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  Ele­men­tal Assas­sin
  Book #1

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  Ele­men­tal Assas­sin
  Book #2

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  Ele­men­tal Assas­sin
  Book #3

Ele­men­tal Assas­sin Fre­quently Asked Questions

Ques­tion: What are the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin books about?

Answer: The Ele­men­tal Assas­sin books are set in the fic­tional south­ern metrop­o­lis of Ash­land, where Ten­nessee, Vir­ginia, and North Car­olina meet in the heart of the Appalachian Moun­tains. The books focus on Gin Blanco, an assas­sin code­named the Spi­der who runs a bar­be­cue restau­rant called the Pork Pit in her spare time. Gin is also an ele­men­tal or per­son who can con­trol one of the four ele­ments – Air, Fire, Ice, and Stone. Gin has the rare gift of being able to con­trol two ele­ments, Ice and Stone in her case. Besides ele­men­tals like Gin, Ash­land is also home to giants, dwarves, and vampires.

The first book in the series, Spider’s Bite, was released in Feb­ru­ary 2010 by Pocket Books. Web of Lies, the sec­ond book in the series, was released in June 2010. Venom, the third book, will debut in Octo­ber 2010. Tan­gled Threads, the fourth book, will be released in May 2011, with the fifth book (unti­tled at this point) to be released in Octo­ber 2011.

Ques­tion: How many books will be in the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin series?

Answer: Right now, I’m con­tracted for five books – Spider’s Bite, Web of Lies, Venom, Tan­gled Threads, and book #5 (which is unti­tled at this point). These five books will let me fin­ish out the first major story arc with Gin and her neme­sis and answer a lot of the big ques­tions in the series. Of course, I would like to write more books in the series beyond these five. But that depends on sales. So if you like my books, please tell your friends about them.

I also plan to write a free short story to go with each one of the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin books and post them on the Excerpts page on my Web site. Spider’s Bar­gain, a pre­quel story that takes place before the events of Spider’s Bite, has been posted, along with Web of Death and Web of Deceit, which are two sto­ries that go along with Web of Lies.

There are also two sto­ries that go along with Venom — Poi­son and Wasted, which are both told from the point of view of Finnegan Lane, Gin’s fos­ter brother.

You don’t have to read the short sto­ries to enjoy the books, but I thought the sto­ries would be some­thing fun and extra to offer read­ers – for free!

Ques­tion: Why write about an assas­sin? That doesn’t seem like a very sym­pa­thetic character.

Answer: Ever since I started read­ing epic fan­tasy books in high school, I’ve been intrigued by assas­sin char­ac­ters and the moral ques­tions that they raise. Do some peo­ple deserve to die? Does killing some­one for money auto­mat­i­cally make you a bad per­son? Does an assas­sin ever feel guilty about killing? These are some ideas I wanted to explore, so I cre­ated my own assas­sin Gin Blanco, with her own moti­va­tions, quirks, pow­ers, and problems.

Assas­sins might not be the most sym­pa­thetic char­ac­ters or the eas­i­est to iden­tify with, but I think they are some of the most fas­ci­nat­ing. Plus, I wanted to write a really smart, strong, tough female char­ac­ter, which I think that I’ve done with Gin Blanco.

Ques­tion: What exactly is urban fantasy?

Answer: Urban fan­tasy is a genre that’s really exploded in pop­u­lar­ity in recent years. Urban fan­tasy books are usu­ally set in a con­tem­po­rary world (one with cars, elec­tric­ity, etc.) that also fea­tures magic and mag­i­cal crea­tures of some sort. Ele­men­tals, vam­pires, giants, dwarves, demons, elves, selkies, trolls, witches, wiz­ards – all those and more can be found in urban fan­tasy books.

