Thriller And Dark Fantasy Author J.F.Penn

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Writing Religion, Scene Setting In Amazing Locations And More

February 3, 2012 By J.F. Penn

For the launch of Prophecy, I did an interview on GhostWriterDad, a great blog for writers. Here are 2 of the 8 questions. Click here to read the full interview.

Writing Religion, Scene Setting

1. Your books use aspects of religion as the basis for their stories. How have readers reacted to that?

I am personally fascinated by religion and actually have a Masters degree in Theology so I have studied in depth. It’s been a continued interest of mine and I’ve read and travelled widely to learn more. I find that religious story and myth are already deeply rooted in our society and that resonates with people even if they don’t believe in a specific faith.

From a commercial perspective I think Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code was so popular because it connected with something people already knew about. So I wanted to tap a similar theme, taking religious ideas and using them as the basis for action-adventure thrillers.

This is the Empire of the Dead. Paris Catacombs
Generally, people have taken the religious aspects as entertainment and also some education as I try to use real places and existing objects. Prophecy features the Devil’s Bible which is actually a real medieval book, and Pentecost involves a search for the bones of the Apostles, again based on truth.

I have the greatest respect for believers but at heart, I am writing fiction. Some people think the books aren’t Christian enough but I want to entertain and make you think. No preaching, more action!

3. Your books race through amazing global locations including famous churches and creepy ossuaries. Have you been to all these places and what’s your obsession with scene setting?

Travel is one of my obsessions and I have been to a lot of the places I write about over the last 20 years. Jerusalem in particular is a muse for me and I’ve been there 11 times. It’s woven into both thrillers and will return again. Certainly I’ll be needing another research trip there soon!

In writing my books, I actually start with the idea and then look at places that resonate with the theme. When I was gathering ideas for Prophecy, I went to the Paris catacombs and I knew that bones and ossuaries would be a great atmospheric thread. It turned out that the Devil’s Bible had been kept at the bone church of Sedlec in the middle ages and then I found the mummy crypt of Palermo in Sicily, both awesome locations.

As a reader, I love to learn about new places and descriptions of setting make a difference to the atmosphere of the book. In the writing process, I often plot the book by location rather than by plot on the first pass. One of the important elements for action-adventure is the movement and pacing so fantastic scene locations are critical, and amazingly fun to write!

Filed Under: Book Research, Interviews with Thriller Authors Tagged With: interview, prophecy, religion, settings, travel

Thriller Novel Prophecy: Author Joanna Penn Interviewed

February 1, 2012 By J.F. Penn

Thriller Novel Author Joanna Penn InterviewedIn this short interview, I talk to Trevor Lund from RevTrev.com about my ideas for Prophecy [Ed. note: this book is now called Crypt of Bone], how some of the scenes came about as well as my own writing process as a plotter.

Plus, some hints about the 3rd in the series, Exodus.

You can also get the audio here => ProphecyInterview.mp3

Filed Under: Interviews with Thriller Authors Tagged With: arkane, interview, prophecy

Psychology Of Religion: The God Helmet

January 26, 2012 By J.F. Penn

Psychology Of Religion- The God HelmetReligious belief and experience fascinate me. Much of how we experience God is based on where we live and how we are brought up, but there are many common threads across the world of spirituality. I am also deeply interested in psychology and neuroscience, and in particular, the intersection in the new field of neuro-theology.

We know so little about the brain and consciousness, let alone what exists beyond the physical. All of this leads to my interest in the God Helmet, whose technology I modified to become the headsets in Prophecy. The crude device from Persinger's experiment is shown right but nevertheless, stimulation of the temporal lobe using a low magnetic field has resulted in some people experiencing religious visions.

As  the character of Dr Maria Van Garre explains in my novel Prophecy, both sides of the religious debate claim a victory from the results. Atheists claim God is just a neuro-chemical response, and believers claim God put that area of the brain there so we can experience Him. I leave your own interpretation up to you.

You can read an article on Wired: This is your brain on God

This slightly sensational video [6:58 mins] is quite crude but you can get the basic sense of the experiment. I used some of the experiences in Prophecy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y02UlkYjSi0

If you want to explore this further, you might like these books (affiliate links to Amazon):

Fingerprints of God: What science is learning about the brain and spiritual experience – Barbara Hegarty (2009)

The God Gene: How faith is hardwired into our genes – Dean Hamer (2005)

Filed Under: Book Research Tagged With: god helmet, neuroscience, prophecy, psychology of religion

Ancient Cities, Sacred Sites: Ossuaries And Catacombs

December 31, 2011 By J.F. Penn

Setting is incredibly important in my writing.

