Friday, January 13, 2012

Project Greenlight 2 (The Complete Second Series Plus Film The Battle of Shaker Heights)

  • Miramax Home Entertainment along with Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Chris Moore present PROJECT GREENLIGHT . a unique, behind-the-scenes look at the Hollywood filmmaking process that documents all the hurdles and pitfalls encountered by first-time filmmakers as they bring their labor of love to the big screen! This special three-disc collection includes the complete second season of the acclaimed H
This perfectly pleasant, if minor, coming-of-age comedy-drama is the second feature released via the Miramax/HBO/Ben Affleck-Matt Damon TV program Project Greenlight. Series viewers watched Heights directors Kyle Rankin and Efram Potelle struggle to get their vision of screenwriter Erica Beeney's story past an intractable producer. If the process was not pretty, the final result--i.e., this film--has some nice things. Leading the list is rising star Shia LaBeouf (Holes) as lika! ble, 17-year-old misfit Kelly Ernswiler, coasting through life and fascinated by simulated war games. He befriends a sweet but cynical preppie, Bart Bowland (Elden Hensen), whose sexy older sister, Tabby (Amy Smart), offers Kelly a glimpse of adult passions and heartache. The cast is strong, including Kathleen Quinlan and William Sadler as the Caulfield-esque hero's troubled parents. There are solid moments of comedy and affecting, better-than-average drama. If Heights fails to ignite, at least it doesn't fail to move. --Tom KeoghThis perfectly pleasant, if minor, coming-of-age comedy-drama is the second feature released via the Miramax/HBO/Ben Affleck-Matt Damon TV program Project Greenlight. Series viewers watched Heights directors Kyle Rankin and Efram Potelle struggle to get their vision of screenwriter Erica Beeney's story past an intractable producer. If the process was not pretty, the final result--i.e., this film--has some nice things. Le! ading the list is rising star Shia LaBeouf (Holes) as l! ikable, 17-year-old misfit Kelly Ernswiler, coasting through life and fascinated by simulated war games. He befriends a sweet but cynical preppie, Bart Bowland (Elden Hensen), whose sexy older sister, Tabby (Amy Smart), offers Kelly a glimpse of adult passions and heartache. The cast is strong, including Kathleen Quinlan and William Sadler as the Caulfield-esque hero's troubled parents. There are solid moments of comedy and affecting, better-than-average drama. If Heights fails to ignite, at least it doesn't fail to move. --Tom KeoghThis perfectly pleasant, if minor, coming-of-age comedy-drama is the second feature released via the Miramax/HBO/Ben Affleck-Matt Damon TV program Project Greenlight. Series viewers watched Heights directors Kyle Rankin and Efram Potelle struggle to get their vision of screenwriter Erica Beeney's story past an intractable producer. If the process was not pretty, the final result--i.e., this film--has some nice things. Leading ! the list is rising star Shia LaBeouf (Holes) as likable, 17-year-old misfit Kelly Ernswiler, coasting through life and fascinated by simulated war games. He befriends a sweet but cynical preppie, Bart Bowland (Elden Hensen), whose sexy older sister, Tabby (Amy Smart), offers Kelly a glimpse of adult passions and heartache. The cast is strong, including Kathleen Quinlan and William Sadler as the Caulfield-esque hero's troubled parents. There are solid moments of comedy and affecting, better-than-average drama. If Heights fails to ignite, at least it doesn't fail to move. --Tom KeoghFrom executive producers Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and producer Chris Moore, THE BATTLE OF SHAKER HEIGHTS is the uniquely funny and touching comedy at the center of HBO's highly entertaining series PROJECT GREENLIGHT. For troubled high school senior Kelly Ernswiler (Shia LaBeouf -- CHARLIE'S ANGELS: FULL THROTTLE, DISNEY'S HOLES), life is war -- or at least an incredible simula! tion. With all the difficulties in his real life, Kelly has fo! und just one true escape: Losing himself in fantasy reenactments of World War II's epic battles. Then he strikes up an unlikely friendship with fellow reenactor, preppy Bart Bowland (Elden Henson -- DUMB AND DUMBERER), and Kelly's life is set to explode in ways he never expected! Also starring Amy Smart (ROAD TRIP) and Kathleen Quinlan (APOLLO 13) in a winning cast of Hollywood favorites -- here's your chance to enjoy the final cut of the film millions watched come together in the second hit season of PROJECT GREENLIGHT.This perfectly pleasant, if minor, coming-of-age comedy-drama is the second feature released via the Miramax/HBO/Ben Affleck-Matt Damon TV program Project Greenlight. Series viewers watched Heights directors Kyle Rankin and Efram Potelle struggle to get their vision of screenwriter Erica Beeney's story past an intractable producer. If the process was not pretty, the final result--i.e., this film--has some nice things. Leading the list is rising star Shi! a LaBeouf (Holes) as likable, 17-year-old misfit Kelly Ernswiler, coasting through life and fascinated by simulated war games. He befriends a sweet but cynical preppie, Bart Bowland (Elden Hensen), whose sexy older sister, Tabby (Amy Smart), offers Kelly a glimpse of adult passions and heartache. The cast is strong, including Kathleen Quinlan and William Sadler as the Caulfield-esque hero's troubled parents. There are solid moments of comedy and affecting, better-than-average drama. If Heights fails to ignite, at least it doesn't fail to move. --Tom KeoghMiramax Home Entertainment along with Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Chris Moore present PROJECT GREENLIGHT ... a unique, behind-the-scenes look at the Hollywood filmmaking process that documents all the hurdles and pitfalls encountered by first-time filmmakers as they bring their labor of love to the big screen! This special three-disc collection includes the complete second season of the acclaimed HBO se! ries, extensive bonus material, and the finished theatrically ! released project THE BATTLE OF SHAKER HEIGHTS -- starring Shia LaBeouf and Amy Smart.Anyone contemplating a career as a screenwriter or film director--or anyone who simply wonders how movies get made--would do well to watch Project Greenlight 2 from beginning to end. The second season of the HBO reality series, co-created by Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and producer Alex Keledjian, follows the creation of Miramax feature The Battle of Shaker Heights from unknown screenplay through various levels of Greenlight competition to first-run theatrical feature with a big, Hollywood premiere. The road to completion, however, runs through hell many times over. Shaker Heights writer Erica Beeney, having survived Greenlight's script contest and intimidating meetings with Affleck, Damon, and various producers and executives from Miramax and elsewhere, is matched with the directing team of Efram Potelle and Kyle Rankin, who have undergone similar trials. With little! time to celebrate, the winners moves into production offices in Los Angeles and confront a stark reality: A lot of people are involved in getting a movie made, and very often a writer or director is just one voice among many.

