I just spent the weekend in fantastic, artistic Berlin and while I was there, I met up with bestselling and award-winning author, Rebecca Cantrell.

Rebecca writes the Hannah Vogel mysteries, set in 1930s Berlin, and has recently started The Order of the Sanguines series with uber-thriller-author James Rollins. I loved Blood Gospel, so I was thrilled to talk to Becky about her books.

You can watch the video interview below, or here on YouTube.

In this on-location video in front of the Berliner Dome, we discuss:

• Why Rebecca moved from Hawaii to Berlin, and how the city influences her writing.
• What drew Rebecca to the history of Nazi Germany, and why she uses the perspective of crime reporter Hannah Vogel to explore the issues around the establishment of the regime. How the issue of gay rights in Germany became a focus based on a friendship she had back in the 1980s when she lived in Berlin when the Wall was still up. When Rebecca visited Dachau, she realized that her friend would have ended up in the camps because of his sexuality.
• Rebecca's research process through original printed material and also films made in Berlin in the 1930s. She also managed to get a whole load of 1930s newspapers on eBay.
• On writing Blood Gospel with James Rollins. How they met at a writer's conference years ago and stayed in touch, when the opportunity for the book came up, Rebecca was intrigued by the idea. The premise is that there is a group within the Catholic Church, the strigoi, who live on sanctified wine, when it is turned into blood through transubstantiation. So yes, it's a vampire series, but so much more than that! Here's my 5-star review on Goodreads. The next in the series is Innocent Blood, coming Dec 2013.
• The World Beneath is coming soon, featuring a software millionaire who is stricken by agoraphobia and descends into the tunnels beneath Grand Central Station, NYC to solve crimes without ever going outside. Researching the tunnels was a lot of fun!
• The themes that keep coming up for Rebecca include justice, as well as the stories of non-famous people behind the famous events.
• How Rebecca spends her writing hours. She's a veteran cafe writer. She's currently reading Doctor Sleep by Stephen King at the moment, and also reads a lot of non-fiction historical books for research.

You can find Rebecca at her site RebeccaCantrell.com and on twitter @rebeccacantrell.

Her books are available on Amazon and all online bookstores. If you like some mystery, thriller and a touch of history, you'll love the books!