Jess Granger, Interview by Michelle M. Pillow (Originally published in Paranormal Underground Magazine)

Jess Granger, Interview
By Michelle M. Pillow, www.michellepillow.com

An adventurer at heart, Jess Granger has done everything from working as a balloon artist, brewing her own beer, traveling through Europe, and working to rehabilitate injured birds. When she isn’t writing like a mad fiend, you can find her pondering the complexity of ecosystems while tending her massive butterfly gardens. She’s a national bestselling, science fiction romance author with her series, Realms Beyond. Her latest work, Beyond the Shadows, arrives in bookstores May 4, 2010.

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Q: In your book, both your hero and heroine are aliens. What inspired you to create such characters?

Jess:Part of the fun of Science Fiction, especially on the Space Opera end, is creating new worlds out in the vastness of space with new rules. I love world building from scratch. The universe is endless and full of possibility for wonder, adventure and excitement. In the case of my hero and heroine from Beyond the Shadows, it was fun to portray a matriarchy that isn’t all good, or all bad for that matter. It was also interesting to play with male/female dynamics when both characters come from a completely alien culture that has very different rules from ours. It led to some pretty entertaining fireworks. It was also a challenge to create a world and a culture that developed into a matriarchy through a natural state of cultural evolution dictated by the nature of their planet and the needs of war in an arboreal realm.

Q: Why do you think readers, and society in general, are fascinated by the paranormal?

Jess:I think people are excited by possibility. I think it is fun to ponder what is out there. Who knows what is really out there? It gives us the thrill of fear, but that lingering excitement that what we know as truth may not be truth, and in fact we are small in the face of true wonder.

Q: Do you believe in the supernatural? Or are you a skeptic?

Jess:I like to believe in possibility. When faced with something that might be possible but seems impossible, I err on the side of, well maybe, who knows?

Q: How would you react if you came face to face with an alien?

Jess:I’d freak out. Hands down, I’d freak out. I’m really a skeerdy cat. After the freak out, I’d freak out in a different way. If they didn’t intend us harm, wow, could you even imagine the nature of a feat of exploration like that?

Q: Have you ever been abducted by aliens?

Jess:Um, barring some entertaining shenanigans in college, I’m pretty sure that no, I have not been abducted by aliens. I fell out of my body once and landed on the ceiling while sleeping, and I’ve dated a couple of guys that I believe might have been aliens, but no, in the grand scheme of things, I have not seen any little green men, nor have any tried to kidnap me because Mars needed women. I guess the night is still young.

Thanks for joining us, Jess!

You can learn more about Jess and her books at her website, www.jessgranger.com. Interview by Michelle M. Pillow, www.michellepillow.com