The most interesting backstage dramas in the series take place during pre-production for Shaker Heights, when casting proves to be a nightmare, time runs short, and Miramax starts insisting that Potelle and Rankin take the actors they're told to take. Part of the problem is that the team, new to the big leagues, often look like startled deer. They don't know how to talk to stars or make decisions quickly, they question the need for vital crew members, and they don't understand that in the absence of leadership a panicked studio will take over. Still, everyone gets through intact, and after a couple of episodes detailing Shaker Heights' actual shoot (with stars Shia LaBeouf, Kathleen Quinlan, William Sadler, and Amy Smart), the editi! ng and marketing processes become a new kind of misery, threat! ening to destroy the film and end careers. It's all very engrossing, and its good to have a DVD of the highly enjoyable The Battle of Shaker Heights (which comes with this set and offers a "jump-to" feature linking select scenes to Project Greenlight background info) to prove, in the end, that all that matters are results. --Tom Keogh

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Afterschool

Everything Is Illuminated: A Novel

  • ISBN13: 9780060529703
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!

With only a yellowing photograph in hand, a young man -- also named Jonathan Safran Foer -- sets out to find the woman who may or may not have saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Accompanied by an old man haunted by memories of the war; an amorous dog named Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior; and the unforgettable Alex, a young Ukrainian translator who speaks in a sublimely butchered English, Jonathan is led on a quixotic journey over a devastated landscape and into an unexpected past.

