QUESTION 1: Cassie’s world is so intricate and detailed. How do you keep it all organized in your head? Do you need a visual, or some kind of cheat sheet? I imagine one of those boards you see on TV sometime, with pictures and post-its and strings connecting them.
Lol, no. I’m a Gemini. We’re not that organized! And, actually, it really is mostly in my head. I have a few notes for the overall storyline (the one encompassing all the books) but they’re brief. So sometimes, I have to go look something up (usually height or eye color, that sort of thing). But mostly I just remember.
If it seems intricate to you, it’s probably because you pick up a book whenever one comes out, read it, and then that’s all until the next one. I live with this stuff every day, so it’s easier for me. It’s sort of analogous to you trying to explain to me how your job works. I’d probably find a lot of that to be complex, too, because I don’t do it all the time. Or because it has to do with math. I don’t math.
QUESTION 2: How did you get the inspiration for this story, and how did you start to write it? Did you have a basic outline of where you wanted it to end up? I’m not looking for spoilers, I’m just curious as to how much of was already in your head when you started, and how much of it has yet to be filled in.
I know the overall story arc. I have to, or I couldn’t steer the series where it needs to go. Sometimes I wish I didn’t, because I often want to hurry up and get to a certain thing sooner than the story progression allows. But them’s the breaks.
But no, I don’t know every single thing that happens in every book ahead of time. I go into each new project with a few key points that I know I need to hit for the story to come together. But otherwise, I just have fun!
QUESTION 3: I believe it’s in the third book, when Mircea goes off to visit Radu. Is that when he has his duel with Vlad? I read the Dory books first, so my timeline in regards to Cassieverse is off.
It’s actually in the fourth book, Curse the Dawn. There’s a timeline on my web page that may help with this sort of thing, at least a little.
QUESTION 4: How does Pritkin’s blood smell to a vampire? Is it any different because of his mixed heritage? Because Pritkin sure ends up injured and bleeding plenty of times in a vampire’s presence but no one notices anything unusual about him?
They don’t notice anything unusual about Dory, either. A vampire can tell a lot from feeding off a person, but even then, there are limits. They don’t come with a built-in mental rolodex of every possible type of creature and how they taste. Much less how they smell.
And remember, Pritkin is half human, too. And he veers more toward his human heritage than his demon side. Plus, the demon traits he does have are those of the incubi, whom the vamps could have no experience with in physical form since there aren’t any other incubi in physical form. Unless you count Rosier. And if anyone ever tried to feed off him, they didn’t live to tell about it.
QUESTION 5: Why would it be inadvisable to disturb a demon when it’s feeding? If demons have to drop their personal shields to feed, wouldn’t that make them more vulnerable and easier to take down instead?
First, it would seriously piss them off. Ever interrupt a feeding wolf? Not a great idea. Their instincts take over during feeding, and their instincts are…possessive.
Second, if you know you’re vulnerable in a given situation, wouldn’t you be a little paranoid? And wouldn’t you provide other means to protect yourself? If you want to attack someone and succeed, you do it when they aren’t expecting it, not when they are. So people in the know about demons most definitely do not approach when said demon is feeding. Those who do…well, they’re called lunch.
QUESTION 6: What happened to Tremaine after he reported to Marsden about Saunders shady doings? Why doesn’t Marsden have Tremaine working with Cassie? He’s loyal to Marsden and, unlike a lot of the mages Cassie dealt with, he also treated Cassie respectfully once he realized she was Pythia in Curse the Dawn.
He had just gotten out of a lengthy incarceration and the procedure the Circle uses takes a lot out of a person. It’s reasonable to assume that he’d need a little time to recuperate. But even if he didn’t, what would he be doing with Cassie? He couldn’t train her any better than Pritkin, and the vamps are touchy enough just having him around. Why make things difficult by introducing more people when they can’t do anything better than the one you already have in place?
QUESTION 7: What kind of work, if any, does Caleb specialize in for the Corps? And how does he luck out as being one of the war mages who regularly showed up when trying to apprehend Cassie as a false Pythia or cleaning up the messes Cassie’s adventures leave behind?
Caleb helps to coordinate policy in his area of specialty (the Black Circle) and to lead raids against it when there’s activity in his sector. In a smaller or less busy office, he might well be in charge (his rank is commander, which is fairly high). But the Corps’ Vegas branch is its largest in North America, so he’s just a senior member.
As for your other question, it’s not a matter of luck. It’s one of two things depending on whether you want a book-centered answer or an author-centered one. The book-centered answer is that Caleb is trying to help his crazy buddy Pritkin, and so pays attention when calls come in related to him. And pretty much everyone was on hand in the battle for Dante’s in CTD, so his being there wasn’t too surprising.
The author-centered answer is a matter of me being realistic. I already have people who complain that there are too many characters for them to keep up with. I don’t happen to agree, and think that the characters that are in a given book are easily distinguished from one another and all have reasons for being there. But then I would, wouldn’t I? But anyway, introducing more new characters when there’s already one in place who can suffice for a particular scene doesn’t make sense and it pisses people off. I manage to do that by accident enough as it is (it’s a gift), so I try to avoid obvious pitfalls.:-)