Ancient Cities, Sacred SitesI often start with setting and then write a scene to fit the place, rather than the other way around. I'm primarily a visual person and the aspects of place in terms of resonance and spirituality are also important.

For Crypt of Bonemy novel, Crypt of Bone, I wanted to have the theme of bones throughout the book so these places were great inspiration. For a villain who wants to kill a quarter of the world, the dead are important witnesses.

Paris Catacombs

J.F.Penn in the Paris catacombs
In June 2011, my husband and I took a trip to Paris and visited the Catacombs which contain the remains of around 6 million people. By the 17th century, graveyards throughout Paris had become full up and the dead were poking from the ground. Decomposing remains were causing sanitary issues in the city at multiple locations. So it was decided to move all the bones to one location. After years of horse-drawn carriages moving the dead at night, the catacombs were full of bones. In 1810, it was decided to make the site more of a mausoleum and the bones were arranged into the designs that can be seen today.

You can see my photos of the catacombs on Flickr here and you can watch the catacombs in more detail in the video below:

Sedlec Ossuary, Kutna Hora, Czech Republic

I just had to use Sedlec as a key setting for my bad guy and his evil deeds. It's a church but such a macabre place. I haven't been in person but the images available are fuel for the imagination.

This video includes some great images including the chandelier that features in the climax of the book.

Capuchin Crypt of Palermo, Sicily

As I investigated the ossuaries of the world, I found Palermo. Again, I haven't been there myself but the amazing pictures and video online made it easy to write about. It's definitely on my list to visit! You will see how I have used many of the images in this video in my chapter set in the crypt. Rosalia Lombardo is the little girl with the ribbon – yes, she is real. I personally found the more fleshy bodies of the mummies far more disturbing than the bones at Sedlec which I have reflected in the way Morgan feels when she is down there looking for the Devil's Bible.

Crypt of Bone is available here in ebook, print and audiobook formats.

 

Sharing image photo courtesy Wikipedia Creative Commons

Filed Under: Book Research Tagged With: catacombs, ossuaries, paris, prophecy, travel

Prophecy Cover And Back Blurb And Giveaway

December 5, 2011 By J.F. Penn

Exciting times! My next novel, Prophecy, will be coming out at the end of December (final edits still to come!) and I wanted to share the cover design and also the back blurb for the novel. I'd love to know what you think! It's the next in the ARKANE series, kind of Dan Brown meets Lara Croft in a kick-ass thriller! Below I also share a giveaway for print copies of Pentecost which I am soon to ‘un-publish' in the current print form. See below for all the details.

Prophecy, an ARKANE thriller by Joanna Penn

“I looked, and there before me was a pale horse. Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.” Revelation 6:8

The prophecy in Revelation declares that a quarter of the world must die and now a shadowy organization has the ability to fulfill these words. Can one woman stop the abomination before it’s too late?

When the medieval Devil's Bible is rediscovered, the malevolent Thanatos organization finally holds the power to fulfill the prophecy through demonic curses that lie within. All they need is the vehicle to take the curse to the masses and the pale horse of the apocalypse will ride forth.

When mysterious suicides in Israel draw Oxford University psychologist Morgan Sierra into the fray, she joins ARKANE, a secret British agency investigating paranormal and religious experience, for their investigation. Partnered with Jake Timber, the two must stop the Devil's Bible from reaching Thanatos before destruction is unleashed.

From the catacombs of Paris to the ossuaries of Sicily and the Czech Republic, Morgan and Jake must find the Devil's Bible and stop the curse being released into the world before one in four are destroyed in the coming holocaust. Because in just seven days, the final curse will be spoken and the prophecy will be fulfilled.

What do you think?

I'd love to know what you think. Does this sound like your type of book? Please do leave a comment below.

Giveaway of print copies of the first novel, Pentecost

Pentecost sales are almost at 16,000 copies now and unsurprisingly, 98% of those have been ebook sales. It's still ranking in the Bestseller lists for Religious Fiction in the US & UK and sporadically ranks for Action-Adventure. It currently has 57 reviews averaging 4 star in the US Amazon store & 16 reviews averaging 4 star in the UK Amazon store.