The simplest thing would be to describe Everything Is Illuminated, Jonathan Safran Foer's accomplished debut, as a novel about the Holocaust. It is, but that really fails to do justice to the sheer ambition of ! this book. The main story is a grimly familiar one. A young Jewish American--who just happens to be called Jonathan Safran Foer--travels to the Ukraine in the hope of finding the woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis. He is aided in his search by Alex Perchov, a naïve Ukrainian translator, Alex's grandfather (also called Alex), and a flatulent mongrel dog named Sammy Davis Jr. Jr. On their journey through Eastern Europe's obliterated landscape they unearth facts about the Nazi atrocities and the extent of Ukrainian complicity that have implications for Perchov as well as Safran Foer. This narrative is not, however, recounted from (the character) Jonathan Safran Foer's perspective. It is relayed through a series of letters that Alex sends to Foer. These are written in the kind of broken Russo-English normally reserved for Bond villains or Latka from Taxi. Interspersed between these letters are fragments of a novel by Safran Foer--a wonderfully imagined, almo! st magical realist, account of life in the shtetl before the N! azis des troyed it. These are in turn commented on by Alex, creating an additional metafictional angle to the tale.

If all this sounds a little daunting, don't be put off; Safran Foer is an extremely funny as well as intelligent writer who combines some of the best Jewish folk yarns since Isaac Bashevis Singer with a quite heartbreaking meditation on love, friendship, and loss. --Travis Elborough, Amazon.co.uk

Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman Movie Poster

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Studio: Uni Dist Corp. (mca) Release Date: 07/24/2007 Run time: 145 minutes Rating: NrFor the first time ever, the original The Wolf Man film comes to DVD in this extraordinary Legacy Collection. Included in the collection is the original classic, starring the renowned Lon Chaney Jr., and three timeless sequels, featuring legendary actor Bela Lugosi and others. These are the landmark films that inspired an entire genre of movies and continue to be major influences on motion pictures to this day.Universal's first werewolf film falls in the shadow of the 1941 hit The Wolf Man. You might say it's a different animal, as this version carries none of the now-familiar trappings of the wolf-man legend: no wolfsbane, no silver bullets, no gypsy curse. Dr. Wilfrid Glendon (Henry Hull) is a London botanist whose search for a rare flower takes him to a "cur! sed" valley in Tibet where he's mauled in the moonlight by a wolflike creature. Back in London he meets the mysterious Dr. Yogami (a marvelously melancholy performance by Warner Oland), who explains they met once before "in Tibet... in the dark" before asking for a flower from his botanical find, the only antidote for his curse. Glendon scoffs at his stories of werewolves--until he transforms into a hirsute killer under the effect of the full moon. Although leaner and edgier than the famous 1941 Lon Chaney classic, The Werewolf of London stumbles with the corny Scotland Yard investigation of the murder spree and gets sidetracked in the bizarre bickering of two old drunken cronies. But it takes flight in wonderfully imaginative and eerie scenes and striking action sequences, while a Jekyll-and-Hyde dynamic turns a jealous squabble between Glendon and his young wife Lisa (Valerie Hobson) into the tragic twist of the curse: "The werewolf instinctively kills the thing it! loves best." --Sean AxmakerOver 10 years after first t! urning d own the role, Bela Lugosi donned the neck bolts and platform boots to play Frankenstein's monster for the first and only time in Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman. Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr., reprising his most famous role), killed at the end of The Wolf Man, is inexplicably alive and searching for the brilliant Dr. Frankenstein but instead finds the Monster, frozen in ice beneath the castle, and an ambitious scientist (Patric Knowles) who revives the creature and promises to cure Larry. Lugosi is lurching and clumsy as the Monster, while Chaney is appropriately tortured as Larry but stiff and snarly as the Wolf Man, more man than wolf. Last-minute cuts by the studio renders much of the film incomprehensible: the monster was left blind and vocal at the end of Ghost of Frankenstein, but all references to either were deleted (which partly accounts for Lugosi's performance) and he's now sighted but mute. Roy William Neill, a talented B-movie director best kn! own for his Sherlock Holmes films with Basil Rathbone, can't do much with the perfunctory script, but he does deliver a highly entertaining conclusion: the Wolf Man battles the Monster while a spectacular disaster (accomplished with obvious but charming models) wipes the castle off the face of the earth... at least until House of Frankenstein the next year. --Sean AxmakerABBOTT & COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN - DVD MovieUniversal Pictures made a great deal of money from its monster movies in the 1930s. In the early '40s, the burlesque team of Bud Abbott and Lou Costello kept the studio's coffers full. When the two franchises were combined in 1948, the result was another windfall--despite the apparent oil-and-water mix of subject matter. Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein was the first of these summit meetings, although the title is a misnomer. Actually, Bud and Lou bump into most of the Universal heavy-hitters, including Count Dracula (played by Béla L! ugosi himself), the Wolfman (Lon Chaney Jr.), and the Frankens! tein mon ster (veteran monster Glenn Strange). There's even a token appearance by the Invisible Man, whose disembodied voice is recognizable as that of Vincent Price. Sure enough, the film is funny, especially since it gives the portly Costello multiple opportunities to do his wide-eyed, quivering scaredy-cat routine. Audiences ate it up, and in future installments Bud and Lou would run into Boris Karloff, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the Invisible Man, and the Mummy. But the first was the best. --Robert Horton Feature titles include: The Bride of Frankenstein, Frankenstein, The Ghost of Frankenstein, House of Frankenstein, Son of FrankensteinUniversal Pictures made a great deal of money from its monster movies in the 1930s. In the early '40s, the burlesque team of Bud Abbott and Lou Costello kept the studio's coffers full. When the two franchises were combined in 1948, the result was another windfall--despite the apparent oil-and-water mix of subject matter. Abbott and Costel! lo Meet Frankenstein was the first of these summit meetings, although the title is a misnomer. Actually, Bud and Lou bump into most of the Universal heavy-hitters, including Count Dracula (played by Béla Lugosi himself), the Wolfman (Lon Chaney Jr.), and the Frankenstein monster (veteran monster Glenn Strange). There's even a token appearance by the Invisible Man, whose disembodied voice is recognizable as that of Vincent Price. Sure enough, the film is funny, especially since it gives the portly Costello multiple opportunities to do his wide-eyed, quivering scaredy-cat routine. Audiences ate it up, and in future installments Bud and Lou would run into Boris Karloff, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the Invisible Man, and the Mummy. But the first was the best. --Robert Horton Approximately 12x18. Print may show fold marks, tears, stains and blurry text and graphics from reproduction of aged original vintage art print. Great wall decor art print at a fraction of the cost! of an original vintage print.

