Interview with Sylvia Day, author of So Close

Today it gives the Indie Crime Scene great pleasure to interview Sylvia Day, whose novel So Close is our featured new release on March 28.

So Close is the first novel in your Blacklist Duology. Billed as a psychosexual thriller, it tells the story of a widower who marries a woman in the image of his late wife. What animates this gothic and haunting novel?

SO CLOSE opens with Kane Black accepting a woman as his late wife, despite her death having occurred several years before. This introduction of a new player within the family dynamic is the catalyst that drives the narrative of the primary characters: Aliyah, Kane’s mother; Amy, Kane’s sister-in-law; and Lily, the woman who may or may not be his wife. As these women pivot around each other, we discover that all of them are harboring dangerous secrets and personal agendas.

Why does the theme of obsession and irrational love fascinate you?

My characters are always fierce, focused, and protective—even in love.

Who is Kane Black, and what can you tell us about his relationship with his late wife, Lily?

Kane married his dream girl, and his life became a nightmare when she died. Lily made Kane want to be the best version of himself, and while he achieved that in honor of her memory, his victories are hollow because his reason for transformation isn’t there to witness it or celebrate with him.

Kane Black brings home the woman, who is the spitting image of Lily, having met her on the streets of Manhattan. How much can you tell us about the mystery woman?

She’s very dangerous.

The dead Lily is not the only woman in Kane’s life. Two other strong femmes fatales haunt him: his mother, Aliyah, and his sister-in-law, Amy. The stage is set for a battle royal between the newcomer, the dominant women, and Kane. What can your fans expect?

My fans can expect the unexpected. Kane isn’t a primary character. The women are great examples of toxic femininity. They’re unreliable narrators. The story isn’t a romance. The book is like a thousand-piece puzzle—I give the readers the clues, but they must piece them together into a coherent picture.

What can you tell us about Kane’s mother, Aliyah, and sister-in-law? Both have their own secrets and interests to protect.

Aliyah and Amy are primary POV characters, like Lily. All three women’s lives haven’t gone in the directions they’d once hoped for, and they haven’t pivoted well into their new circumstances. They’re all strong and wily, and will do anything to achieve their aims.

You are a well-established, best-selling author who has written over twenty award-winning novels. Your work has been translated into forty-one languages, and there are over twenty million copies of your books in print. What will your readers experience on picking up So Close, and what is the meaning of the series title, the Blacklist Duology?

Readers will experience a treacherous family in crisis. I caution readers not to trust any of the characters, but they can trust me to pull it all together in the end. “Blacklist” refers to a number of different elements in the story, which readers will spot as they go, and a duology is one story broken into two parts. So, the second book, TOO FAR, isn’t a sequel; it’s the second half and conclusion.

You served as the 22nd President of Romance Writers of America and presently sit on the Board of Directors of the Authors Guild and the Authors Guild Foundation. How important to you is it to write about strong women characters?

I write strong women because that’s what I know. Every woman in my inner circle is strong, determined, and ambitious, from my mother to my sister to all my closest friends. I instill in my characters traits that I admire because I have to spend a lot of time with them.

So Close is a mystery and a thriller with darkly gothic themes. How far is this a new departure for you?

Mystery and suspense have threaded through several of my works, starting with my first manuscript. SO CLOSE departs from the larger body of my backlist because there’s no primary romance driving the plot. While it has romantic and sexy moments, the story is about the evolution of three women, each recovering from past trauma.

How do you see the Romance genre changing as more genres crossover and new ones appear?

A romance novel covers the evolution of a partnership through communication, transformation, and sacrifice as the primary plot driving the narrative. Further, romantic leads must be heroic. They may not start that way, but through that transformation I mentioned, they become the heroes of their fairytale. The setting, time period, secondary plotlines, etc., are irrelevant to whether a book is a romance. So, I would say the romance genre doesn’t change. However, misunderstanding what a romance novel is has led to some books being mislabeled as a romance by both the author and readers.

So Close will be followed by its sequel, Too Far. What can you tell us about the sequel?

TOO FAR is the second half of the story, so you’ll get the answers to the questions that surfaced in SO CLOSE.

As a prolific author, how do you organise your day? Do you have a routine?

I haven’t been prolific in many years now. Twenty years into my career, I find it takes me longer to tell the stories I’m crafting. I just give each story as much time as it needs and give myself as much time as I need to be a healthy and happy writer. My only routine is avoiding stress, which is anathema to feeling creative.

What writers do you enjoy, and what do you read to relax?

I love Nalini Singh, Patricia Briggs, Linda Howard, Julie Garwood, Shelby Reed, Dean Koontz, Stephen King, and so many more! As a reader, I enjoy commercial fiction of all genres, and I hop around a lot depending on my mood.

What can you tell us about your current works in progress?

I’m not presently working on anything, but I know what I’ll be writing next and expect readers will be happy about the direction.

Amazon

About Sylvia Day:

Sylvia Day is the #1 New York Times, #1 USA Today, and #1 international bestselling author of over twenty award-winning novels, including ten New York Times and thirteen USA Today bestsellers. Her work has been translated into forty-one languages. With over twenty million copies of her books in print, she is a #1 best seller in twenty-nine countries. Day served as the 22nd President of Romance Writers of America and presently serves on the Board of Directors of the Authors Guild and the Authors Guild Foundation.

Her work has been covered in Time, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, People, the Wall Street Journal, Cosmopolitan, the Associated Press, USA Today, and Entertainment Weekly, among others. Her bestselling novel Afterburn / Aftershock was developed into a motion picture by Passionflix and released in November 2017. The documentary following her 2016 world tour, Beyond Words: Sylvia Day, was released in October 2018.

Bestselling titles in Sylvia’s canon include Bared to You, Reflected in You, Entwined with You, Captivated by You, One with You, Wish List, A Touch of Crimson, Eve of Darkness, Seven Years to Sin, and more. The sequel to So Close and the final chapter of the Blacklist Duology will be entitled Too Far.

Connect with Sylvia on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Goodreads, or at www.sylviaday.com