Eden, Unplugged

Interview with the fabulous Eden Bradley.
I wanted help coming up with questions for you so I asked my blog readers to submit some to me for you. The first question submitted was a tried and true one. Where do you find your inspiration? Is it based all in fantasy or is there some reality within it?
Eden/Eve: Of course much of my inspiration comes from pure fantasy. Who hasn’t had a dream or a few moments alone in their head? I simply turn mine into full stories on paper. And as a writer, you learn to sort of farm your mind for different scenarios. But some of my inspiration has also come from real life. I’ve led a…varied existence-lol! Something I’m not afraid to talk about, and often have. And that runs anywhere from modeling a hero on a guy I couldn’t forget to writing about actual experiences (with a few embellishments, perhaps, and names changed to protect the not-so-innocent).
Why erotic romance?
Eden/Eve: Well, it’s a helluva lot of fun, to begin with! But also because I’m a people-watcher—I majored in psychology in college—so what makes people tick is endlessly fascinating to me. I like to really dig deep when exploring my characters. And the deep stuff, the most powerful stuff, tends to come out when a person is at their most raw, their most vulnerable, which often happens during sex. If you want to strip a person down to their most basic, primal selves—literally and metaphorically—start by getting them naked. Or, you know, bent over a desk with a blindfold on…
What is a favorite line or moment from one of your own books?
Eden/Eve: Ooh, so many! But right now I am madly in love with my vampires, especially my poor, tortured Ever. I’ve even written a short prequel story about him. EVER: THE TURNING, which I’m putting out myself at the end of this month.I’ve even had a book trailer made for that story by the fabulous Saturday Buffet:

…But there is a moment in his book, EVERSONG, Book Four in my Midnight Playground series, where you see a flash back to his past, to the female vampire who made him. Vérún is an even more tragic figure, and there is something so powerful to me in their love for each other while they battle her encroaching insanity. Here’s a small peek:
Together they moved. Pleasure was hot, sharp. His heart hammered as his hips arched, as she took him into her body, over and over. As she bit into his shoulder, his neck, pulling his blood into her hot mouth, tearing his flesh. Still, he could only see a darkness inside her. But he kept fucking her. Kept loving her.
Vérún.
She gasped as she came, then screamed. He was coming, too, his hips pistoning. And before he was done with the final shivers of his climax, she was crying. Still drinking from the wound in his throat, pulling at his blood, sobbing against his skin.
“Vérún,” he whispered, his body going weak as she drained him. “Do not do this, my love.”
His fingers went into her long, silky hair, trying to pull her head back. She fought him even as she cried.
“Stop, my love. I cannot fight your sadness if I am made too weak.”
She latched on. Cried harder. Drank more deeply. Until he had to dig into her scalp and yank her head back so hard he heard the bones of her neck crack with the force of it.
He was gasping for breath. She had taken too much again. He blinked at her lovely face, which was covered in her tears, his blood.
“Ah…” she made a noise, a strangled sound coming from deep in her throat. She pushed away from him, fell to the ground in a crumpled heap.
“No, Vérún…”
He bent over her, gathered her in his arms, his heart breaking.
If only he could take her sadness from her. The shadows that haunted her mind. That had begun to fill it completely lately.
Vérún. His lover. His love.
“I want to die,” she sobbed.
“No,” he protested. “You cannot leave me.”
“But I will, Ever. You know I must.”
He only rocked her in his arms. And tried to resist the knowledge that the unthinkable would surely happen, just as she said. It was the one thing he was helpless against. Her darkness. Her shadows. The death that hovered always over his love, and that eventually, he would not be able to fight.
Are there any romance tropes you love? What about hate?
Eden/Eve: I can love them all, as long as they’re done well, in a way that’s organic to the characters and makes for an interesting story. I believe that a really talented writer can write about anything and make it magical for the reader.
How do you manage your time? Are you too easily distracted by the internet when you should be writing? Twitter? Facebook? Can you ease in and out of places like that while you write or do you set aside times to play?
Eden/Eve: I’m supposed to manage my time…? Seriously, I am awful at it. I get caught up in Facebook and Twitter and visiting blogs and my Yahoo group because I love talking to readers, as well as other writers. I think that kind of interaction is just as important for me as it is to them. No one can exist in a bubble—which is really the only way a book gets written—so it’s necessary to break out and socialize once in a while. Finding a good balance is the hard part. I haven’t figured it out yet.
What would be off limits to you in writing. (besides the cardinal no-no’s like incest, rape, etc.)
Eden/Eve: I’m really not into the whole toe-sucking thing. DP, rimming, fisting, even an intimate golden shower I’m okay with, but toes….*shudder*
If you could go to any workshop, given by any author, what would it be?
Eden/Eve: I would love to hear Tanith Lee talk about how she develops her characters and her worlds. Her prose is just magic for me.
If you could co-author a story with any author who would it be?
Eden/Eve: I’m a terrible control freak, so the idea is absolutely agonizing! But I have to say I have recently considered the idea of co-writing something with my dear friend and critique partner R.G. Alexander—”˜considered’ being the key word-lol! We’re sort of attached at the hip, anyway, and when the Smutketeers did our Wasteland continuity series together for Samhain, while everyone chimed in on building the world, her story and mine were very closely linked and I think they wove together beautifully. I can almost imagine writing a book with her. It would have to involve bunnies. She knows what that means…*G*
All the writers I know are also avid readers, at least they were before they started writing. One thing I’ve heard again and again, and even experienced is being so busy writing you don’t have time to read. Personally I found that when I don’t pleasure read (as opposed to research read) often enough, my passion for writing can wane a bit. What about you? Do you read every day like Stephen King suggests in ‘On Writing’ or are you more sporadic when writing?
Eden/Eve: I’m always writing—that’s been nearly every waking moment for the last several years. I really only read for my critique partners, the writers I mentor each year, and then there’s that one hour (or less) at bedtime for my luxury reading. I remember the days when I would devour a novel or two in a week. Now it can take me a month to read anything. But I do read something each day.
What about Genre? What’s your favorite genre to read?
Eden/Eve: I’m an old sci-fi fan from way back, and I still love to read it. I also love women’s fiction, both serious and comedic. And I’ve been reading a ton of YA. There are amazing YA authors out there, in all subgenres. I’m really loving the serious contemporaries and some vampires. Genre of the day changes, depending on my mood, but I’m always up for something funny.

