Tell us a little about yourself and your work.

I am a psychologist and writer who treats patients in psychotherapy and creates phantasmagoric tales set in the mystic land of Aztlan. The Unholy conjures a spell about life, love, and religion gone bad. It’s a step into horror that chills, frightens, and then blows out clogged psychic pathways.

You’ve got 20 words to sell your work. Tempt us.

A young medicine woman, uncovering the secrets of her past, struggles in a life-and-death battle against an evil Archbishop.

Where do you like to write?

In the lair of my private study, I am surrounded by old gothic masters who whisper twists and turns of fate that propel my writing into dark places and winding tunnels where life and death hang in the balance.

Is there anything you must have in order to write?

There is one woman I need and must have, she who knows me intimately and inspired me to turn from writing depth psychology to penning dark fiction with the human heart ushered into perilous psychic realms.

What books have influenced you most, both as a person and as an author?

Stories from the gothic spellbinders, Algernon Blackwood, H.P. Lovecraft, Arthur Machen set my mind loose into dimensions outside of time and space and into hallowed realms of imagination.

What is the one thing that has helped you develop most as an author?

Treating trauma survivors, people who’ve lived through and healed from terrible happenings, propelled me into another level of writing that tears into illusion and opens pathways to human understanding.

What do you want to achieve most from your writing?

I want to pop the top of the head off with writing, to quote Emily Dickenson, a task not necessarily for the feint of heart and not to be read by timid souls.

Is there something specific you do to improve your writing?

Reading and writing and editing improve writing like drip by drip from a mountain stream carves into granite and forms a wondrous natural basin.

What is the ideal relationship between editor and author?

Tension, understanding, encouragement, and authenticity pivot an author and editor in a unique relationship that painfully births a well-crafted story.

If you had a direct line to someone who loves your writing, what would you say?

Thank you for reading and passing on to friends, foes, and casual acquaintances the insight, joy, inspiration and entertainment you discovered in The Unholy.

If you had a direct line to someone who hates your writing, what would you say?

Thank you for reading and passing on to friends, foes, and casual acquaintances the passions stirred by a controversial novel, The Unholy.

If you could give one piece of advice to an aspiring author, what would it be?

If you feel the itch to write, there’s something in you that needs to come out. Stay with it. The Unholy took many years and much fortitude to bring to fruition. Staying with it makes things happen.

What does your writing future hold for you?

My next psychological thriller, Dark Goddess, a novel of love and whether bad love is better than no love, is set for release by Sunstone Press at the end of 2016.

How have you set about the task of creating enticing cover art?

Images for the front cover of Dark Goddess have been streaming my way via virtual reality, dreams, and sudden insights. The front cover of The Unholy is an actual place, the Devil’s Throne, set into the landscape between Albuquerque and Santa Fe. It came to me years ago and finally materialized in a surrealistic version on the captivating front cover of The Unholy.

How often do you read? What genre?

I read mystic texts every day as much as possible since words, thoughts, and stories nourish and stimulate just as food metabolizes into nutrients and energy.

Thanks for taking the time to answer our questions. Best of luck in the future.

Amazon.com Website Facebook Twitter

by