Threads That Bind

"At 16, Madison has accepted herself for who she is: smart and witty, but overweight with thick glasses and the social life of a Tibetan monk. Everything changes the summer before her junior year of high school when her eyesight inexplicably corrects itself, and she begins to rapidly lose weight. However, her new look comes with an unexpectedly expensive price. Madison’s first kiss with the boy she has had a crush on for years triggers powers she can’t control, almost killing him.

She discovers she is a Berserker, a powerful being chosen to guard the world from the Havocs, ancient creatures brought into our world by magic thousands of years ago. They cause destruction and death, but cannot be killed. Only the Berserkers’ life-blood can bind – and free – the Havocs. One Havoc is free and wants Madison’s blood to free another. Instead of enjoying her new look and popularity at school, Madison must now work with the Berserkers to master her powers and bind the Havoc before it kills her.

Oh, and if that weren’t bad enough, it turns out she is the first female Berserker since, well - ever."

My first book review!   Plus an interview with the author.   How cool is that?!   It's just like a real blog.

I must confess Brant Williams is my brother in law.  And he is wonderful.  A wonderful father, brother & of course, writer.   I am so proud of his hard work and determination to accomplish his goal.  And the result is a great book!   If you like YA urban fantasy, you will LOVE this book.  And if you don't like YA urban fantasy, you have never read this book.  :)

Here's my oh-so-professional, nitty-gritty, right-to-the-heart interview with the author himself.

Q. What or who was your greatest influence in becoming a writer?

A. It’s hard to pick one single thing. I’m going to have to go with the Scooby doo episode formula (darn those meddling kids) - or maybe bacon. It’s a bit of a tossup.

If I am being serious - which I rarely am - at the top of the list would be my parents. They taught me to love reading and stories in particular, and that love of a good story directly led to my desire to write. When I read a good book, I get a little lost. (Those who know me will find that easy to believe.) For a brief time I am submerged in a completely fictional world and held captive by the author’s imagination. I wanted to have that kind of impact on others. I wanted to create a book where people would not want it to end, but at the same time they would procrastinate things they really should be doing just to keep reading. When I hear people tell me they stayed up late reading, didn’t get their homework done, or forgot to feed their children, I know I’ve done my work.

Another powerful influence was that in 2007 I was accepted into Orson Scott Card’s Literary Boot Camp. That was a very influential event for me. It was essentially a crash course on how to write a good story. I went in looking to soak up anything I could learn. Being able to work with Scott for a week and hear him dissect stories and talk about what made them work, or what was preventing them from working was phenomenal. I still have my story that he marked up with the comments he wrote.

Q. Where did your inspiration for Berserkers come from?

A. Berserkers are part of Norse legends, although they are very different from the ones I created. I had been familiar with their existence, but when I was out at OSC’s Boot Camp, I stayed at my parents’ house. My dad showed me some genealogy on the computer and we followed a line where we tapped into royalty and thus had the genealogy going back for thousands of years. One of the farthest back was Arngrim “Berserkur” Grimsson. I thought it was so amazing that I was the descendent of a berserker. At the same time, I had been thinking about the idea of adrenalin magic, where the power was triggered by an adrenalin surge. I put the two ideas together and had my berserkers.

Q. How were you able to identify with your main character, an insecure sixteen-year-old girl while you are a middle-aged man who grew up without sisters?

A. Middle-aged is a bit harsh, don’t you think? Given advances in medical science, I could easily live to 110, maybe 120. That would make me FAR from middle aged. FAR, FAR, from middle-aged. But it is true that I am male, and did not have sisters growing up. Unless you count Aaron. Which, to be completely honest, I kind of do.

As far as identifying with an insecure sixteen-year-old girl, that was a bit of a challenge at first. Fortunately, I had the advantage of having been an insecure sixteen-year-old boy as a base to work from. I think a lot of the feelings and emotions between boys and girls in adolescence are quite similar, they are just aimed in vastly different directions. I mostly took my own memories of what it was like at that age and filtered them through a female lens. This didn’t work in every situation, so I had some female readers who helped make sure I had my girl facts straight – word usage, mental focus, communication style, etc. It also helped that I didn’t make Madison (my main character) a typical girl. I wanted her to have a unique and quirky voice. For me it is her quirky world-view that dominates her, not her gender, so I had some freedom to explore that side of her.

Q. If you got to spend the day with one fictional character from literature, who would it be and what would you do?

A. I’m going to have to go with Abraham Lincoln. Wait, he was real? Dang. Let me chose again… How about Oprah? Wait, also real? I’m really messing up this question. In all seriousness, I would actually rather meet the authors than the characters. But if I have to choose a fictional character I would go with Kvothe from Patrick Rothfuss’ “The Name of the Wind”. I would listen to him tell stories and put on some plays. I love to watch a good play.

Q. What do you do when you get writer's block?

A. I was a psych major at BYU so I decided to try a bit of operant conditioning (the kind of stuff they use to train animals to perform tricks – fitting, huh?) on myself. Most of this book and the sequel were written at the same time every weekday morning, listening to the same music, in the same location. When I was doing that regularly I didn’t have writer’s block. My mind became trained to know that when I woke up early, sat at my desk and put on my music, it was time to write. I basically beat my muse into submission every morning. Don’t worry, my muse likes the rough stuff.

 That being said, there are still times when I am writing that I get a bit stuck. It generally means that I haven’t thought things through well enough. I will usually take a couple of days (during my morning writing time) and spend some time outlining and thinking through the possible ways of fixing the problem. I type out questions and answers as I think through the problem part until I have a workable solution. So far it has seemed to work for me.

 Q. Who's your favorite sister-in-law?

 A. Do you really think I would make a rookie mistake and answer that question? :)

Q. Can you give us a little teaser for the next installment of "Threads That Bind”?

 A. The next book will be called “Unbound”. I hope to have it up on Amazon in late June or early July. In “Unbound” I really put Madison through the emotional wringer. The first book had a lot of her exploring her powers and preparing for battle. The next book will deal more with her figuring out what she really wants and the complications that come from relationships in the Berserker world. I really wanted to up the emotional stakes in this book. Madison is in less physical danger for the most part, but the consequences of her choices will have a huge emotional impact on her and those she loves. A spoon will play a role in the book, and Madison will finally have a kiss where she doesn’t end up seriously injuring anyone.

You can buy the book {HERE} on Amazon.  Enjoy!