Author Interview – Bradley Convissar

4:00 AM | Labels: Authors

What is your greatest strength as a write? The ability to write stories, whether they be funny or creepy or scary, that keep the readers thinking long after they’re done reading. My writing style, as well. I think it’s engaging without being too simple or overly complicated and stilted.

Have you ever had writer’s block? If so, what do you do about it? All the time… I have a list of ideas and concepts to build off of, but from the time I finished editing Blood, Smoke and Ashes up until two weeks ago, I had no idea what I wanted to write next. I had ideas but no stories, no characters. Going to the gym helps to free my mind.

Can you share a little of your current work with us? Another horror/thriller. It was actually the first book I tried to write as an adult after finishing my residency ten years ago. The main character is a dentist (several of my short story protagonists are dentists as well) with a disturbing history. His life starts to unravel the day before Thanksgiving when a patient, who is a gypsy, calls him an abomination before storming out. This is followed by the death of his grandmother and a disturbing scene at his grandparent’s house the night before the funeral. I plan on releasing it as a 4-5 part serial.

How did you come up with the title? Blood, Smoke and Ashes… it was easy. That’s what you see when an execution by electric chair goes horribly wrong. The execution of Molly Blackburn by an electric chair is the impetus behind the story. That’s why there is an electric chair on the cover of the book. Both covers. Blood, Smoke and Ashes conveys something very visceral about the experience.

Can you tell us about your main character? There are four main characters in Blood, Smoke and Ashes, and what I love about them all is that they are all tragic in their own ways. I think the best stories are those where the line between good and evil is blurred; where the bad guys are bad but you understand why they are bad; where you can empathize with the evil characters. Stories where the good guys aren’t necessarily all good; where they have the same faults and weakness as real people do. These characters are all dear to my heart because none of them-and I mean none of them- get what they deserve in the end, and the reader is left wondering if they would have made the same decisions.

How did you develop your plot and characters? I wrote the opening scene and the “bad guy’s” history, and let the story write itself. While my newest project is outlined from beginning to end, Blood, Smoke and Ashes was written night to night depending on what the characters were doing and how I felt. The prologue was even an afterthought. Hell, I thought that the story was going a certain way half way through. Certain of it. Then bang, one night I’m writing a scene with two of the female characters on the stairs talking with each other and I said to myself… what would happen if this one was pregnant? And that was it… the story went in a completely different direction. For the better. Is the story what I envisioned when I started it? No. It’s better. Because I allowed the characters to create the story.

Who designed the cover? The very talented Scarlett Rugers designed the original cover, which I love and is on the print version and currently displayed for the eBook version. I designed the second. Why did I do a second? Because, to build my platform, I wanted all of my covers to have a similar layout. So I needed to do another cover that matched the layout of my other books.

Who is your publisher? Me, myself and I. Darkest Days Publishing.

Why did you choose to write this particular book? I watched a lot of Auction Hunters on Spike TV. Wondered what some strange things treasure hunters would find inside a storage unit. And the rest is history.

What was the hardest part about writing this book? Trying to write a satisfactory ending that wrapped things up but left a small opening in case I wanted to expand on the mythology. I think I succeeded. Forget that, I know I succeeded. No joke, I got a review today, right before I wrote this, from a reader who enjoyed the book as a stand-alone story for what it was but noticed the open door for a sequel. And I hope to maybe write it someday.

Did you learn anything from writing this book and what was it? I learned a lot about legal prostitution in Nevada. And about capital punishment. And Multiple Sclerosis. I also learned how hard it is to write a whole book when you only have an hour a night to dedicate to your art.

How do you promote this book? I bought ads and ad space on multiple web sites. Ran some contests. Talked about it on Facebook and Twitter. I put quite a bit of cash into it. The fact is, as distasteful as it may be, unless you’re lucky and the right person with the right connections or right blog with thousands of followers stumbles on your book and promotes the hell out of it because they love it, you have to put your book out there. No one else will. In a marketplace where there are millions of books, you have to make sure people see it. And that requires some money.