Forsaken
The Netherworlde Book 1
by Sara Reinke
Genre: Paranormal Romance
Jason Sullivan has everything he could have wanted in life -- his own business, the perfect girlfriend and
the perfect opportunity to ask her to marry him. Then, in one violent, unexpected moment, he loses it all.
Murdered in cold blood, wrongly condemned and enslaved to a sadistic demon, Jason must fight to
reclaim not only the life and love he'd once known, but also his soul.
Book Trailer
"Definitely an author to watch." That's how Romantic Times Book Reviews magazine describes Sara
Reinke. New York Times best-selling author Karen Robards calls Reinke "a new paranormal star" and
Love Romances and More hails her as "a fresh new voice to a genre that has grown stale."
When she's not writing, Sara is probably dreaming up her next fictional adventure, driving one or both of
her kids to or from school, trying to keep her house from looking like a hurricane ripped through it, or
working full-time as a registered nurse. During her free time, she's likely to be found with a margarita or
glass of Moscato in hand, failing miserably to replicate a recipe she saw on an episode of The Pioneer
Woman.
GUEST POST
What inspired you to write this book?
Years ago, I read
a graphic novel called The Crow by J. O’Barr. It told a
tragic love story in which the hero loved his girlfriend enough to
defy death for her. It was dark, violent, and hopelessly romantic,
and the contradiction of those themes really stuck with me over the
years. I wrote Forsaken with that in mind—a man who would
literally go through Hell and back to be with the woman he loved.
What can we expect from you in the
future?
I’m currently
working on a romantic fantasy. It doesn’t have a title yet, which
is kind of sad because I’ve been working on it off and on over the
last fifteen years. One of the reasons I’ve held onto it for that
long is because I really love the characters..
I’m also working
on another manuscript, a shifter romance called Badlands that’s
set in the Lake Tahoe area of the Sierra Nevada mountains. My
brother-in-law used to live there, and my husband and I visited a
long time ago. I fell in love with the scenic beauty and have
actually used the same region as a setting in some of my Brethren
vampire romance stories. It’s very hard not to be inspired by it if
you’ve ever been.
Do you have any “side stories”
about the characters?
In Forsaken,
the hero, Jason, befriends a young runaway named Mei, who is
originally from Louisville, Kentucky, which happens to be my
hometown. She talks briefly in the book about her parents owning a
small Chinese restaurant downtown. She speaks disparagingly of it
(because she’s a teenager, LOL), but the actual restaurant I had in
mind is a place I have personally fond memories of—this tiny
hole-in-the-wall place I used to walk to for lunch when I worked
downtown. I knew the couple who owned it, and the people who worked
there really well, which tells you how often I grabbed take-out from
there. They had the best chicken fried rice EVER. I still crave it
even now, years later.
And while not a
character in the traditional sense, the setting for Forsaken plays
a large role in the story. It’s based loosely off San Francisco,
which I visited ages ago for an RWA national conference and
absolutely fell in love. It had such a unique feel to it, from the
architecture to the streetcars, the waterfront and Chinatown. I love
how some cities just seem to have their own personality, a life all
of their own, and San Francisco is definitely one of those. I didn’t
make Forsaken specifically set there (in fact, like in many of
my books, I never state exactly where the story takes place),
but it was definitely the primary inspiration.
Can you tell us a little bit about the
characters in (Forsaken)?
I wanted to
explore a romantic storyline with a darker edge in Forsaken. I
found the idea of a couple torn apart by circumstances beyond their
control to be an appealing challenge as a writer. The hero of
Forsaken, Jason Sullivan, is an average guy, one who has
historically relied more on his looks and common sense to get by in
life than anything else. He inherits his father’s business, a bar,
but doesn’t give himself credit for successfully running it on his
own. He’s not a bad person, but he doesn’t have a lot of ambition
in life until he meets Samantha. In Sam, he finds his perfect match,
someone who encourages and challenges him. Jason wants to be a better
man—and more importantly, a better person—because of Sam.
For her part, Sam
can be naïve and trusting, but has learned to harden herself after
Jason’s murder. The time that has passed in what seems like seconds
for him has been years of grief and coping for her. Throughout the
book, she struggles to reconcile the future she’d once wanted and
longed for with Jason, and the new reality and future she’s had to
build and aspire towards since his death.
How did you come up with the concept
and characters for the book?
I was inspired by
a graphic novel I read years ago called The Crow, by J.