In urban fan­tasy, the focus is usu­ally one main char­ac­ter, and the story is often told in the first-person point of view. Read­ers fol­low this one char­ac­ter through her var­i­ous tri­als and tribu­la­tions. Exam­ples of urban fan­tasy include my Ele­men­tal Assas­sin series, the Dres­den Files by Jim Butcher and the Hollows/Rachel Mor­gan series by Kim Har­ri­son, among many others.

Ques­tion: Why is the tone of the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin books so much darker and grit­tier than your Big­time series?

Answer: The Big­time books are basi­cally tongue-in-cheek comic book spoofs. The tone is light, fun, and campy in keep­ing with the old tele­vi­sion shows like Bat­man with Adam West and Won­der Woman with Lynda Carter. They’re just fun, breezy reads.

But I wanted to write a dif­fer­ent kind of book with the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin series – a dark, gritty urban fan­tasy full of magic, power, and dan­ger. My city, Ash­land, is a vio­lent, cor­rupt, south­ern metrop­o­lis where any­thing can hap­pen, so I wanted to make my hero­ine, Gin Blanco, as strong, capa­ble, and deadly as she could be. Also, Gin is an assas­sin – she kills peo­ple for money, which neces­si­tated the darker tone of the books.

But in the end, I think the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin books have a lot in com­mon with my Big­time series. Both books fea­ture strong, smart, kick-butt hero­ines, cool mag­i­cal pow­ers, awe­some action scenes, and steamy romance. I think they’re all just fun reads. Every­thing is just a lit­tle darker and grit­tier in the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin series, includ­ing the humor.

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Gin’s Recipe Box

Want to cook like Gin Blanco does in the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin series? Then check out these recipes.

Note: I did not come up with these recipes myself. They are tried and true favorites that I’ve col­lected over the years from var­i­ous rel­a­tives, cook­books, mag­a­zines, food prod­uct pack­ag­ing, and more. Enjoy!

Choco­late Chip Pound Cake

1 (18.25 ounce) pack­age choco­late cake mix
1 small pack­age instant choco­late pud­ding mix
1/2 cup sugar
2/3 cup water
1/2 cup veg­etable oil
3 large eggs
1 (8 ounce) con­tainer sour cream
1 (12 ounce) pack­age mini choco­late morsels

Pre­heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour 10-cup Bundt pan. In a large bowl, com­bine cake mix, pud­ding, and sugar. Add water, oil, and eggs. Beat with an elec­tric mixer at medium speed until smooth. Stir in sour cream and mini choco­late morsels. Pour bat­ter into pre­pared pan, and bake for 1 hour (check at 50 min­utes) or until a wooden tooth­pick inserted in cen­ter comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 min­utes. Remove from pan and let cool com­pletely on wire rack. Sprin­kle with pow­dered sugar, if desired.

Moun­tain Dew Cake

1 box yel­low cake mix
3 large eggs
1 small box instant vanilla pud­ding
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup Moun­tain Dew

Mix all ingre­di­ents together and bake in a bundt tube pan at 325 degress for 50–60 min­utes, check­ing at 45 minutes.

For the glaze:
1 stick but­ter
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup Moun­tain Dew

Melt over medium heat, boil for 1 minute. Cool 2–3 min­utes and pour over cake while hot. Let set 30 min­utes. Then, turn cake out of pan.

Peanut But­ter and Banana Sandwich

1/2 cup peanut but­ter
1/2 cup pump­kin
1 banana, sliced
Honey
Cin­na­mon
2 slices of your favorite bread

Mix the peanut but­ter and pump­kin together to form a creamy spread (there will be enough spread for more than one sand­wich). Put the spread on one slice of your favorite bread. Top with the banana slices. Driz­zle the banana slices with honey and sprin­kle with cin­na­mon, if you wish. Top with the remain­ing piece of bread and enjoy your sand­wich with a glass of cold milk.

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The Runes

Almost every­one in Ash­land uses a rune of some sort to iden­tify them­selves or their power, or say some­thing about their fam­ily, alliances, busi­nesses, and more. Here are some of the runes men­tioned in the Ele­men­tal Assas­sin books:

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