1–What is the title of your latest release?
2–What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
Three generations of women escape the cycle of abuse during a pandemic that causes random bouts of animalist violence.
3–How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
I was living in Tampa at the time, and mosquitoes were a constant annoyance. It made perfect sense to create a disease spread by mosquitoes and set it in my sunny suburb. Once I started writing, I felt a wave of paranoia every time a mosquito landed on me… which was often!
4–Would you hang out with your heroine in real life?
There are three POVs: Chelsea, her daughter Ella, and her mother, Patricia. Chelsea and I don’t have much in common, and Patricia and I would hate each other, but I would’ve been friends with Ella when I was in high school.
5–What are three words that describe your hero?
For Chelsea—victim (at the beginning), mother, fighter (at the end)
6–What’s something you learned while writing this book?
I grew up with the kind of domestic violence Chelsea and Ella experience in the beginning of the book. Writing it was so cathartic, and as the words bled out of me, forgotten memories of my youth bubbled up. I had to analyze my feelings about my childhood on the page, tempered with the knowledge I have now as adult and as a mother. It was a unique experience, discovering my beliefs in real time by making art.
7–Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
My first drafts are quick and dirty. I don’t edit, reread, or judge myself at all. I think of it like carrying hot laundry from the dryer to the bed—hurry, hold on tight, and if you lose a sock, let it go or you’ll drop everything! When the first draft is done, I do a quick second draft to tighten things up with the knowledge I didn’t have at the beginning.
8–What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
Whenever I’m in a new city, I like to find the weirdest or fanciest restaurant and try foods I’ve never had before. I can’t eat gluten, so I’m sadly limited, and the foods that were once my favorites—bread! Cake! Tempura!—are now off the table. Cake is my favorite food, and my daughter makes amazing gluten free baked goods. I also really love wild game, when I can get it.
9–Describe your writing space/office!
I have an upstairs office with lots of light, books, and plants. On one wall is a quilt made for me by a wonderful fan and inspired by my book Wake of Vultures, which I wrote as Lila Bowen. I also have a neon orange taxidermy deer I bought at an antique shop. His name is Cheeto.
10–Who is an author you admire?
So many! Charlaine Harris is definitely up there. I’ve loved so many of her books, and when I got to meet her, she was so kind and supportive.
11–Is there a book that changed your life?
Again, so many! I grew up in a prudish family, so when I found VALLEY OF HORSES by Jean Auel at the used bookstore around age 13, I was completely shocked. I had no idea women could enjoy sex before that time.
12–Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published)
I was waiting in the carpool line to pick up my kids from preschool. That was 2011, back before texting was king and phones had email, so it was literally ‘the call’. I freaked out, and from then on, every time I was in carpool line, I was like, maybe something good will happen!
13–What’s your favorite genre to read?
Depends on the mood. The books I read for pleasure have to be very different from what I’m writing. Since I’m usually writing some sort of science fiction or fantasy these days, that means I like to read psychological thrillers or historical romance.
14–What’s your favorite movie?
Just one?! No way. I love Pride & Prejudice, Austenland, anything Star Wars, What We Do in the Shadows, Dune (both of them). My attention span lately is definitely more Netflix than long-form.
15–What is your favorite season?
Spring and Fall.
16–How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
At Disney World! When we lived in Tampa, my husband and I would go for a couple of days without the kids, eat at all the best restaurants, and ride Everest at night until close.
17–What’s a recent tv show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
I love the Great British Baking Show, so I really enjoyed The Big Flower Fight and The Great Pottery Throw down.
18–What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
Anything foodie and intricate that I’ve never tried before. Soup served in a beaker? Rattlesnake nachos? Nitrogen-frozen chocolate mousse? Reimagined haggis? I’m in!
19–What do you do when you have free time?
When I have free time, I love mountain biking, and I make the time to do Olympic lifting every week. It’s changed my life!
20–What can readers expect from you next?
In March comes the second book in my Minecraft series, Never Say Nether, and then in August I have my next middle grade Horror, Camp Scare. I have a couple of secret projects that aren’t announced yet, too! My backlist ranges from Romance to Horror to Fantasy, so if you’re not into kids’ books, I hope you’ll rewind back a few years and pick your poison.
THE VIOLENCE by Delilah S. Dawson
Three generations of abused women must navigate their chilling new reality as a mysterious epidemic of violence sweeps the nation in this compelling novel of self-discovery, legacy, and hope.
“A gorgeously creative and surprisingly gleeful story about the way violence infects every aspect of American life.”—Sarah Langan, author of Good Neighbors
“A novel that defines this era.”—Stephen Graham Jones, New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians
ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF 2022—CrimeReads
When Chelsea Martin kisses her husband hello at the door of their perfect home, a chilled bottle of beer in hand and dinner on the table, she may look like the ideal wife, mother, and homemaker—but in fact she’s following an unwritten rulebook, carefully navigating David’s stormy moods in a desperate nightly bid to avoid catastrophe. If family time doesn’t go exactly the way David wants, bad things happen—to Chelsea, and to the couple’s seventeen-year-old daughter, Ella. Cut off from all support, controlled and manipulated for years, Chelsea has no resources and no one to turn to. Her wealthy, narcissistic mother, Patricia, would rather focus on the dust on her chandelier than acknowledge Chelsea’s bruises. After all, Patricia’s life looks perfect on the surface, too.
But the façade crumbles when a mysterious condition overtakes the nation. Known as the Violence, it causes the infected to experience sudden, explosive bursts of animalistic rage and attack anyone in their path. The ensuing chaos brings opportunity for Chelsea—and inspires a plan to liberate herself and her family once and for all.
Horror | Suspense Psychological [Del Rey, On Sale: February 1, 2022, Hardcover / e-Book, ISBN: 9780593156629 / ]
Buy THE VIOLENCE: Amazon.com | Kindle | BN.com | Powell’s Books | Books-A-Million | Indie BookShops | Ripped Bodice | Love’s Sweet Arrow | Walmart.com | Book Depository | Target.com | Amazon CA | Amazon UK | Amazon DE | Amazon FR
About Delilah S. Dawson
Delilah S. Dawson is the author of the New York Times bestseller Star Wars: Phasma, Hit, Servants of the Storm, the Blud series, the creator-owned comics Ladycastle and Sparrowhawk, and the Shadow series (written as Lila Bowen). She lives in Florida with her family and a fat mutt named Merle.
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