(Michelle’s sidenote: I am a very hard reader to please. I buy a great number of books but very few pass my fifty page test (fifty pages before it bores me and I stop reading). When I do find a book that I adore, that sweeps me away into a different world, I feel the great and powerful need to share my discovery with everyone who will listen. And even those who won’t. ;-)I read a book just like that in the past week. I am now a fan for life of Lilith Saintcrow. Her new book WORKING FOR THE DEVIL, the first of a five book urban fantasy series published by Warner Aspect, just hit the stands at the beginning of this month. The book *rocks*. If you like Laurell K. Hamilton, Rachel Caine, Kim Harrison, and others of that ilk, you will adore Lilith and the world she’s created with her kick-ass character Dante Valentine.

Lilith agreed to do an interview with THE MIDNIGHT HOUR (and specifically her new fangirl: moi) about life, the universe, and everything to do with Dante. Enjoy!)

Can you please tell us a little about your fabulous new book WORKING FOR THE DEVIL?

Well, it’s set six hundred years in the future or thereabouts (I like to keep the timeline fluid) and a woman who raises the dead to answer questions of probate and inheritance gets a knock on her door. It’s a demon sent to collect her, because the Prince of Hell wants her to kill someone for him. And everything just gets worse from there.

WFTD is the first in a five book series you’ve already almost finished writing. When will the other books be available? Can you give us a peek at what lies ahead for Danny Valentine?

Well, DEAD MAN RISING is due out in September, and it’s in many ways the darkest Valentine book. It has Danny facing down ghosts from her childhood and also coming to terms with her new status as not-strictly-human. I really wanted to explore how Danny’s childhood shaped her, how she is the way she is because she had to make a choice—get strong or die. Anyone faced with that choice walks away with some damage, and I wanted to explore how Dante’s damage made her stronger, why she chose getting strong instead of giving in. I also wanted Dante to realize something very important about compassion and forgiveness.

The last three books in the series go in a different direction, with the Prince of Hell messing around in Danny’s life again. I’m in the middle of writing the fifth book now, and it’s hard going. I hate doing mean things to characters once I’ve gotten to know them so well. It just feels wrong. And having to say goodbye to Dante is going to be wrenching, she’s been in my head so much the past two years.

The world of WFTD is set in an urban setting, but has many differences to our world. How do you go about worldbuilding such a complex society while keeping it believable?

Actually (and I am hanging my head in shame here) the characters take care of all that for me. I see the events going on very clearly in my head and just write down what’s playing on the mental screen. I do have little tricks—like interviewing the characters on paper, and writing fake history papers—that help me get “in the mood.” But largely, it’s the characters that do all the heavy lifting. I’m just along for the ride.

If WFTD became a movie or TV show, do you have any actors in mind for the main characters?

Oh, I have a whole list. Here’s my fantasy cast:

Dante: Fairuza Balk (first choice), Rachel Weisz—if we can teach her how to cuss and kick ass, not be so much of a lady.
Japhrimel: Karl Urban, Alan Rickman ten years ago. Michael Biehn, who was actually the actor who gave me the idea for Japh. I had a particularly detailed fantasy about Viggo Mortenson, but decided, alas, it wouldn’t work. Sigh. He’s just not a demon.
Jace: Matt Damon, Sean Bean, Jason Statham. I liked Damon in The Bourne Identity, where he kind of gets dirty and lethal. If he could do that again it’d be cool.
Gabe: Kate Beckinsale
Eddie: Giovanni Ribisi—only actor who’s twitchy enough
Lucifer: Tilda Swinton—the ONLY choice!
Santino: Brad Dourif. OH, man! The creepiness!
Abracadabra: Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio

Where do you find your inspiration for your novels?

Well…it happens everywhere. Plot bunnies will attack while I’m driving or walking on the treadmill, or out at the track. Lots of music, I listen to music constantly, all day. Movies are good, but I will only find inspiration in one scene or dialogue exchange, usually.

