Welcome to Deidre Knight's guest blog

I’m so delighted to be guest blogging here at Love Romances and More. Thanks to Danny for the wonderful invitation. As a good southern woman (sweet tea anyone?) I must politely introduce myself. I’m Deidre Knight, and for those of you who don’t know me, I’m the author of the Midnight Warriors series (Signet/NAL), which began with PARALLEL ATTRACTION. More recently, the second installment in my immortal Spartan series, Gods of Midnight, published with RED KISS (Signet/NAL).

Oh, I love me some warriors (of any kind), but give me immortal ones—history’s greatest military men—and I’m so there. Even if I did dream up the series myself. For those of you who write, you know exactly what I mean: it’s as if the stories we come up with have a life all their own. And for the readers and fans out there, you’ve probably visited enough author blogs by now to realize that those of us who write the darn books really do find ourselves a bit at the mercy of the characters.
That’s exactly how it was for me with this series: it literally sprang to life when I was minding my own business. Climbing out of a taxi at the Denver airport, to be exact! I was exhausted, and quite frankly I used that self-pity moment for inspiration. I imagined a heroine who was an assassin, instantly heard her name (by then I was moving into the airport, not exiting the taxi). But my mental slideshow rushed right past Shay Angel and provided the perfect military partnership for this human: Spartans. Hoo-wa! Or is that more the Marine cry of “Hoorah?”

I was deep into writing about aliens at the time—and the movie 300 hadn’t even been announced. So I knew that, despite admiring this band of mighty warriors, I had research to do. Not only that, when I chose Savannah as a setting, I wanted to get to know the city that was only about three hours away—yet was truly a blank canvas to me.

So how did I dig in and begin my research? And more importantly, why was that so important to my process? Well, I’ll answer the latter question first: because my very best inspiration always seems to come from the little things I learn along the way.

It’s also crazy (but totally true) that stories assume a kind of supernatural authenticity sometimes. A true life of their own. For instance, I chose Savannah as the setting for the Gods of Midnight before realizing that there’s a huge Greek American population there! I mean, Shay Angel and her brothers, Mason and Jamie? They are Greek American. When I came up with their characters, I imagined them as a southern anomaly, a blip in a world of Irish/German/Cherokee/English/Scottish mixed heritage, much like most everyone I know here in Georgia. Not so. They fit right into the real, authentic world of Savannah, GA!

As you can tell, I was learning about my own home state of Georgia, so how much more did I have to find out about a unique breed of stern, battle-hardened warriors who lived some twenty-five hundred years ago. Therefore, I did everything I could to immerse myself in their world, from reading amazing novels like Steven Pressfield’s Gates of Fire (highly, highly, highly recommended. Need I say more?) to watching endless documentaries about modern day Marines. Any medium, any era—if the information helped me saturate myself with the mentality of my Spartans, I drank it in.

I hope you’ll get to know these brave ones, “my” seven Spartans: Ajax, River, Aristos, Kalias, Straton, Leonidas, Nikos. If you’re familiar with the series, you probably feel you know these guys already. If not, consider this your invitation to find out what makes these rough-hewn men tick…what dreams still haunt and drive them, despite living eternally.

RED KISS is especially near to my heart because it’s River Kassandro’s story. Of all the seven, River is the only servant; the other six are full Spartans. The only thing this loyal, gorgeous fighter has ever wanted is freedom. That, and to be fully Spartan. Will he gain these only two wishes of his heart? Of course, it wouldn’t be romance if he didn’t harbor a third long-yearned for desire: the love of a soul mate.

What do you think? Will he find these three things in RED KISS? I invite you to find out!

Contest: Deidre will give away a signed copy of RED FIRE to one lucky blogger. So stop by and say hello. Please check back here tomorrow to see who the lucky winner is. You have 7 days to contact me.