With the Fever Series officially over (until one or two of those nagging stories burning in my brain demand the stage; I do so wonder what they’re up to) I had my first opportunity in fifteen years to conjure a new tale, starting from a blank page, with no pre-scripted framework. 

It was both exhilarating and terrifying. The blank page has always screamed ‘the sky’s the limit’ to me. It’s also daunting. With countless possibilities—how to choose?

I hadn’t realized what comfort there was in writing a novel set within the established world of a successful series until I faced the prospect of moving beyond it. I knew each character intimately; could picture every detail of the grimy, glamour-filled streets of Dublin, every fantastical room in the White Mansion. It was reflexive and nearly effortless to write the next leg of that journey.

The blank page made me contemplate things I’d not wondered about for over a decade: if my voice had changed, tempered by time and trauma; how it was relevant today; if the subjects that initially inspired me to write still provoked my imagination, and filled me with the thrill of discovery.

The last question was the easiest to answer, so I started there. Scotland and Ireland, Druids and Fae, Paganism, including the Cailleach (or witches, but that word conveys too many of the wrong things and too few of the right ones), are subjects that have always riveted me, as are stories that unfurl vast limbs of cohesive mythology, with taproots deep in time-honored legend.

Houses, too, have long obsessed me. Especially gloomy manors with dark histories and tragic pasts. I’m captivated by stories about protagonists thrust into situations that exceed their capabilities, in which they must level-up fast, or die. I like battle-hardened men with vulnerabilities, good-hearted, brainy men with concealed darkness. Love, grief, hope, fear, second chances, joy and pain are a must, as is a lush, atmospheric setting that transports me far from everyday life. 

As many of you know, I’m drawn to the gray, the ambiguous, the unsettled, and I enjoy characters who dwell there, too. Watch Hill is about duality, dichotomy: loving and hating in the same breath; hungering for yet fearing; raging against yet fighting beside. Enemies to lovers rock my world. 

Good luck figuring out who the villains are this time 😉

 The first novel of the trilogy sets the stage. as I build in the layers. The second installment blows it all to hell. The third takes Hell to a whole new level. Expect cliffhangers, and a few other shocking surprises.

I never begin my stories with protagonists who are finished products. They’re always lacking something, often many things, and not necessarily characters I like right off the bat, because transformation is my gig. I enjoy watching the average, everyday person—someone that, like each of us, holds something extraordinary within—rise to meet circumstances that force them to choose who and what they will become. They’ll stumble along the way. We all do. 

With each book I write, my hope is always the same: To capture something ineffable that slips into your soul and settles quietly there, a phrase or an idea or a character you keep, which inspires, delights, comforts, and perhaps, in some small way, transforms the way you view the world, maybe even your life. 

Welcome to the world of Zo and Kellan, Este and Devlin, a Stygian owl named Rufus, and a host of witchy and otherworldly characters. 

Welcome to Divinity, a very strange town a few hours from New Orleans that is virtually impossible to find without formal invitation or guide, which exists a smidgen adjacent to reality, rather like a radio station that perpetually eludes your dial, affording only brief, staticky bursts of a mesmerizing song.

Welcome to the town where all Zo Grey’s dreams come true. 

As do the vast majority of her nightmares.

Welcome to Watch Hill.