Deadly Pursuit by Nina Croft – guest post

The Challenges and Delights…

Today, I was asked to write a little about the challenges as well as the delights in creating my Blood Hunter series of books.

The Blood Hunter series is a mixture of genres: science fiction, paranormal and a whole load of romance. It’s set in a future where man has fled to the stars and there they have discovered the secret of immortality—Meridian. Rare and exorbitantly expensive, Meridian is only available to a select few, and a new class has evolved—the Collective—super rich and immortal. They rule the universe.

I started writing Break Out, book 1 in the series, as a backlash to writing an earlier book requested by my dear husband. One morning, he glanced up from his newspaper and, bless him, asked me, why didn’t I write a ‘good’ book?

Being the calm reasonable person I am, I replied, “What do you mean, darling?”

A good book: No vampires. No space ships. No romance.

So I wrote a thriller for him, and I enjoyed it, but afterward, I needed a fix of all my favorite things, and so I wrote Break Out. And for me, the biggest delight in writing Break Out, and ultimately the series, is—absolutely anything goes—I’m allowed to travel as far as my imagination will take me.

I’ve always loved space operas—I’m a big Star Wars fan from way back, and more recently Joss Whedon’s Firefly. So I really wanted to write a space adventure. But I also needed a paranormal fix, so enter Ricardo Sanchez, my hero. Rico is the owner and pilot of the space cruiser, El Cazador (full name: El Cazador de la Sangre, which means Blood Hunter in Spanish). He’s also a vampire.

I think one of the biggest challenges with writing Break Out was getting the balance right between science fiction and paranormal. Break Out was never intended to be a ‘vampire’ book as such. Rather it was an adventure story in space where the main character just happened to be a vampire. I also wanted it to be fast-paced and not slowed down by a lot of background information. Break Out is a novella; there’s not a lot of room for extraneous details, so it was hard to work out what was essential and what wasn’t.

I never actually started out with the intention of writing a series. But as usual, by the time I’d finished Break Out, I really don’t want to say goodbye to the characters. So when Entangled Publishing said they wanted to contract Break Out, and would I be interested in writing a series—I was very happy to say yes. I signed the contract for the first three books, and Break Out came out in July. The second book, Deadly Pursuit, is out any day now and I’m currently working on book 3.

Deadly Pursuit was easier to write than Break Out. The world was already formed in my mind, I knew most of the characters well from the first book, and Deadly Pursuit is a full length novel so there was more room to include world building, both paranormal and futuristic. And keeping with the ‘anything goes’ policy, the hero of Deadly Pursuit turned out to be a werewolf!

Each book is a stand alone romance focusing on a member of the crew of El Cazador and probably the biggest challenge in Deadly Pursuit, was getting Rico, my vampire hero from book 1, to take a back seat. He’s a strong character, and he would keep trying to take over.

Right now, I’m having great fun writing book 3, and I just signed a contract with Entangled for books 4, 5 and 6. My current challenge for the series is to introduce a few more secondary characters, so I have some great future heroes and heroines to pick from.

So what sort of creatures, real or imaginary, do you think would make good additions to the crew of El Cazador? Let me know for a chance to win an ecopy of Deadly Pursuit.

Title: Deadly Pursuit (Blood Hunter, #2)

Author: Nina Croft

Genre: Sci-Fi Romance/Vamps/Shifters

Length: Novel

Release Date: October 2011

ePub ISBN: 978-1-937044-88-6

Print ISBN: 978-1-937044-89-3

BLOOD HUNTER SERIES – Book Two by Nina Croft

http://www.entangledpublishing.com/deadly-pursuit/

Book Description:

Breaking assassin Jonathon Decker out of a maximum security prison on Trakis One seemed like a good idea at the time. Now, pursued across space by the two most powerful factions in the universe, the crew of El Cazador are having second thoughts. They’d like to give him back. Unfortunately, that no longer seems an option.

Jon is used to working alone. Now, he’s stuck on the space cruiser El Cazador until he can work out just what he’s supposed to know that puts him on everybody’s most-wanted-dead list. He’s not happy that the crew includes a runaway priestess with designs on his virtue—such as it is. Jon likes women, but he gave up the role of protector a long time ago, and Alexia, High Priestess of the Church of Everlasting Life, is an accident waiting to happen.

After twenty-four excruciatingly boring years of doing her duty, Alex is finally having some fun. She never meant to run away—it was a rash impulse—and she means to go back—eventually. But first, she’s going to squeeze enough excitement out of the situation to last her a lifetime. And what could be more exciting than a stunningly gorgeous werewolf?

Meanwhile, the Church are chasing their missing priestess, and the Collective are pursuing their escaped assassin. Being hunted has never been more deadly…or more fun.

Title: Break Out
Author: Nina Croft
Genre: Sci-Fi Romance/Vamps
Length: Novella
Release Date: July 5th, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-937044-04-6

Blood Hunter Book 1

http://www.entangledpublishing.com/break-out/

Book Description:

Irreverent. Irresponsible. Insatiable. Who says immortals can’t have any fun?

The year is 3048, Earth is no longer habitable, and man has fled to the stars where they’ve discovered the secret of immortality—Meridian. Unfortunately, the radioactive mineral is exorbitantly expensive and only available to a select few. A new class comprised of the super rich and immortal soon evolves. The Collective, as they’re called, rule the universe.

Two-thousand-year-old Ricardo Sanchez, vampire and rogue pilot of the space cruiser, El Cazador, can’t resist two things: gorgeous women and impossible jobs. When beautiful Skylar Rossaria approaches him to break a prisoner out of the Collective’s maximum security prison on Trakis One, Rico jumps at the chance. Being hunted by the Collective has never been so dangerous–or so fun!

About the Author:

Nina Croft grew up in the north of England. After training as an accountant, she spent four years working as a volunteer in Zambia which left her with a love of the sun and a dislike of 9-5 work. She then spent a number of years mixing travel (whenever possible) with work (whenever necessary) but has now settled down to a life of writing and picking almonds on a remote farm in the mountains of southern Spain.

Nina’s writing mixes romance with elements of the paranormal and science fiction.

http://www.ninacroft.com