What Do Regencies and Paranormals Have in Common?

Hi, Everyone!  Blogging is one of my favorite things because I love chatting with readers about books, reading, and writing.  So feel free to join in today and offer a comment or two.  I’ll be giving away the winner’s choice of a Guardians of Ascension novel as well as a choice of wing-based, hand-crafted earrings!  In addition, I always include romance trading cards of all four novels in my winged vampire series, a bookmark, and a couple of postcards.  And this is an international giveaway, so please, join in the fun!

Though most of my work to date has been in the Regency era, I’m often asked how in the world I made the switch to paranormal?  But the fact is, it never felt like much of a stretch to me.  For one thing, three of my Regencies included Greek mythological characters (and that was way before Sherrilyn Kenyon’s fab Dark Hunters series) and I also wrote a vampire Regency novella, which was a blast and a half!

However, beyond that, historicals and paranormals share one major thing in common:  world-building.  In the same way that I helped my Regency readers to feel like they were living during the time of curricles, muslin gowns, snuff and masquerade balls, I’ve worked just as hard helping my paranormal readers experience the vampire world I’ve built.  In my Guardians of Ascension series, for instance, I created wings and flight, a different take on the vampire mythos, an array of powers that so far doesn’t seem to have an end in sight, and most importantly tough leather battle gear for my warriors, including super sexy black leather kilts!  *Tssss!!!*

I also think that both Regencies and Paranormals have wonderful alpha males.  My vampires are warriors and all my Regency heroes were titled men:  viscounts, earls, the occasional marquis.  I think if you added up the number of ‘lords’ I created in my Regencies, I may have bestowed more titles than any single monarch in British history!  Alphas are wonderful to write as well:  they’re strong, but usually isolated and just need a good, powerful woman to bring them down a peg or two in order to open up that stubborn heart to love!

In recent years, I left my Regency world behind—just temporarily, mind you—and have focused on the pleasure of writing my vampire series.  Guardians of Ascension is set in a world of ascending dimensional earths of which there are six known dimensions.  Perhaps because I wrote Regencies for so long, it was a natural thing for me to include social aspects to this world as well, like the various philosophies of my ascenders, the reverential aspects of sharing blood, as well as the potential abuses, the war, the effects of the war on my overworked, but oh-so-hunky warriors, and even what it’s like to raise children on Second Earth. 

Above all, however, I write romance no matter what the genre.  So, each novel in either my Regencies or my Guardians of Ascension focuses on one couple and their struggle to find love within all the challenges of the world in which they live.

     

BORN OF ASHES, my current release, is the fourth book in the series and came out on the 3rd of this month.  It features a blood slave, Fiona, who has been rescued by the Warrior Jean-Pierre.  Because she was a slave for a hundred years, she has a mission to in turn rescue other women.

I have to say that it’s been hugely satisfying to write a series, something I haven’t done before.  The continuing characters become like olds friends and with each successive book I always try to take a moment to bring forward, even if it’s just in the space of a paragraph, one of the couples from a previous novel.   

     

I love to talk about writing in general and my winged vampire series specifically.  Please ask me anything you like but I always want to know what you’re favorite romance novel of all time is and what has made that book so special for you!

To learn more about the Guardians of Ascension, go to:  www.carisroane.com

Caris Roane has published over fifty Regency romance novels and novellas under the pen name, Valerie King.  In 2005, Romantic Times gave her a Career Achievement award in Regency Romance.  Having had a long-time love affair with vampires, Caris tackled the paranormal genre and built a unique vampire world based on ascending dimensional earths.  Her series is called Guardians of Ascension. 

The first novel of the series, Ascension, debuted in January of 2011 and has been nominated for a Romantic Times Reviewer Choice Award in the category of Vampire Romance.  Burning Skies was released in May, and the third novel, Wings of Fire, hit the shelves in September.  Her novella based on the series, Brink of Eternity, released July 12^th as a $.99 e-read!  And most recently, on January 3^rd, the fourth novel, Born of Ashes, opened the New Year.  The fifth novel, Obsidian Flame releases on April 24th.  Caris lives in Phoenix, Arizona with her two cats, Sebastien and Gizzy.

***TashNZ was picked as the winner!  Congrats, Tash! Please email totebag@authorsoundrelations.com with your full name and mailing address!  Thank you!!***