was murdered for no apparent reason. The rest of the pieces involving the Doctor and his bigger role in the world of Clockwork medicine didn't really fall into place until I started writing the nitty gritty of the book. I didn't plan out his involvement in the larger scheme of things until later. The idea that maybe things weren't as good as they seemed stemmed from Blaze's abhorrence and absolute aversion to the Clockwork enhancements, and his reluctance to take the case in the first place. I wish that I could say more than that but it gets a bit spoilery and I don't want to give away everything before you all have a chance to read!

6) Kali and Blaze can be seen as either the direct opposites or two fish in the same pond. How does their relationship actually work out?

Oh, I can't tell you much of that. Spoilers, you see. What I can tell you is that Blaze and Kali have been friends for a long time. They worked together when Blaze was a cop. She is the coroner at his old precinct and they've always had a bit of a thing for each other. She sort of grounds him and he reminds her that the cadavers she works with are still people to the families left grieving. Kali and Blaze balance each other when it comes to their objectivity. They enhance each other's personalities and they fill in certain weak spots. Blaze surrounds himself with people who can think objectively when he's in the thick of things, and Kali usually just surrounds herself with corpses and medical equipment and she forgets that there's people outside who are still breathing. I think of them as opposite sides of the same coin because they both have the same lust for justice, except Blaze deals with the living, and Kali deals with the dead. They're my favourite to write because everything they do compliments each other so well, in my opinion.  

So now, I bet you are asking yourself where can I get this book? You can get it here at Create Space , Itunes , Kobo, and Smash Words. Definitely don't forget to go on Good Reads to review the book! You can follow Kai on Twitter @TheRaggedyAuthor. Enjoy this book!