Interview: Ilona Andrews, authors of 'Burn for Me'

HEA is thrilled to share this interview with the best-selling writing duo of Ilona Andrews. We're all anticipating book one of their new Hidden Legacy series, Burn for Me, which arrives Oct. 28.

Q: On your website, you have an official "short bio" and a longer "this is the painful but true story of how we got published" version. Did you ever think that you'd have such a successful writing career, with multiple publishers and hybrid publishing platforms?

Gordon: I wish I could say it's all been part of our fiendish plan but no, neither of us could have foreseen how fortunate we have been. It's often very humbling to see the turn out for a signing or to talk to individual readers about the books and what they've meant to them. Our fans are the best.

Ilona: We periodically stop and remind each other that we are very fortunate. We worked very hard for our success, but hard work alone often isn't enough. We were very lucky that our stories found so many readers.

Q: You've worked your magic on Atlanta. On the Bayous. You're finally ready to set your hometown of Houston "on fire" with an alternative/urban fantasy landscape?

Gordon: Atlanta, like Houston, is sort of the big town in the same state as our hometown. We travel there enough for business to be familiar with it, but unlike Atlanta, we have no particular animosity to Houston and chose only to damage it a bit rather than raze it to the ground. Still, who knows by the third book how much of it will be left standing?

Q: Readers keep calling Burn for Me "the Avon Book" — and it's definitely because of the superhot cover treatment! What did you think when your editor first presented the cover art to you?

Gordon: I think we both really liked it. We looked at it and agreed that it conveyed to the reader that the book was a paranormal romance with a very good-looking couple. I hope that it grabs a potential booklover and makes them want to know more about it.

Q: Tell us about your vision for the Hidden Legacy series.

Gordon: We want each book to stand alone on its own as a mystery while telling an overall story and building up the romance over the course of the three books. We want this series to be fun and funny, while at the same time having a bit more focus on the relationship between the main characters and we would like to turn up the heat.

Q: How will this series differ from other books you've written, and how will the relationship that develops between the two major characters differ from other pairings that you've penned?

Ilona: It's still an "Ilona Andrews" book. We can't really get away from that. But there are some key differences. We are working with a modern world of smart phones, automatic weapons, and magic. We've never done this before. Usually we limit the world in some way: either technology stops working or doesn't work at all. Characters grow from the world, and Nevada Baylor is very much a part of this modern tech-savvy Houston. She thinks on her feet and she tried to evaluate the situation instead of rushing into a fights against overwhelming odds. Like all of heroines, she tries to be a good person and tries to desperately hold on to her moral code even when the grim reality pushes her to compromise. That's why the relationship between her and Connor "Mad" Rogan is so fascinating.

In the novel, Nevada often thinks of Mad Rogan as a dragon. He is a creature of power and he has complete confidence in his abilities and course of action. The only laws he follows are his own. He doesn't care what people think about him and he doesn't care about being a "good" person in someone else's eyes until he meets Nevada. If Rogan is a dragon, Nevada is a paladin. We're just going to wait and see who slays whom first.

Q: You're quite innovative in how you put new stories out. For example, how Clean Sweep went from a free serial on your site to a bestseller. Do you have more flashes of brilliance forthcoming?

Gordon: Hmmm, not that I know of. We got lucky with Clean Sweep. Neither of us was sure it would do anything, but it was fun to write as a pet side project. That we've had even a bit of success with it is surprising and encouraging.

Ilona: When we began posting it, quite a few people e-mailed us and tried to steer us away from it. They brought up good points such as giving away something we could publish wouldn't make us any money and the likelihood of anyone paying for the completed story after it was posted on the site had to be remote. Besides, posting a rough draft of a story chapter by chapter without a plan is simply not a good idea. Everyone can see all of your mistakes and all of the narrative's imperfections. But we did it anyway and, much to everyone's surprise, it was a hit.

Q: Given that you have so many series in process (including Kate Daniels, Innkeeper Chronicles, Hidden Legacy) — what's next for Ilona Andrews?

Gordon: Well, to be honest we really need to sit with our butts in chairs for several hours a day and work on all those things you mentioned. Not a bit of it is going to write itself. If we finish writing stuff that people paid us for, we can think about other stuff.

Ilona: Yes. Contractual obligations. Must write or people might start coming after us with pitchforks and torches. But on a serious note, we are hoping to finish sequel to Clean Sweep sometime this year and continue our work on Kate Daniels and Hidden Legacy.

Q: Do you ever sleep? (Really!)

Gordon: Nope, we're all jacked up on Mountain Dew. :) Seriously, though, we do sleep. We also play computer games. We watch television. Ilona loves The Good Wife, whereas I prefer true crime and forensic shows. We enjoy watching movies at home. For instance we have been watching all the Rocky movies at night with our oldest. She's grown now and we feel that as an adult she needs a good grasp and understanding of cinema's classics. We also really like taking the whole family or going together on a date to the Alamo Drafthouse Movie Theater for dinner and a movie. We're so spoiled now we rarely go anywhere else.

Ilona: It's true. He suffers nobly through Good Wife. I love that show. I can't help it. We try to have some free time every night and we do our best to spend it with each other, our children, and our friends. It may mean we might be late on a book, but we both learned that life is very brief. We want to enjoy it and make some good memories while we can.

Find out more about Ilona Andrews' books at www.ilona-andrews.com.