Inspiration, or ideas, come very oddly for me. I will see a flash, a very clear mental image, and it can be anywhere in the book. I start writing to try to figure out what the story is behind this picture in my head and how it ends. Or I’ll be crouched over my keyboard, finishing something up, and a character will start to whisper in my ear. That’s what Danny Valentine did. It was about three in the morning, and she suddenly breathed into my left ear, “My working relationship with Lucifer started on a rainy Monday.”

Well, I was hooked. A writer just can’t walk away from something like that.

Are you a pantser or a plotter? And, if you’re a plotter while working on a series, did you plan out the entire series before writing book one?

Oh, boy. I am a total pantser. I can’t outline. If I do, the characters seem to delight in taking the story Somewhere Else. The story just comes out in lumps, and later I have to go through and add structure, take little bits out, put little bits in.

Actually, it’s funny, but the editor for WFTD had trouble with the ending until I told her about Book 2. That clinched the deal, so to speak. I knew it was a series about midway through WFTD (I realized it during the hover flight to Rio, listening to Gabe and Danny talk) and I had the entire arc of the series in my head by the end of the book. After that, it was just a matter of waiting for the books to be ready.

Who are some of your favorite authors?

Tanith Lee is my favorite author ever. Other than her: Jacqueline Carey, the best thing to happen to fantasy in a decade; Linda Howard, my guilty pleasure; Stephen King, the best at narrative drive; Gibbon for his footnotes; Noam Chomsky…I’m a bit of an eclectic. Right now I’m going through another Roman history phase.

What is one of your favorite books to read that other people might never have heard of?

Either Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire or SM Stirling and Shirley Meier’s The Sharpest Edge. Both wonderful and very useful.

I see that you have soundtracks for your novels. If you could only listen to three or four songs to write urban fantasy to, what would they be?

Oh, choices, choices. Anything by Rob Dougan, I just got his Furious Angels 2-CD set and am very happy with it. Also Loreena McKennit’s Tango to Evora, which fuels my Muse like nobody’s business. And Rob Zombie’s Living Dead Girl. That song just gives me shivers.

What is your best piece of writing advice to aspiring authors?

Do not give up. Do not give up. Tell the best story you can, and when you’re done, tell another one. And another one. Sooner or later, someone will want to read your work. It’s only a matter of numbers.

You are the president of the Romantic Bitches Association. How did this come about and what is the RBA’s purpose?

Well…there was this big flap in the RWA (Romance Writers of America) about cover art and about erotica. I won’t revisit it, but I will say several writers and readers were upset enough to ask, “What alternative do we have here?” And the RBA was born.

Basically, we were just tired of feeling guilty because we liked to read and write romance, and tired of all sorts of tomfoolery about what is “proper” romance and what isn’t. The RBA hasn’t taken off the way I dreamed, mostly because I don’t have time to nurse it between revisions etc. But I like the idea that it’s out there, and eventually will be an alternative to the straitjacket of conservative forces that sometimes happen in the romance field.

Finally, and most importantly, Spike or Angel? And why?

Spike. SpikeSpikeSpike! I’m just a fool for James Marsters. The voice. The eyebrows. The moral ambiguity. The first time I saw Spike-and-Drusilla I about fainted, the chemistry was so cool. And I love how Spike was always ambiguous; I was never sure what he was going to do next. Lynxlike inscrutability, he could grin easily or go to tear your throat out.

I must admit I didn’t watch much beyond the second season of Buffy, but if I was flipping channels and came across Spike, I stayed put. Yum.

Thanks Lili! I can’t wait till DEAD MAN RISING is out!

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Lilith Saintcrow was born in New Mexico, lived in Britain, Wyoming, and most currently Washington state, where she currently resides with two kids, three cats, one husband, and assorted other strays.

Check out Lilith’s website at www.lilithsaintcrow.com. Buy WORKING FOR THE DEVIL.