The Sunday Salon: Guest Post by Dusty Crabtree

Happy Sunday, everyone! I'm so excited to bring this guest post to you today. It has been quite awhile since I've had one on my blog and I'm hoping to be able to share them with you more regularly. Today, I'd like to welcome Dusty Crabtree, author of Shadow Eyes, which was released earlier this year in February. She will be sharing the inspiration behind her book, and it's not what you might think! Check out that beautiful, spooky cover! But enough from me...

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Christian Horror Movie?
Inspiration Behind Shadow Eyes by Dusty Crabtree

Where did you come up with the idea?  What was your inspiration for the story?  Aren’t those the most commonly asked questions for writers?  Especially fantasy writers, since our plots are often so unique?  I guess it’s hard for most to believe that such creative and crazy ideas can just spring up out of nowhere inside our heads and that our muses can’t magically make the storyline unfold before our very eyes.

In truth, it doesn’t just come out of nowhere.  Even if there wasn’t some major thing that helped us come up with the full idea, there was a slow process, a series of ideas, that evolved over time, morphing and changing until they became the plot that makes up the novel.

For my young adult urban fantasy Shadow Eyes, the idea actually first came to me as a screenplay for a Christian horror movie, if there ever was such a genre.  The movie would have been about a cast of intertwined characters going about their lives and making mistakes with dark, creepy shadows (demons) hovering around them, whispering to them, and influencing them to do evil things. Only the audience would see the shadows.  The characters would be completely oblivious.  I could see it all in my head, and it was awesome!  But I had no idea how to write a screenplay.

A few years after I’d had that idea, my friend suggested I should write a novel like the paranormal angel books we’d been reading and loving.  I’d always loved the concept of angels and demons in stories and immediately thought back to that screenplay idea.  After realizing 3rd person omniscient was not a great narrator choice for a novel, I decided on a 1st person narrator, Iris, who had a special ability to see the shadows, as well as light figures (angels), but nobody else could.

As far as the rest of the plot - all the mysterious characters, the big mystery about what happened to Iris when she was 14 that first gave her the ability, and the details of her making mistakes and discovering who these characters were and, more importantly, who she was – it all just fell into place on an outline out my crazy, overly-creative, overly-stimulated mind.  Shadow Eyes, my pride and joy, my baby, is the result.

Shadow Eyes Synopsis:

Iris thought she could ignore the shadows...until they went after everyone she loved.

Iris Kohl lives in a world populated by murky shadows that surround, harass, and entice unsuspecting individuals toward evil.  But she is the only one who can see them.  She’s had this ability to see the shadows, as well as brilliantly glowing light figures, ever since an obscure, tragic incident on her fourteenth birthday three years earlier. 

Although she’s learned to cope, the view of her world begins to shift upon the arrival of three mysterious characters.  First, a handsome new teacher whose presence scares away shadows; second, a new friend with an awe-inspiring aura; and third, a mysterious and alluring new student whom Iris has a hard time resisting despite already having a boyfriend.

As the shadows invade and terrorize her own life and family, she must ultimately revisit the most horrific event of her life in order to learn her true identity and become the hero she was meant to be.

Dusty's Bio:

Dusty Crabtree has been a high school English teacher at Yukon High School in Oklahoma since 2006, a challenge she thoroughly enjoys. She is also a youth sponsor at Cherokee Hills Christian Church in Oklahoma City and feels very blessed with the amazing opportunities she has to develop meaningful relationships with teens on a daily basis.  Her passion for teens has poured into her writing as well.  She is the author of the young adult urban fantasy, Shadow Eyes, through Musa Publishing, which she wrote in order to give teens an intriguing and provocative book series that promotes moral messages.  She lives with her husband, Clayton, in Yukon, Oklahoma, where they often serve their community as foster parents.

More Goodies:

Check out Dusty’s blog at http://dustycrabtree.wordpress.com/
Find her on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/dusty.crabtree.1
Follow her on twitter at https://twitter.com/dustycrabtree
Buy Shadow Eyes at http://musapublishing.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=176
(also available at all major online bookstores)
View the book trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7UP9A0Fm78

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Many thanks to Dusty for stopping by the blog to share the inspiration behind Shadow Eyes. I can't wait to share my review with all of you in the next day or two -- I'm right in the middle reading the book as you read this! EDIT: I stayed up until 2:00am last night (well, this morning, technically) to finish Shadow Eyes, so that should tell you something!