O’Barr. It was a tragic love story that somehow, despite the grim,
tragic storyline, managed to remain romantic at the same time. (They
made a movie version of The Crow, but it never really captured
that same sort of dark love story that was at the heart of the
books.) The hero’s driving force was his love for not only the
girlfriend he’s lost, and the life they’d had together, but the
future they’d envisioned for themselves, as well. Forsaken was
my chance to explore these same themes, that dichotomy between
darkness and light, life and death, love and loss.
Tell us about your main characters-
what makes them tick?
The hero of
Forsaken, Jason, is motivated by his love for his girlfriend
Samantha, and his desperation to reclaim the life and love they once
had together. For Sam, five years have passed since Jason’s murder,
and she’s not only grieved, but tried to move on—and that
includes finding love again. For Jason, the time passed in the blink
of an eye, and he’s hurt and confused to realize how much things
have changed. He’s desperate not only to win her back, but to try
and find a place for himself again in a world—a life—that’s
moved on without him.
My villain, Sitri,
is immortal, and to be honest, he’s kind of bored with that. I
present him as having inhabited many different names and personas
over the course of human history, including Loki. Not like Loki from
the Marvel movies—no offense to Tom Hiddleston, who is delicious in
the role—but the actual Old Norse version, who was a lot more
sadistic and cunning. He enjoys interfering in human affairs and
causing hardship and heartache whenever possible. In Forsaken,
Sitri manages to steal Jason’s soul and binds it to an entity
known as the Eidolon. By doing so, Sitri is able to enslave them
both, and uses Jason’s physical form as a vessel through which he
can harness the Eidolon’s tremendous strength, resilience, and
powers for his own purposes.
The Eidolon is
referred to by other characters in the book as a shadow demon, but as
Jason comes to discover, it’s not demonic at all, but rather
something living and sentient. I wrote about it with a wild animal in
mind, like the wild mustangs you’ll see roaming through the high
desert country in Nevada—something magnificent, full of energy,
strength and power, unbroken and indomitable. The Eidolon has no
physical form of its own and appears as an amorphous shadow whenever
it manifests. Jason serves as the Eidolon’s host, and throughout
the course of Forsaken, the two learn to work together as a
symbiotic unit, making the most of their combined strengths and
abilities.
Who designed your book covers?
I designed the
cover for Forsaken myself. Years ago, I worked in part in
graphic design, and I like to joke that I learned enough Photoshop to
be dangerous. I’ve bought premade book covers in the past and have
even had a professional design a cover for Forsaken when I
first planned to publish an earlier version of it several years ago.
But since then, the publishing world has changed, and for me, my
goals as a writer have, too. I lost a lot of my enthusiasm for
writing because of all the bullshit that goes with publishing,
whether you self-publish or try to go the “traditional” route.
I’ve learned to follow my heart and make my personal publishing
experience something rewarding and satisfying to me, if no one else.
And that has come to include utilizing my own graphic design
abilities (such as they are) to build my covers most times.
It’s a very
gratifying experience for me—as much as writing itself, sometimes.
I felt such a click when I was able to meld the images together in
the cover for Forsaken, the young couple I felt perfectly
personified my main characters, along with the dark, smoke-like wings
that, to me, incapsulate what the Eidolon—the shadow demon
possessing Jason—would look like. Additionally, you don’t see
white space used much in book covers, especially for paranormal
romances or urban fantasy. Everything is set again dark backgrounds,
with dark color palates. I really wanted something that stood out
from the pack and looked unique, so I use a lot of white space to
off-set the artwork, and simple fonts I felt would guide a reader’s
eye along the page. I love what I was able to come up with.
Did you learn anything during the
writing of your recent book?
Since my most
recent book is my current WIP, I would have to say what I’ve
learned is that good ideas die hard. My WIP is a romantic fantasy
I’ve been working on for years. I had no idea how long it had
really been until recently, when I found an old backup CD (remember
those?) with an early version saved on it—from 2004. That means
this story has been in my heart and mind for so long, in one version
or stage of development or another, and the reason is simple—because
I love it. I love the characters; I love the premise; I love the
challenges my main characters face, and I want to know what happens
to them. At this point, I feel like I owe it to them as much as to
myself.
What did you edit out of
this book?
Earlier versions
of Forsaken had more scenes set inside the Netherworlde itself
after Jason is murdered, and his soul is enslaved by a shadow-demon,
the Eidolon. I never felt like they fit, and felt they were too
jarring a transition from Jason’s world to that of the
supernatural, and ultimately, in the published version, they were
eliminated.
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