Today, Naomi Clark shares with us how Demonized, her latest release from Damnation Books, came to be.
Welcome, Naomi.
DEMONIZED – When side characters take over
When I wrote
AFTERLIFE, I didn't honestly think it would ever get published. I was going through a bad patch with my writing – I'd just left my agent, and wasn't sure I really had what it takes to "make it" as a writer. So in writing AFTERLIFE, I just wanted to have fun and I threw in a whole bunch of things purely to entertain myself. One of those things was Ethan Banning.
I've always had a thing for private eyes and noir, and I had a blast writing about down-and-out PI Ethan. I loved him the minute he showed up on the page. I loved his mannerisms, his not-as-funny-as-he-thinks jokes, and his ballsy, no-defeat attitude. I even loved the bad things about him, like his chain-smoking and incessant foul language. He wasn't supposed to be more than a side character, but for me he took over the page every time he came on it. So it seemed natural – nay, inevitable - to me when AFTERLIFE was finished, to follow it up with a story all about Ethan.
You see, in AFTERLIFE, Ethan got possessed. Oh, sure, Yasmin Stoker, heroine of that story, helped get rid of the demon, but a little piece stayed behind. And now Ethan has it's voice in his head constantly, telling him to hurt people, to hurt himself. When you're already broke and living off noodles, that's the last thing you need. So in
DEMONIZED, readers get to see what happens to Ethan now the events of AFTERLIFE are wrapped up. It's a dark book, and I actually felt pretty bad about some of the things I put Ethan through whilst writing it, but I love it nonetheless.
I got to know Ethan better now he was centre stage. I found that he loves dogs and late-night shopping channels, that he's not always as brave as he likes to pretend, and that he keeps his sense of humour no matter how bad things get. You've got to love a man like that, even if he's not real. And I hope readers will feel the same way I do.
Demonized Blurb:
PI Ethan Banning is smoking too much, sleeping too little, and hearing voices. One voice, to be exact: the voice of the demon that possessed him on his last case. A voice that urges him to hurt, rape, kill, and Ethan doesn't think he has the strength to ignore it much longer.
When his latest missing person case turns into a murder investigation, Ethan finds himself fighting not just demonic urges, but black magic, an incubus with a hidden agenda, and a client who just won't pay up. Luckily, Ethan's got a few friends on his side, like Detective Anna Radcliffe, and his trusty dog, Mutt. If Ethan can ignore the demon long enough, he might just solve this case before it kills him.
About Naomi Clark:
Naomi Clark lives in Cambridge and is a mild-mannered office worker by day, but a slightly crazed writer by night. She has a perfectly healthy obsession with giant sea creatures and a preference for vodka-based cocktails. When she's not writing, Naomi is probably either reading or watching 80s cartoon shows, and sometimes she manages to do all three at once.
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