Guest Author: Jill Myles

Jill Myles, author of Gentlemen Prefer Succubi, has been kind enough to stop by Reading with Tequila to answer some questions.

Where to start when writing a creature (succubi) that hasn't been done much before.

Wherever you want to! I was actually a little concerned when I first started writing about succubi, because they hadn’t been done too much before. Was I picking something that nobody knew about? Was this going to be a mistake? Succubi have an unpleasant history in lore, so I felt like if I strayed away from the ‘reality’ of the tales and built my own mythology, nobody would care much. I had carte blanche! After all, succubi hadn’t been done before, right?

And then Richelle Mead sold her books about succubi.
And Jackie Kessler sold her books about succubi.
And Nina Harper sold her books about (you guessed it) succubi.

Back in the day, this upset me a lot, because shoot! Instead of being original, I was just the latest in a long line of authors. At least, that’s how I felt for a while. Now, I’m really thankful that those books came out before mine. I feel that they helped mainstream succubi a little more and made them easier for the average reader to recognize. And my books are different enough from those other series to not seem like the same old stuff, so I’m really happy. Plus, they were great books so I enjoyed reading them!

Biggest influences and/or idols when it comes to writing

The entire list probably changes on a day to day basis, but I’ve always been a huge fan of Anne McCaffrey. She was the first science fiction author that I’d ever read, and her stories opened up entire new worlds for me. I loved that each of her stories had a romantic theme to it, and that there was nothing off limits. She wrote a ton of different worlds, too – in addition to the Dragonriders of Pern, she wrote about Space Pirates, Brain and Brawn partnerships, psychic families, unicorn girls, living planets, stranded on planets, dinosaur planets… you name it, she wrote it.

I’m currently a slobbering fangirl of Kresley Cole. She takes mythology and weaves it into her setting in an effortless way. Her world is eclectic and fresh and I never know what is coming next. She manages to take some amazingly wild storylines and mix them with hot, sexy couples and funny scenarios. I cannot get enough of her books.

If I had to choose who I’d love to write like, I’d probably want to be like some Frankenstein mash-up of Ilona Andrews and Meljean Brook. Those two are a couple of my favorite authors (and good friends to boot!) and I just love the way both of them write. Ilona Andrews has the most complex, intricate, and amazing world-building and plotting. Meljean Brook has incredibly emotional, intense stories with some of the flat-out best characters I’ve ever read about. My stuff is nothing like theirs, of course! But I’d be thrilled if it was.

If Jill and Jackie would get along and what would they do if they were hanging out together?

I don’t know if we’d get along too much – Jackie is a stick-in-the-mud sometimes! But I think we could manage to not kill each other for a day.

As for hanging out…oh man! We’d probably nerd out and go hang out at a museum somewhere. I’m a sucker (just like Jackie!) for history in all forms, so my ideal vacation involves words like “Smithsonian” and “Louvre”. Maybe we’d field-trip it out to an archaeological site and spend the day taking pictures of us in ugly-sun hats, standing in front of 2000 year old fire-pits. Sounds pretty awesome to me!

About the Author

Jill Myles has been an incurable romantic since childhood. She reads all the 'naughty parts' of books first, looks for a dirty joke in everything, and thinks to this day that the "Little House on the Prairie" books should have been steamier. After devouring hundreds of paperback romances, mythology books, and archaeological tomes, she decided to write books of her own - stories with a wild adventure, sharp banter, and lots of super-sexy situations. She prefers her heroes alpha and half-dressed, her heroines witty and strong, and she loves nothing more than watching them overcome adversity to fall into bed together.

About the Book

Jackie Brighton woke up in a Dumpster this morning, and her day has only gotten weirder. Her familiar B-cups have somehow become double Ds, her sex drive is insatiable, and apparently she had her first one-night stand ever...with a fallen angel. All she remembers is gorgeous Noah's oddly hypnotic blue eyes...and then a dark stranger whose bite transformed her into an immortal siren with a sexy Itch. With help from Noah, Jackie begins to adapt to her new lifestyle -- until she accidentally sends Noah into the deadly clutches of the vampire queen and lands herself in a fierce battle for an ancient halo with the queen's wickedly hot right hand man. Who just happens to be the vampire who originally bit her. How's a girl supposed to save the world when the enemy's so hard to resist?

Gentlemen Prefer Succubi on Amazon
 Jill Myles' Blog
 Reading with Tequila's Review of Gentlemen Prefer Succubi