Guest Author Interview: Mari Mancusi

Please welcome today's guest author Mari Mancusi!  Mari is the author of the Blood Coven series including Boys that Bite, Stake That!, Girls that Growl, Bad Blood, and Night School.

EJ:  When did you begin writing?

Mari:  I've always loved to tell stories. When I was too young to pick up a pen, I would draw pictures and have my mother transcribe my words onto paper. All through school I wrote short stories and in high school I graduated to longer, serial pieces--usually romances starring my friends and the rock stars who loved them. (If only David Bowie knew what he's done in my books!) When I got to my twenties, I realized if I wanted to get serious and get published, I'd need to dedicate myself to writing one full novel. My first novel or two ended up under the bed, but my third full length book, "A Connecticut Fashionista in King Arthur's Court" scored me an agent and eventually a publishing deal at Dorchester.

EJ:  What brought you to the paranormal genre?
 
Mari:  I've always loved the dark and spooky. As a goth girl I listened to dark music and watched dark films. Vampires became an obsession after reading Anne Rice and seeing films like The Hunger. Later, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sherrilyn Kenyon novels solidified the desire to create my own fanged world, which I did with The Blood Coven Vampire series.

EJ:  If you could be any paranormal or have any one supernatural talent, what would it be? Why?

Mari:  Invisibility because then I could be a fly on the wall. I'm nosy like that and I love observing people. I believe this would make me a better writer, as well, studying people as characters without them knowing.

EJ:  Tell us why readers will enjoy your new release.

Mari:  In January, readers will be able to pick up Book 5 of The Blood Coven Vampire series, called Night School. It's a young adult series, but has a lot of appeal for adults as well, especially those who are Buffy fans. My books always have a mixture of dark angst, romance and humor. After all, if we can't find something to laugh about in the darkness, then we are truly doomed.

While I try to make all the books understandable if a reader were to pick them up out of order, I hope people will check out the first four books in the series, which are available now in bookstores or online in print or ebook formats.

EJ:  If your book(s) were being made into a movie, who would you cast for the leading roles? Why?

Mari:  I just saw Easy A in theaters and I think Emma Stone would be amazing as my heroines. (They're twins so she'd have to play both parts.) She's cool and tough, but pretty at the same time and I think she could easily encompass both the good and bad girl roles. For the boys, Magnus, the Blood Coven Master is supposed to be like a Pirates of the Caribbean Orlando Bloom type, with long brown hair. And I think the guy who plays Jasper in the Twilight saga could be my Jareth, Rayne's vampire boyfriend.

 Night School (Blood Coven, book 5) by Mari Mancusi.

Vampires, Slayers and…FAIRIES? Sunny and Rayne McDonald are about to get SCHOOLED. 

After their parents’ shocking revelation about their fae heritage and an attack on their lives, the McDonald twins find themselves on the run—forced to hide out at Riverdale Academy , a boarding school for vampire slayers, deep in the Swiss Alps. With no cells, no internet, and no way to contact their vampire boyfriends—the twins are on their own.  Being a vampire stuck in a school full of slayers isn’t easy. Especially with no blood substitute stocked on campus. Soon Rayne finds herself succumbing to her bloodlust and losing control—especially around the arrogant, but devastatingly handsome Corbin Billingsworth the Third—who isn’t sure whether he wants to kiss her…or kill her.  But when Sunny starts acting strange, Rayne realizes Riverdale Academy may be hiding some deadly secrets of its own—leading to a showdown in Fairyland that may cost the twins their lives.


Thank you Mari for joining us here today at From the Shadows!

To learn more about Mari Mancusi's and her books, please visit her website.