Ghoulies IV

Angel-A

  • From the director of The Professional and The Fifth Element comes a stunning, sexy tribute to the healing power of love. When Andr , a down-on-his-luck gambler, dives into the icy Seine to end it all, he winds up instead rescuing Angela, a gorgeous, mysterious blonde. Filled with renewed passion for life, they set out to settle Andr 's scores as they wander the City of Lights. Along the way, A
From the director of The Professional and The Fifth Element comes a stunning, sexy tribute to the healing power of love. When André, a down-on-his-luck gambler, dives into the icy Seine to end it all, he winds up instead rescuing Angela, a gorgeous, mysterious blonde. Filled with renewed passion for life, they set out to settle André's scores as they wander the City of Lights. Along the way, André finds himself, but he still has some questions about his leggy, lovely companion -can sh! e really be as heavenly as she seems? Filled with wit, warmth and eye-popping visuals, Angel-A shows just how high you can soar when passion takes flight.It's a Wonderful Life meets Wings of Desire in French director Luc Besson's Angel-A, a surprisingly charming fable of low-life redemption. The low-life in question is André (Jamel Debbouze, from Amelie), a mousy, disheveled Parisian scam artist who's deeply in debt to various underworld thugs. Suicide seems like the best available option, but just as he's about to leap into the Seine, he encounters Angela (Danish model/actress/filmmaker Rie Rasmussen), a leggy blonde beauty who's going to change André's life in ways he never expected. Filmed in gorgeous black and white in a shimmering Paris that seems almost completely depopulated (most of the filming took place in early-morning sunlight), Angel-A is a rough-edged yet ultimately sweet-natured tale of two chatty characters who find new h! ope through mutual devotion, and that's likely to disappoint a! ny Besso n fans who are expecting another high-octane crime thriller like Leon--The Professional. And yet, Besson's tenth film has a light, feathery quality that works in its favor, even when the characters lack interest and their scenes together grow slightly redundant. Debbouze is perfectly cast as a likable loser who deserves a break, and Rasmussen (who memorably appeared in Brian De Palma's Femme Fatale, wearing nothing but lavish diamonds and a killer smile) is, to say the least, angelically seductive. How well you respond to this romantic fantasy will depend on how attracted you are to these characters, but if you give Angel-A a chance, you might find it to be a worthy companion to Richard Linklater's Before Sunrise and Before Sunset, two other appealing films about love, set in, respectively, Vienna and Paris. --Jeff Shannon

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Ghostbusters [Blu-ray]

The Fallen 1: The Fallen and Leviathan

  • ISBN13: 9781442408623
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
There's something achingly familiar about Daniel Grigori.

