7 Deadly Questions with author Julia Madeleine

1. Your new thriller No One to Hear Your Scream drops in June and appears to be a perfect summer read – full of thrills, chills, and plenty of mayhem.  What was the inspiration for this story?

The story evolved from an experience my family and I had when we bought a country house in foreclosure in 2008. One morning, shortly after we moved in, we discovered a window in my husband's car smashed in. Being that we were on a 30 acre wooded property out in the middle of nowhere, we knew it couldn't be some random vandalism act. Then, when we came home to discover a window on our garage door completely smashed in and what appeared to be a break in, we called the police. When the cop showed up at our door, the first thing he asked us was, "Have you had any problems with the former owner?"

Apparently, he was known to the police and was quite upset about losing his property. That same night my husband was leaving for Quebec. He had a gig with his band and would be gone for the weekend. My daughter was already spending the night at a friend's house. So I was going to be alone in the house. I slept that night with the phone beside my head, and a knife under my pillow. We had two large dogs that were reassuring but still, I was terrified. I guess it was because I didn't know who this person was and if he was dangerous or crazy or what. During the little sleep I did manage to get, I had a dream of a man standing at the end of our driveway wearing a long black leather coat, smoking a thin cigar, holding a shotgun. From there my character, Rory Madden, was born. I sat down at my computer that morning and banged out the outline for my novel and wrote several chapters over that weekend. Interestingly, I was no longer scared. I even put up a big threatening sign in magic marker over the broken garage window, with the guy's name on it, telling him to stay the f**k off my property or I would kick his lousy ass.

The title for the book came to me right away. Being a city girl living out in the middle of nowhere in the woods with no neighbours within view, I used to say to my husband, "There's no one to hear you scream out here". A year later we sold the property and moved back to the city. While I loved aspects of country life I can honestly say I feel safer here having neighours within ear shot.

 

2. I am blown away by the cover for No One to Hear You Scream. The grittiness and terror of the imagery jumps off the page. Talk to me about how you arrived at that artwork?

The original cover concept was much more subdued with a half face of a woman with her eyes downcast. But I think it wasn't compelling enough. The new cover art is definitely more intense. Sometimes I wonder if it's too intense and I've asked my husband more than once if he thinks my novel warrants that cover. He assures me that it does. I still wonder sometimes but I suppose that's just my writer's insecurities that are always creeping up on me.

 

3.  This is your second novel. What changed in your approach to writing from Scarlet Rose to No One to Hear You Scream?

I think my writing has evolved since I wrote my first novel. I don't know if my approach to writing has changed much during the time I penned these two books. Normally I start with a character and let the story unfold with only the most vague of ideas as to where it's going. But I did try something new with writing my next novel and that is doing an entire outline first, really trying to lay out every chapter with an idea of what will happen. But I still think I prefer letting my character dictate the direction of things. I like being surprised by the outcome.

 

4. I see from your bio that you are also a tattoo artist. If you could have the title of one book tattooed on your skin for all eternity – which book would you choose and why?

That's an interesting question. I have to chuckle at that. Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe has always been one of my favourites. I remember reading it in bed one night when I was a girl and having the sensation of Poe's hand thrusting out from between the pages and latching onto my throat. He's the only author who's given me that kind of chill. I'm not big on "script" or "lettering" for tattoos. I'd be more inclined to have the artwork tattooed. One of Poe's famous head shots done as a portrait perhaps, with a really cool life size, realistic crow done in grayscale. An inkwell spilling blood and a quill. On my thigh perhaps. Sounds like a good idea actually. I could get carried away with that.

 

5. You also have quite a list of short stories under your belt. When you get an idea for a story how do you decide whether its a short or a novel?

I did start one short story last year with the intent of making it a short piece but it's since evolved into my next manuscript. The characters have taken over and are demanding their own novel. I love it when this happens. When a character becomes so real that they start directing the show.

A lot of my short stories come from a folder I keep on my desk top called "deleted scenes". This is where I put all the stuff I've written, pages and pages, that I've cut from various manuscripts I've been working on over the years or stories I've started and never finished. In Scarlet Rose, I cut an entire character out because he wasn't really furthering the story at all. I spent hours writing him. So rather than disposing of all that great stuff in the trash, I simply drop it into my deleted scenes folder and from time to time I look through it and pull out a short story. It's kind of like left over fabric from a dress you've been sewing that's too good to throw away so you make a bikini. My mother did the same things with left over pie dough; she made tarts.

 

6. When did you know you wanted to be a writer?

When I was a kid in school, the only subjects I liked were Art and English. Everything else sucked. The best times in school was in English class when we got to write short stories because to me that wasn't work, it was just fun, like art. I think that's when I must have been bitten by the writing bug.

The day I finally decided I wanted to write fiction seriously was when I was eighteen and I read a thriller that was so badly written it made me angry and I couldn't believe it had been published. I remember thinking that I could write better than this crap. Way back then my writing was pretty cheesy stuff, so it was really my grand illusions about myself that fuelled my writing addiction. And over the years with the help of many wonderful teachers, I like to think that I've improved some.

 

7. Where can people go to learn more about you and your work?

My website www.juliamadeleine.com and for tattoos www.malefictattoos.com

 

About Julia

Julia Madeleine is the youngest daughter of Irish immigrant parents from Belfast, Northern Ireland. Born in Canada and raised in a small town in southern-western Ontario on the shores of Lake Huron, Julia honed her duel passions for art and fiction writng from the time she was old enough to hold a crayon. As a teenager she moved to Toronto and graduated in Media Writing from Sheridan College. She wrote for a number of entertainment magazines, while spending all her free time writing fiction, and then in 2000, her passion for art led her, quite by accident, into a career in the tattoo industry.

"I wasn't looking to become a tattoo artist, it actually found me. Since I was a teenager my focus has been on writing fiction, art was something that always came naturally to me, I never had to work for it. And it never occred to me that I could make a career out of it until one day I found myself without a job and the opportunity to learn to tattoo came to me via my husband, a professional tattooist."

Home for Julia is Mississauga, where she lives with her husband and teenaged (future tattoo artist) daughter. For a year she lived in the country on a 30-acre property in the middle of nowhere, which became the inspiration for her latest novel, No One To Hear You Scream. When not writing or sticking needles into people, Julia enjoys cooking, sewing, yoga, meditation, health and fitness, gardening, and anything that doesn't involve snow or sports or rollercoasters. Julia loves shoes and harbours a secret fantasy-career as a shoe designer. She's also obsessed with true crime shows and researching ways to kill people which makes her husband nervous.