Please welcome Kenya Wright to Novel Reflections!

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Blurb:

Since the 1970’s humans have forced supernaturals to live in caged cities. Silver brands embedded in their foreheads identify them by species: a full moon for Vampires, a crescent moon for Shifters, a pair of wings for Fairies, and the list goes on, for each supernatural species has been tagged and categorized by humans.

Lanore Vesta is marked with a silver X, the brand of Mixbreeds, second-class citizens shunned by society. She stays to herself, revealing her ability to create fire only during emergencies. All she wants to do is graduate college and stop having to steal to survive. But when she stumbles upon a murder in progress, she catches the attention of a supernatural killer. Now all she wants is to stop finding dead bodies in her apartment.

Enlisting help from her Were-cheetah ex-boyfriend Meshach and a new mysterious friend named Zulu, she is steered through the habitat’s raunchy nightlife. But their presence sometimes proves to be more burden than help, as they fight for her attention.

While the corpses pile up, and the scent of blood fills the air, Lanore is left wondering: will she find the psycho or die trying?

THE GOOD, BAD, AND IN BETWEEN OF URBAN FANTASY WORLD BUILDING.

    Building my world was the best part of writing Fire Baptized. There are so many fun things to consider. Here are my choices of the good, bad, and in between of world building.

The Good
There were no limits. In the beginning of writing my world, I didn’t limit myself with real world rules. I just let my imagination run wild. One example of this is an awesome television I invented called the 6DTV.  The television is patented by Air Witches. The viewer can see, feel, hear, and taste everything that is happening on the TV program.

I gave my world’s entertainment a magical flair. There is nothing more fun than adding mystic possibilities to entertainment. In my world, Splash, a Siren R&B singer, tops the billboard charts with “Seduction.” Human girls go crazy over the Vampire boy band Staked. Additionally, the all Supernatural ballet troupe Prese sells out every show.

I let my own interest guide the creation process. I’m a big foodie so I enjoyed giving each supernatural species their own restaurants, food products, and drinks. My main character Lanore is a huge coffee drinker. When she’s not trying to find a killer that is stalking her, she enjoys an Inferno at the Fire Bean Café. An Inferno is slowly roasted coffee beans infused with jalapeño pepper juice and blended with chocolate sauce.

The In Between
I read a lot of books with creative worlds. My favorite books are set in magnificent settings. Some of my favorite authors are Kim Harrison, Ilona Andrews, Laini Taylor, and Patrick Rothfuss. I use their books as learning tools.

The Bad
During the revision process, I had to cut a lot of the great details. Unfortunately, readers hate large dumps of world information. Info Dumps are boring and severely slow down the story’s pacing. I spent many painstaking months removing world facts out of the novel. Then, I asked my critique groups members, editor, and proofreader to point out unnecessary information dumps. My initial rough draft was 180,000 words. A year later, my final word count was 63,032. That means, I not only grew as a writer, but I spent a few times crying in the fetal position after a rough revision.

Here’s an excerpt from my novel Fire Baptized.
In this scene, I take a normal strip club setting and let my imagination go wild.

Ray and I sat in Goldie’s strip club. A jazz ballad soared out of the DJ’s speakers. The singer, a famous Siren, sung about a hot, passionate night, full of slow, lusty grooves. Ginger candles adorned tables with an erotic scent, inflaming the atmosphere with sex and seduction. Amber lanterns hung by mystic cords and glowed above the center stage where exotic dancers of all shapes and sizes performed.

The women twisted and bended into poses, suggesting the promise of carnal pleasure. Sweat clung to their skin. The colored lights bounced off their jiggling breasts. They were all Purebloods.

Maybe the owner thought nude Mixies wouldn’t bring in customers.

I slung a handful of stale popcorn into my mouth while scanning the crowd and wondering if Larry was here.

Too much salt.

I coughed into my hand.

Ray shook his head and smirked. Earlier, he’d warned me not to eat the free snacks, claiming that waitresses over salted the food to get Supes to buy more drinks. Maybe he was right. A layer of salt stuck to my tongue and I yearned for something to wash it down.