Mysterious and aloof, he captures Luce Price's attention from the moment she sees him on her first day at the Sword & Cross boarding school in sultry Savannah, Georgia. He's the one bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the other students are all screw-ups, and security cameras watch every move.

Even though Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce--and goes out of his way to make that very clear--she can't let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, she has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret . . . even if it kills her.

Dangerously exciting and darkly romantic, Fallen is a page tur! ning thriller and the ultimate love story.Maggie is unaware of the terrifying fate that awaits her. It isn’t until she lands in New Orleans for a full year at a private high school and her unknown enemies find her does she realize that her life is in danger. As a mystifying stranger repeatedly intervenes and blocks the attempts on her life, she begins to learn that there is more to him than his need to protect her and that he may be the key to understanding why her enemies have just now arrived. INTENSELY PASSIONATE AND INCREDIBLY GRIPPING, FALLEN IS A LOVE STORY THAT TESTS THE BOUNDARIES OF TIME. A BESTSELLER ON AMAZON.COM IN MULTIPLE GENRES. THE GUARDIAN TRILOGY: Fallen Eternity ReckoningThere's something achingly familiar about Daniel Grigori.

Mysterious and aloof, he captures Luce Price's attention from the moment she sees him on her first day at the Sword & Cross boarding school in sultry Savannah, Georgia. He's the o! ne bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the! other s tudents are all screw-ups, and security cameras watch every move.

Even though Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce--and goes out of his way to make that very clear--she can't let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, she has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret . . . even if it kills her.

Dangerously exciting and darkly romantic, Fallen is a page turning thriller and the ultimate love story.


From the Hardcover edition.There's something achingly familiar about Daniel Grigori.

Mysterious and aloof, he captures Luce Price's attention from the moment she sees him on her first day at the Sword & Cross boarding school in sultry Savannah, Georgia. He's the one bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the other students are all screw-ups, and security cameras watch every move.

Even though Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce--and goes out of his way to make that very clear--she ! can't let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, she has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret . . . even if it kills her.

Dangerously exciting and darkly romantic, Fallen is a page turning thriller and the ultimate love story.


From the Hardcover edition.

Luce would die for Daniel.

And she has. Over and over again. Throughout time, Luce and Daniel have found each other, only to be painfully torn apart: Luce dead, Daniel left broken and alone. But perhaps it doesn’t need to be that way. . . .

Luce is certain that somethingâ€"or someoneâ€"in a past life can help her in her present one. So she begins the most important journey of this lifetime . . . going back eternities to witness firsthand her romances with Daniel . . . and finally unlock the key to making their love last.

Cam and the legions of angels and Outcasts are desperate to catch Luce, but none are as frantic as Daniel. He chas! es Luce through their shared pasts, terrified of what might ha! ppen if she rewrites history.

Because their romance for the ages could go up in flames . . . forever.

Sweeping across centuries, Passion is the third novel in the unforgettably epic Fallen series.

There’s no police training stronger than a cop’s instinct. Faith Mitchell’s mother isn’t answering her phone. Her front door is open. There’s a bloodstain above the knob. Everything Faith learned in the academy goes out the window when she charges into her mother’s house, gun drawn. She sees a man dead in the laundry room, a hostage situation in the bedroom. What she doesn’t see is her mother. When the hostage situation turns deadly, Faith is left with too many questions. She’ll need the help of her partner, Will Trent, and trauma doctor Sara Linton to get some answers. But Faith isn’t just a cop anymore, she’s a witnessâ€"and a suspect. To find her mother, Faith will have to cross the thin blue line and bring the truth to ligh! tâ€"or bury it forever.