What was your favorite childhood, I’m thinking middle school or younger, book?
Eden/Eve: I loved the Narnia tales. I probably read the entire series a good dozen times.
You can have only 1 book with you on a deserted island. Which one do you choose and why?
Eden/Eve: I can’t have two?? Okay…it would be Time Enough For Love by Robert Heinlein, for several reasons. It’s an old favorite-my comfort book. If I can’t sleep or I’m stressed, I’ll pull out one of my dog-eared copies and open it to any page. And in that book is romance, adventure, science, comedy, characters I’ve loved for a lifetime, and even sex, so it satisfies on every level.
What do you think readers would be shocked to discover about you?
Eden/Eve: I’m not sure there’s anything left that I haven’t shared-lol! Everyone already knows I’m fairly heavily tattooed, am in a relationship with a much younger man, am addicted to shoes and lip gloss, have spent time in the BDSM clubs, love my cats, am a daddy’s girl, a huge art geek and am obsessed with anything steampunk. Hmm…maybe it’s my shark phobia? Seriously, I can’t go in the ocean because I’m deathly afraid a shark will bite my leg off. They’ve been known to attack in as little as three feet of water, you know! Which doesn’t explain why the fear will sometimes creep up on me even in a fresh water lake. And the occasional swimming pool.
Do you believe in soul mates? Does everyone have one?
Eden/Eve: I do believe in soul mates, but not necessarily one for each of us. I think we have a number of possible soul matches out there. I do, however, totally believe in love at first sight.
Do you prefer George Clooney, or Johnny Depp? (I”m going to say Johnny Depp for me because I think roleplaying with him would be oh so wicked.;) )
Eden/Eve: Sasha-do you not know me at all?? It’s Johnny, all the way, all the time. Johnny, Johnny, Johnny. And…Johnny. Yep. *girlish sigh*

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Award winning and best-selling author Eden Bradley aka Eve Berlin writes dark, edgy erotica and erotic romance for Harlequin Spice, Berkley Heat, Bantam/Delta, and Samhain Publishing, and soon for HQN.

Eden lives in Hollywood and has appeared regularly on Playboy Radio’s “˜Night Calls’. She loves shoes, tattoos, art, younger men, reading smutty books, chocolate and sex, of course, not necessarily in that order. Eden’s next books include her first self-published title, EVER: THE TURNING, a prequel to her Midnight Playground vampire series, out at the end of this month. After that look for her second title from Berkley Heat, where she writes as Eve Berlin. DESIRE’S EDGE, a contemporary erotic BDSM story, will be out September 6th.

On October 4th Book Four in Eden’s Midnight Playground series from Samhain, EVERSONG will be out!

~And~ as of today Eden’s first book in her Midnight Playground series, THE SEEKING KISS, is FREE on Kindle and Nook! The free read will continue through August 28th, so if you’ve never read her vampires and want a free taste, you can download now for FREE!

CONTEST! I can’t visit Sasha and not have a contest! All you have to do is answer this question: What is your favorite kind of hero? Do you like them dark and tortured? Totally Alpha? Or do you prefer they have a softer side? What’s your kind of guy? Post your answer here, and be entered to win the winner’s choice of either a $10.00 Amazon gift card ~or~ a $10.00 Sephora gift card (my favorite stop to indulge in my lip gloss habit), PLUS a copy of any one of my Samhain backlist e-books-they can be found on the Books page of my website, or on the Samhain site (this does not include my latest release, EVERSONG, or the print Wasteland anthology). I’ll announce the winner tonight in the comments section, so be sure to check back!

Be sure to check her websites for book releases, appearances, book trailers and other news and updates: www.EdenBradley.com www.EveBerlin.com or her group blog www.Smutketeers.com

You can also find her on Facebook: www.facebook.com/AuthorEdenBradley.EveBerlin

***Eden will be also guest blogging at Genreality on Thursday***