This means that a print book is basically a vanity project for me so I have something to give to my Mum & Dad 🙂 I still want to do print books but because of the extra design & pro-typesetting I want to use, it takes more money than ebooks. I am also un-publishing the current print version of Pentecost soon in order to republish at a smaller size, 5×8 instead of 6×9 as for my shorter books, this just looks like “more value” to the customer. Weird, yes, but true! I also want to correct a few mistakes and also add a chapter of Prophecy at the end. So the current print version of Pentecost will soon disappear and I'm giving away 2 copies on Goodreads – click here for the giveaway (currently pending approval by Goodreads by shouldn't be long!). Check out the video below as I talk about the reasons why I am un-publishing this version and come join the giveaway!

Please leave your comments and valuable feedback below!

Filed Under: News and Press Releases Tagged With: arkane, prophecy

5 Reasons Writers Love The London Library

November 1, 2011 By J.F. Penn

london libraryIn the last month I have been working at the London Library a couple of days a week and it has made all the difference to my new life as an author-entrepreneur. Founded in 1841, it has been the writing home of many great English creatives. Here's why I love writing there these days.

(1) Books, research and serendipity in the stacks

I read 99% ebooks these days. I am a Kindle addict although I often buy the ebook after seeing it in print in a physical bookstore. Being in a print library has meant I am rediscovering the joys of book browsing and the labyrinthine stacks of the London Library are quite the adventure. I had a lovely moment of serendipity the other day when researching apocalyptic art for my next novel Prophecy and came across the book from an exhibition of the apocalypse I had attended in the year 2000 at the British Library. The images of that event have remained with me over the years and in finding the book, I was able to renew my knowledge and weave stories out of the result. I do actually have the book myself but it's in storage in Brisbane, Australia so marvelous to find it here! Research is one of the joys of writing a book and the London Library is a rich resource for it.

(2) Location, St James' Square

I exit the Tube at Green Park and walk through some of the most expensive real estate in London. It's populated by royalty, the Ritz, art dealers and auctioneers like Sothebys, expensive boutique shops with armed guards, hidden member's clubs and embassies. The library sits in one corner of the elegant St James' Square which boasts a beautiful park to sit for coffee and lunch in the sun. It isn't far from Bond Street, Regent Street and some lovely (window) shopping and my treat is to go to Waterstones bookshop for more browsing before I head home. The Library itself may look small but it's a tardis inside, stretching across multiple buildings behind the slim facade.

(3) History and inspirational writers

London is steeped in tradition and history. You trip over famous (often dead) people everywhere you go. But it is still incredibly inspirational to think I am writing in a place where Agatha Christie was a member, where Virginia Woolf and EM Forster wrote, where Darwin and Dickens scribbled and where Tom Stoppard is currently president. This is a literary legacy of greatness. Is it too much to think that the walls have absorbed some of this creative spirit over the years and by being there, I too can imbibe?

(4) Positive atmosphere and peer pressure to write

iPad with keyboard and stand. My writing setup at the London Library

At my home office I have many distractions, blogging and twitter being two major ones. Yes, the London Library does have internet but I go there to write. I settle in and prepare myself for a day's work. Soon I am surrounded by other industrious writers, on laptops, iPads or taking notes from books. There is a general atmosphere of hard creative work. Sometimes a member will nod off in one of the comfy reading chairs, a deserved break from the labour of intense study. This is how I worked at University when I spent my days in the Radcliffe Camera in Oxford. It feels like a correct place of work for a writer. There is a room where laptops are forbidden so not even the tapping of keys distracts you, just the rustle of pages and the innumerably interesting journals on arcane topics that draw the eye.

(5) The normality of a writer's life

I have spent the last 13 years as an international business consultant with all the routine of an office worker. These daily rituals have become ingrained into me, the daily commute, coffee before starting, meeting for lunch in between spurts of intense working, perhaps a drink later in the day before coming home. Going from that life to working entirely from home as an author-entrepreneur hasn't been easy but going into a place of work like the London Library makes the writing life a more normal one and gives me a semblance of routine to base my creative life around. Getting out of the house and into a different space is critical for the solo-entrepreneur. Being in central London also gives me the benefits of being able to network at break-times and after the Library closes.

I have only been a member for a few weeks and already the benefits of the London Library are immeasurable for me. I'm sure other advantages will be realized over time and I hope that I will also be able to give back.

The London Library is a private, paid membership library. If you are interested in joining, all the details are here.

 

Top image: Flickr Creative Commons Gruenemann, Other images my own (also on Flickr CC)
Sharing image bookplate photo: Wikipedia Creative Commons

The London Library from Jeremy Riggall on Vimeo.

 

Filed Under: Book Research Tagged With: library

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