Fallen - the first book in the Guardian Trilogy...

Maggie is unaware of the terrifying fate that awaits her. It isn’t until she lands in New Orleans for a full year at a private high school and her unknown enemies find her does she realize that her life is in danger.

As a mystifying stranger repeatedly intervenes and blocks the attempts on her life, she begins to learn that there is more to him than his need to protect her and that he may be the key to understanding why her enemies have just now arrived.


NOW AVAILABLE: Eternity (Book 2 of the Guardian Trilogy)

COMING SOON: Reckoning (Book 3 of the Guardian Trilogy) will be available in late December.


"This was a really great little read. I finished it within a night because I could not stop reading it. The story moved well and the characters really grew on me." - Shawna, May 24, 2011

"I loved this book...WOW!! It was! so different and I really like Maggie!! She is a great charac! ter that I have loved being introduced to and can't wait to read more about!!" - Kathryn, June 6, 2011


5% of the proceeds from this novel will be donated to the Animal Welfare Institute in an effort to help fight animal neglect and cruelty.

Fallen - the first book in the Guardian Trilogy...

Maggie is unaware of the terrifying fate that awaits her. It isn’t until she lands in New Orleans for a full year at a private high school and her unknown enemies find her does she realize that her life is in danger.

As a mystifying stranger repeatedly intervenes and blocks the attempts on her life, she begins to learn that there is more to him than his need to protect her and that he may be the key to understanding why her enemies have just now arrived.


NOW AVAILABLE: Eternity (Book 2 of the Guardian Trilogy)

COMING SOON: Reckoning (Book 3 of the Guardian Trilogy) will be available in late December.


"This was a really gre! at little read. I finished it within a night because I could not stop reading it. The story moved well and the characters really grew on me." - Shawna, May 24, 2011

"I loved this book...WOW!! It was so different and I really like Maggie!! She is a great character that I have loved being introduced to and can't wait to read more about!!" - Kathryn, June 6, 2011


5% of the proceeds from this novel will be donated to the Animal Welfare Institute in an effort to help fight animal neglect and cruelty.

Hell on earth.

That’s what it’s like for Luce to be apart from her fallen angel boyfriend, Daniel.
It took them an eternity to find one another, but now he has told her he must go away. Just long enough to hunt down the Outcastsâ€"immortals who want to kill Luce. Daniel hides Luce at Shoreline, a school on the rocky California coast with unusually gifted students: Nephilim, the offspring of fallen angels and humans.

At Shoreline, Luce le! arns what the Shadows are, and how she can use them as windows! to her previous lives. Yet the more Luce learns, the more she suspects that Daniel hasn’t told her everything. He’s hiding somethingâ€"something dangerous.
What if Daniel’s version of the past isn’t actually true? What if Luce is really meant to be with someone else?
 
The second novel in the addictive FALLEN series . . . where love never dies.


From the Hardcover edition.Amazon.com Exclusive: Questions for Lauren Kate

Amazon.com: Luce and Daniel's story is very romantic. What inspired you to write a love story between a human and an angel?
Lauren Kate: I’ve been writing love stories for as long as I’ve been writing. To me, the most complicated romances make the most interesting narratives, so I’m always looking for new obstacles to throw in my lovers! ’ paths. When I was getting my masters degree in fiction, I was studying biblical narratives and came across a line in Genesis (6:1-4), which describes a group of angels who fell in love with mortal women. Putting this reference together with a mention in Isaiah and another in Palsm 82, biblical scholars conclude that these angels were actually cast out of Heaven for their lust. Which means--you could say--that these angels chose love over Heaven. I found this to be an endlessly interesting set up for an incredibly complicated romance. I started thinking about what kind of mortal girl it would take to attract an angel’s attention. And what it would be like for her to find herself in this position. What kind of baggage would an angel have? What would her very over-protective parents think? From there, this whole world unfurled in my head with fallen angels, demons, reincarnation, and the war between good and evil all battling for a piece of the action.

