These Vengeful Souls (These Vicious Masks, #3)
by Tarun Shanker & Kelly Zekas
Published by: Swoon Reads
Publication date: February 20th, 2018
Genres: Fantasy, Paranormal,
Young Adult
England, 1883. On the run with the grieving Sebastian Braddock, Evelyn wants two things: to be reunited with her friends, and to get revenge on the evil Captain Goode. Not only has he misused his and Sebastian’s powers to rack up a terrible death toll, but he’s also completely destroyed any hope of Evelyn or her friends regaining the life they once knew.
Evelyn is determined to make Captain Goode pay for what he’s done, but is her revenge worth risking the lives of Sebastian and her friends? Or is it better to flee the city and focus on staying alive? And with the Captain spreading lies about Sebastian in an attempt to flush them out of hiding and turn the populace against them, does she even have a choice at all?
~AUTHOR INTERVIEW with Tarun & Kelly~
1) What gave you the inspiration for the
storyline?
This series started as a fun experiment
with us mashing up a genre Kelly knew well (Victorian-era novels) and a genre
Tarun knew well (superhero comics), and that’s what we’ve always gone back to
for inspiration. We liked how adding superpowers to the world helped say things
about Victorian society and culture. And we liked how the Victorian setting
helped say things about the way we see superheroes today.
2) Are there any hidden themes in the
book that you hope readers will discover?
There’s probably nothing too subtle in
there, but we do hope readers will think about the idea of power, from the way
individual characters use theirs to the way entire organizations and countries
do.
3) Are any of the characters based on
real people you know?
Not particularly! If we had to say
anyone, we’d probably say ourselves. There’s often a kernel of one or both of
us in the main characters and we use that as a way of identifying with them
when we need to.
4) Who has influenced you most as writers?
We are usually inspired by writers who
have a keen eye for truth and humor. Especially those who combine the both,
like Oscar Wilde. He had some extremely funny and extremely true observations
about people and society. We are inspired by writers who create beautiful,
aching romances like Jane Austen and those that can set a galloping,
exhilarating pace like Leigh Bardugo.
5) If you could have any three literary
characters over to your place for game night, who would you invite, what would
you play, what would you serve, and why?
Elizabeth Bennet, Fitzwilliam Darcy and
George Wickham. We would play “never have I ever”, we would serve a LOT of wine
and wait for the shit to hit the fan.
6) Do you feel that you can
ever have too many books?
Of course not! However, we
both realized at some point that we will never be able to read All The Books,
so we decided to give ourselves permission to only read what we actually want
to read. We aren’t going to read That Very Important Book if it doesn’t appeal
to us. We will read romance and comics and other genres that get side-eyed by
judge-y people if we want.
Author Bio:Tarun and Kelly met in a freshman year writing class at NYU and started writing These Vicious Masks a few years later.
Tarun is a writer living in Los Angeles whose idea of paradise consists of kung-fu movies, David Bowie and chai tea. Since completing his first horrible screenplay in high school, he’s written everything from one-act plays and film criticism to humor pieces and strongly-worded emails. He’s also magnetized, crushed and burned the hard drive where that first screenplay can be found.
Kelly is a writer and actor living in NYC. YA is her absolute favorite thing on earth other than cupcakes and she has spent many hours crying over fictional deaths. She also started reading Harlequin romances at a possibly too early age (12?), and still loves a good paperback romance.
Thanks for being on the tour! :)
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