behind-the-book-with-lori-devoti

So, Amie asked me to stop by and talk about the inspiration for my latest release, Guardian’s Keep. Seems like a simple enough topic, doesn’t it? I have to get the basic inspiration for my books from somewhere, right? …..I do. I know I do, but for some reason it isn’t easy for me to pin down where.

Guardian’s Keep is the second in my Unbound miniseries for Silhouette Nocturne. The first book featured a hellhound hero—that idea was inspired by thumbing through a book that had pictures of demon dogs. One of the images spoke to me. He/it wasn’t a hellhound, but hellhound sounded a lot better than Black Dog of Ireland—at least to me.

Uunbound72_150.jpgnbound and Guardian’s Keep are set in the same world, one where Norse mythology is real. I wish I could say where I even got this idea. I think it’s from reading in this same book about a witch named Lusse who at times lead the Wild Hunt (title of my third book to come out in June). Lusse became the villain of Unbound, and somehow the world became Norse. From there things just continued to unwind—in a good way I hope.

That’s the thing about inspiration, at least for me. I think people who don’t create something as complicated as a book from scratch assume it hits you in lightning bolt fashion, and sure some piece of the idea may. But, for me at least, it is much more like pulling on a piece of yarn and slowly watching the ball unwind. At times you get a really long piece to pull free and at times you hit a snag and think the whole thing is done, but never (for me) has the entire ball just landed in my lap, kerplunk.

So, when I try to think about my inspiration for Guardian’s Keep, I hesitate to say what it was. I wanted a sexy alpha hero who was protective. I wanted to pull in more of the Norse world and there was one particular character from Norse myth who to me was just screaming to have another version of his story told (Fenrir) and I wanted a place that was scary and full of atmosphere (Lyngvi). All of those pieces were in my head somewhere, mixed up and confused and slowly bit by bit I pulled them free.

How about you? Are ideas something you build slowly over time, or do they spring forth from your mind fully formed like Athena from Zeus?

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Lori’s Site/ Guardian’s Keep at BN.com