A dancer strolled over to us. Water Witch. Except for the six-inch gold heels, she wore nothing else.

“You like?” she asked, rocking from side to side.

I shrugged, wishing she’d leave.

More men entered.

Any of you Larry?

“Buy some time in the VIP section.” She licked her lips. “I can give you more of me.”

“No, thank you.” I scanned the area behind me. There were so many men in here, and it was only three in the afternoon.

“I’m a lot of woman.” A flicker of blue light emerged above her triangle brand. The light shimmered into a black line that cut into her skin and continued between her eyes, separating her face into two heads.

My breath caught in my throat as she proceeded to split into two women. Motherpounder. I spied Ray yawning and rolled my eyes.

Her two heads leaned in opposite directions as the gleaming line divided her neck and chest. There was no blood. Just skin breaking apart into equal halves of herself. Completely amazed, I clapped as both women smiled at me, swaying and edging closer.

“Come on, that’s impressive. Are you kidding me, Ray?” I asked. “She was one and now she’s two.”

“It’s just an illusion,” Ray muttered, unimpressed. “She’s playing tricks with our eyes. And this is a strip club—you don’t clap here, you give them money.”

“I’m sure she, or really, they appreciated my clapping.” I gazed at them, attempting to guess which one was the original. They focused on me, pinched their pink nipples, and licked their gold-painted lips.

I leaned in Ray’s direction. “This place is a cool adult carnival.”

Ray didn’t respond. He threw red sunglasses over his eyes, his lips formed into an angry line.

What’s his problem?

I turned my attention back to the Water Witches as they got onto their knees and crawled toward me. Their breasts swayed like large pendulums. I looked at Ray. “Okay. What are they going to do?”

He smiled as they crept near me, and then leapt in my direction. Before I could tell them that I didn’t have any money, their oily boobs were in my face, suffocating me. I gasped for air as their chests crushed the sides of my head, surrounding me with cheap perfume.

Cursing, I wrestled away. “Hey! I don’t have any money.”

They immediately pulled back, scowling at me.

“No money?” they said through clenched teeth. Blue flares of light flickered, and smoke exploded, until one pissed off Water Witch remained, hands on her hips. A fierce glare plastered on her face. “If you don’t have any money, then get away from the stage.”

“It takes up all my energy to cast a detachment spell,” she whined. “Fucking Combo Trash.”

Ray laughed and flung a napkin my way as she stormed off.

“Well that’s excellent customer service.” I wiped rose oil off my cheeks and scanned the club.

Author Bio:
    Kenya Wright always knew she would be famous since the ripe old age of six when she sung the Michael Jackson thriller song in her bathroom mirror. She has tried her hand at many things from enlisting in the Navy for six years as a Persian-Farsi linguist to being a nude model at an art university.
However, writing has been the only constant love in her life.
Now Kenya is publishing her first book, Fire Baptized, the urban fantasy novel she always wanted to read. This novel is the first book in a series.
Will she succeed? Of course.
For she has been coined The Urban Fantasy Queen, the Super Iconic Writer of this Age, The Lyrical Genius of Our Generation. Granted, these are all terms coined by her, within the private walls of her bathroom as she still sings the Michael Jackson thriller song.
Kenya Wright currently resides in Miami with her three amazing, overactive children, a supportive, gorgeous husband, and three cool black cats that refuse to stop sleeping on Kenya’s head at night.

Giveaway Details:

  • Kenya will be giving away a $10 Amazon.com gift certificate to one randomly drawn commenter during the tour.
  • Please leave a comment and/or question for Kenya, along with your email addy.
  • Contest is open the duration of the tour.
  • Winner will be randomly selected and notified via email.
  • Remember: The more tour stops you comment on, the greater your chances of winning!!

 

Tour Stops:

The tour dates can be found here:  http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2011/12/virtual-book-tour-fire-baptized-by.html