INSIDER AUTHOR INTERVIEWS

An Interview with Author B. Pine - Familiar Origins

April 2011

The Insider is a Silver Leaf Books sponsored feature that allows the readers to gain additional information about the authors, books, and projects. This section will consist of live interviews with the authors, and their direct responses.

This Insider interview is with B. Pine, author of the upcoming release, Familiar Origins.

SLB: Your debut novel will be released this upcoming May. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about what got you started with writing and how you came up with the idea for Familiar Origins?
 
PINE: I’ve been writing as long as I can remember. It was a type of stress reliever for me, but I never thought I was any good at it. But then I took a creative writing course in college as an elective, and everyone, especially my professor, was impressed with my work. My final paper for that course was about a dragon that was torn between helping a troubled human race and allowing events to unfold naturally, resulting in humanity’s doom. That class was so motivating that I decided to write a few more shorts about dragons and humans. A few years later, I took the stories, dissected them, and next thing I knew, I had my plot for Familiar Origins scribbled out in an old notebook.

SLB: How was the process of taking your initial manuscript and getting it to the point where it is now?
 
PINE: The only word I can come up with is long. The entire process was long. The first draft was long. It took a long time to read the story through. It also took me a long time to realize that I needed to trim the manuscript quite a bit. I realized that I was focusing too much on character details that were really unnecessary. So there was a lot of painful chopping as I reached the final draft. But when I went over the manuscript that I ended up submitting, it was so much easier to read. And I was afraid that all the edits would make the characters two-dimensional and boring, but it seems like the exact opposite happened, because most of the comments I get from readers have to do with how much they like one character or another.

SLB: When your book does finally arrive, after such a long journey, how excited are you about having a tangible book in your hands?
 
PINE: It still seems a bit surreal. I try not to think about it too much because I’m afraid I will jinx myself and my books will get lost, or something along those lines. I’m still not sure how I will react. I’ll probably cry.
 
SLB: Let’s hope those are tears of joy! Why don’t you tell us a little about the book?
 
PINE: Only a little, huh? Okay, I will try to keep it short. The book is a fantasy tale about five children who are being hunted because they were born with the ability to bond with dragons. Familiar Origins tells the stories of each of these characters, where they are from, and how the dragons have impacted their young lives. There are eight children wanted by the dragons, but Familiar Origins focuses on five of them.

SLB: Even though the print book isn’t officially being released until May, the book has been available on the Kindle already. Have you heard any early feedback about it?
 
PINE: Yes. I have a couple of very nice five-star reviews there, and a few e-mails on my website guestbook asking when the print version is coming out. As I said before, the characters seem to be what they like the most about the book. And even my sister, who illustrated the book, is getting comments about how good the story is.

SLB: So your sister is the artist for your book. What was it like working with your sister?
 
PINE: It was a lot of fun. My sister Eimi [pronounced ‘Amy’] is my biggest fan, and I wouldn’t be here talking to you without her. She was my beta reader, my ‘first draft’ critic, and she loves the story and the saga so much that she was able to immediately come up with a vision for the illustrations and website layout. And as sisters, there was a level of comfort and trust that made this project really exciting. We both knew what we wanted the end result to be, and bouncing ideas back and forth was very enjoyable. People say it is a bad idea to work with family, but I think this experience made us even closer.

SLB: That’s wonderful! How did you two come up with the idea for the cover art?
 
PINE: From the beginning, I knew exactly which scene I wanted for the cover. And we both agreed that the sight of a powerful dragon holding a helpless baby in its claws is about as striking an image as you can get. This is a nighttime scene in the book, and we were worried about the cover being too dark, so the original idea was to have the dragon and baby in a frame on the front cover, with a lighter color for the rest of the book. But Eimi felt that a cropped, framed illustration would be too much of a snapshot and could not portray the essence of the scene, so she began detailing the image piece by piece to make it a full front cover illustration. The stars, the moon, and the glow on the baby’s forehead as the dragon deliberates on whether to mark the baby, all of those details were Eimi’s way to pull everything together to make a pitch-dark scene work. It is truly a work of art, what she did.

SLB: For those readers who would be interested in meeting you, are you planning on doing any signings and/or conventions?
 
PINE: The nice part about living in Delaware is that it is close to cities like New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, even Washington DC. I am still working on dates and schedules, but if everything goes well, my plan is to attend at least one event or bookstore for each of these areas this summer. And of course Delaware as well. I will post events on my website once I have final details.

SLB: And what is the address for your website?
 
PINE: Oh, yeah, I’ve mentioned my website a few times but I didn’t tell you what the URL was. Check out www.dracawards.com for more information about the book, the saga, and what I will be up to this summer. I am also on Twitter @B_Pine. Comments are very welcome, thank you.

SLB: Will there be future adventures of the Draca Wards Saga for readers to look forward to?
 
PINE: Oh, definitely! Familiar Origins is just the beginning. These kids have a long road ahead of them.
 
SLB: Other than writing, what are some of your interests and hobbies?
 
PINE: I like to cook and garden. And I like to cook what I garden. I love reading, though it is hard for me lately to sit down with a book. Oh, and video games. I love video games. But I have even less time for that than I have for reading.

SLB: Is there anything else that you would like to add about yourself or your book before we leave?
 
PINE: Sure. If you like the cover art, please let the illustrator know. Her website is www.eimisstudio.com. She is also on Twitter @eimi_art. And I have a few blogs that readers might be interested in: dracawards.blogspot.com and www.bpinestories.com.