I am from Oklahoma, but I move a lot because we are a military family. I am no longer active duty, but I was an Arabic Linguist in the Marine Corps for five years from 2004-2009. (I actually started the first page of the first draft of this book while in Iraqi dialect class in Fort Gordon.) I have an amazing husband, five rambunctious kids–including twins! I homeschool and my main hobbies, other than writing, are jiu jitsu and cooking to feed a crowd. That last one is maybe just a practical survival tactic.

My ‘day-job’ is my kids, especially since I homeschool. I have a 5th grader, a 3rd grader, a 1st grader and 2 preschoolers. It is a very hands-on job, and involves a lot of reading.

My favorite writer of all time is C.S. Lewis. I love his sharp prose, and his theological and metaphysical bent. His non-fiction works are ones I go back to over and over again, but I consider his novel Till We Have Faces to be a masterpiece. I also love Chaim Potok for his ability to create a deep emotional impact without relying on explicitly emotional language. It’s wild how he does that. My favorite book by him is The Promise. Robin McKinley was my go to as a teen for her focus on unusual cultural details in world-building and for her determined heroines. She was very influential on the types of stories I’m drawn to. Others than I adore: Jane Austen, L.M. Montgomery, Dorothy L. Sayers, G.K. Chesterton, Jonathan Sacks, and Lois McMaster Bujold.

One of my favorite things is when I write a line or a paragraph that simultaneously evokes such a specific experience–either visceral or emotional–that the reader feels that it is happening to them AND it aligns with the greater theme or character arc. It feels like magic. If I write a sentence and see all those subtle layers contained in a single line, I get such a thrill. I also love reading out loud for cadence and simply enjoying the way the words sound.

The truth is, there was very little method to the madness at first. I wrote the entire story (to include books 2 and 3 of the series) over the course of 5 years. I wrote it all as one big manuscript in random scraps of time. At 1 am after a 12 hour shift while on deployments. On long weekends when I had nothing to do and nowhere to go. While I was in school in DC, using my GI bill. I just did it for joy, with no real intention of publishing.

But once the story was complete, I knew it had to be worked over. Divided into three books. I shared it with a friend and did my first (haphazard) revision. That was over ten years ago.

Nowadays I have a least a few things I do to help the process when times are busy or I feel creatively stifled:

-I give myself time to do think-work, aka, daydream. Long runs. Long walks, whenever possible. I talk out loud to myself. I bounce problems off of my (kind and long-suffering) husband.

-I like a clean-ish draft. I need the bones to be good and strong before I can move on to the next scene.

-if I get stuck, I go back to characters. If something feels off it usually means that I’m either manipulating a character to behave outside their nature, or I’ve left some aspect of that character unexplored and need to figure it out before moving on.

-I read aloud, as I said. I love reading aloud.

-I have set writing times, and usually do short sprints

I actually did try to traditionally publish and made it a little ways before I got stuck. I got an agent (almost 10 years ago now!) and went through a few big revisions with her. The manuscript was looking pretty good and we submitted it to some big and medium-sized houses. I got some LOVELY feedback from editors and even made it to acquisitions once! But it did not get acquired.

After sitting on the manuscript a while, I went back to it and did another big revision on my own. I knew THIS was it. My agent read it and agreed. We decided to go on sub again. But shortly after that decision, before sending it out, my agent decided to step away from the industry. There are no hard feelings about this, and she did right by me. But of course, now I had no agent and was back to square 1.

After 2 years of sitting on the manuscript and re-writing book 2 just for the fun of it, I watched a couple youtube videos: one from Daniel Green about self-publishing, and one from Jill Bearup…and I decided to go for it.

Honestly my reason is a mixture of principle and plain ignorance. I didn’t want to rely solely on, or force others to rely on, just one company especially for those who prefer not to patronize that company. Basically, I wanted people to be able to get the ebook wherever they liked. But I also did not fully understand how KU works, or how page-reads work, since I don’t own or use an e-reader, and I hadn’t the faintest idea how beneficial that program is for indie authors!

I think I would still have made the same decision, but as for whether or not it paid off? Well, as of now…not really. But time will tell.

All my favorite parts are mixed up with my least favorite parts. I think most indie authors point to creative control as being a huge bonus, but creative control also equates to immense responsibility, and a lot of extra work and opportunity for failure.

