I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to welcome Eden Maguire author of Beautiful Dead to Galleysmith today.  Book One of this wonderful series (and y’all know I’m a girl who likes a good series!) is touring the blogosphere right now. Focusing on one of four recently departed teenagers we get to learn all about Jonas and his experience in the before and after life.  If you haven’t already, check out my review of Beautiful Dead.  Please join me in welcoming Eden.

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‘This is an exciting moment – the publication in the U.S. of the first in my four books series, The Beautiful Dead. It comes after an eighteen month gestation period when I presented an outline to my publisher, had the project accepted (a four book deal is a big decision for a publisher!), then began to write. Meanwhile, my agent negotiated details of the contract, designers worked on the cover and marketing people began to promote the books. Finally, after I’ve submitted the manuscript and my editor and I have worked together on small changes, it’s ready for you to read!

If I had to describe Beautiful Dead – Jonas in a few words, I would say ‘highly charged, intense and mysterious’.  I’ve always been fascinated by a love that is strong enough to defy and overcome even death, which is why, when I first read Emily Bronte’s classic novel Wuthering Heights as a teen, the story of Catherine and Heathcliff grabbed me and has held me ever since.

And it’s the intensity of paranormal romance that makes it such a good read for Young Adults. Teens know all about raw, intense passion. You’re not jaded or cynical – you want to believe!

So, back to the early stages of writing Jonas – my first idea was to create a group of paranormal characters who were not vampires or angels, but zombies – the living dead. I wanted Jonas etc to come back from beyond the grave with supernatural powers. They can time travel, they have superhuman strength and the ability to wipe a victim’s mind clear of all memory. The reason they’re back is not for revenge or for any nasty flesh-eating, grave-robbing purpose, but to clear up a mystery surrounding their deaths. But they’ll need human help in the form of Darina.

Darina talks as a first-person narrator and is the character you identify with – and she’s pretty close to myself as a sixteen year old – sensitive, a little angry and rebellious, insecure, but determined and brave. Oh, and she loves, loves, loves Phoenix – who dies in a fight and then comes back to haunt her.

And here’s the thing – Darina has to help Jonas discover the truth about his death in Book 1, then she has to help Arizona and Summer in Books 2 and 3, then her beloved Phoenix in Book 4. So there’s a slow, relentless build to the final, agonised moment when she finds out what really happened to the guy she loves.

You can see that all four books had to be plotted right from the start. But that doesn’t mean I don’t change and develop things as I go along – especially when a character comes alive on the page and begins taking the plot in unexpected directions.

One thing I had in my head early on was the angel-wing tattoo. All the Beautiful Dead carry this death mark on the exact place on their bodies where they received a fatal gunshot or knife wound. It kind of encapsulates what the books are about – a tragic early death, grief and longing, a magical ability to come back and set things right.

So I’ve sat alone at my desk for a year and a half (isolation is probably the down-side of being a writer, but the power to invent a whole fantasy world with its own mythology and to people it with characters from out of your own brain and imagination is the biggest thrill) and now I’m handing The Beautiful Dead over to you.

I hope from the bottom of my heart that you like reading it as much as I loved writing it.

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Eden, thank you so much for joining us and sharing your thoughts on these wonderful books.  I’m looking forward to reading all about Arizona next.