Likewise, being able to tell the story you want to tell regardless of market or trends is such a boon…but being able to do ‘whatever you want’ without oversight or harsh in-industry critics is no guarantee of quality. I confess I’m very glad I got so much professional input during the years that I had an agent, because my work was handled without kid gloves, and it really benefited from that.

I don’t remember how I heard about it, but I had just started the publication process and it so happened that my timeline for publication coincided well with the start of SPFBOX. I started following SPFBO 9 and reading the reviews and was amazed at what a great competition it was, shining a light on indie authors in such a big way.

I saw how hard it is for so many authors to get the word out and hoped this would get a few extra eyeballs on my work. I admit I did not actually expect to become a finalist.

A debt soldier and his battalion are sent into the desert to capture a devil–or maybe not a devil–and find themselves tangled up in a political coup. Ulterior motives abound.

It depends on how far back you want to go. I wrote a story for a high school assignment that bears absolutely no resemblance to the current story, but it was the seedling for sure. I started the more recognizable version about 17 years ago. It has certainly evolved from there, but in gradual fashion, acquiring themes and characters along the way.

My inspiration is so mixed and muddled it’s hard to put a finger on it. I love the heroism and cultural tension of Robin McKinley’s The Blue Sword, the historical drama of Mara Daughter of the Nile, and the deep spiritual explorations of Till We Have Faces. I can see the traces of these stories in my own, and there is no question that they were influential, in ways direct and indirect.

I was also heavily inspired by my experiences as a translator in the Marine Corps. I knew Hebrew before I joined, so when I learned Arabic for my job I fell to it very naturally, since the languages are cousins, and the experience of language and translation gradually became an important feature and theme of my story.

I was also inspired by several different periods in history, by the complicated realities of tribal politics, by stories of diaspora and exile, by military history, and by my general love for gritty heroism and complex characters.

It’s military fantasy, but I’ve had some readers refer to it as historical fantasy, despite not aligning with any particular real world history or place.

Immersive. Complex. Character-driven. (Is hyphenation a cheat?)

It is the first of a trilogy.

Azetla is our main character. He is a debt soldier from an old battalion. His people are viewed as pariahs, but he is very patient, hardworking, and dogged. After over a decade he has earned the trust of (most of) his fellow soldiers.

James Sivolne is the Emperor’s brother. He would probably get along with Hobbits. He would like to stay at home with some tea and be left alone. But that is not going to happen.

Wesley Verris is James’ friend and advisor and he’s the one dragging him, against his will, into the action.

Then there is another character who is important but shall remain nameless for layered reasons.

The question of the antagonist is layered as well, but on the face of it, the antagonist is: Emperor Riada Sivolne. He is in control and he is trying to be, well…even more in control of everything around him.

There is no magic system. As for whether there is magic or the supernatural, that is for the reader to decide. It is, shall we say, open to interpretation.

Honestly the most classic answer is the true one here: I wrote it because I wanted to read it, plain and simple. I wanted a story that was rich and complex with themes that cut to the heart and with other certain elements that might be spoilery, which has immense realism but which hints at things beyond the natural. So I wrote it for whoever that is.

One of my favorite quotes from my favorite writer (Lewis) is “Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it.”

I’m a firm believer that there’s nothing new under the sun, so I’m not sure what is particularly new in my book, other than that the voice is mine. At most I think what is unique about my book is that it is more of a slow-burn, contemplative style in the midst of our high-speed, fast-paced culture. But even that’s not new!

My idea was to convey a strong sense of place (a rugged desert) and also the fact that you get unexpected angles and perspectives in the story–the character you most connect to may not be the one you expect.

The artist is Jeremy Adams. We did have a lot of back-and-forth on smaller details, but mostly it was just me saying “Yes! That’s exactly how I pictured it, only better!” He did such a beautiful job, and one thing he did that I never would have thought of was to streak the colors of deep red and white across the sky–the colors of blood and salt.

As I type this, I am just over halfway through the final proofread for book 2, the follow-up to By Blood, By Salt. I expect to release it in February 2025. I am about a third of the way through the rough (very rough) draft of book 3, since I am re-writing it from scratch. No set date on that one yet.

It was an honor to get to do this interview, and for any of those who decided to check out By Blood, By Salt, I hope you truly enjoy your time with it…enough to want book 2!