Ama! zon.com: We've been wondering about the "mechanics" of Luc! e and Da niel's story (for lack of a better word). Does Daniel age? Or does he stay seventeen forever (while Luce grows older)? And with that said, what does he do while Luce is growing up in each of her lives? What was he doing before he met Luce in this life?
Kate: What’s important about angels is not their bodies but their souls. In their purest forms, they’re actually genderless, but for my story to work--for the angels to come down to earth and interact with mortals--they all assume human bodies and attach themselves to human genders. Daniel is eternal and will live on forever, but the body Luce sees him in (gorgeous as it is) is really just a shell for the soul that she loves. There’s not the feeling of a ticking clock in the background as there might be with, say, a vampire story. Right now I’m writing Passion, the prequel where we’ll see Luce and Daniel in a dozen other lifetimes, so I’m exploring a lot of these mechanics (a great word for! it, by the way) between the angel’s bodies and souls.

The way Daniel occupies himself in between Luces varies from life to life. His soul is least at rest just after she’s died, before she’s incarnated into another life--when she is “in between.” During her lives, even when he isn’t with her, he is always aware of her age, what she’s going through, how she’s doing. He has a sort of internal Lucinda clock. Sometimes he meets her as a child, sometimes he tries to stay away from her as long as possible, to give her as much of a life outside of him as he can. In the years leading up to the life where they meet at Sword and Cross, Daniel was living on Skid Row in Los Angeles.

Amazon.com: Fallen and Torment talk a lot about the history of Heaven and Hell, the different classes of Angels, and the rules of human-angel interaction. Obviously these themes are explored heavily in religious texts, but were there other so! urces that informed your story?
Kate:It’s in! terestin g because there is actually very little in the Bible about angels--a few mentions in the Old Testament, a few more in the new. And the mentions that we do have are often vague or contradictory. Most of what we think of when we think of angels today comes from secular or cultural contexts. Seventy-five percent of it might have come from Milton alone. I worked with a biblical scholar at UC Davis who pointed me toward some apocryphal texts (books written during the same as the bible, but which were not included in the book when the canon was closed). Books like Enoch 1-3 and the Dead Sea Scrolls are chock full of angel references. I also read a trilogy on Satan and a book called the A History of Heaven both by Jeffrey Burton Russell, as well as a great book by Harold Bloom called Omens of the Millennium.

I got so engrossed in all of the research I did for Fallen that I had a hard time knowing when to stop reading and when to start writin! g. I had to realize that it was okay for me to pick and choose things from various accounts, to look past contradictions, and to come up with my own angel mythology. That’s what Milton did, after all!

Amazon.com: What is Cam's deal? We're not convinced that he's totally evil--in Fallen, he seemed to be trying to protect Luce by keeping her away from Daniel, and in Torment he and Daniel reach a mysterious truce, again to protect Luce. Will we be seeing more of him in book 3?
Kate:Speaking of Milton, isn’t it fascinating that Satan is the most interesting character in Paradise Lost? From the start of this series, I have wanted to test the boundaries between what is “good” and what is “evil.” How and when do those terms get applied? Are they black and white or is there some flexibility along the spectrum? Obviously it’s much more interesting if Heaven and Hell/good and evil work as binaries: opposites tha! t orbit each other and are pulled toward each other with a mut! ual grav itation. We see that at the end of Fallen and in Torment with Daniel and Cam’s truce. The idea that good and evil rely on each other is as old as the oldest dualistic religion, Zoroastrianism (on whose shoulders both Judaism and Christianity stood).

So yes, there is more to Cam than pure evil! (Especially since his character--the charming side of his character anyway--was based loosely on my husband.) We’ll see a lot of him in Passion and will even begin to understand how he got where he is today.

Amazon.com: Can you tell us a little bit about book 3? Will we find out more about Luce and Daniel's past lives?
Kate:Passion is going to be the craziest, coolest book I’ve ever written! I’m halfway through the first draft right now and it is so rewarding to finally get to delve into Luce and Daniel’s past lives together. The history these two share is the stuff of epics, and I am learning! so many new things about them as I write. For any reader out there feeling tortured by the teasing hints of so many thrilling past lives: Passion is your book! Everything--well, almost everything--will be illuminated.


Aaron Corbet isn’t a bad kidâ€"he’s just a little different. And starting on the eve of his eighteenth birthday, Aaron begins to discover supernatural talents. Then he learns the truth about his destiny: He must unite angels, mortals, and Powers both good and evil, some of whom are hell-bent on his destruction....

The Fallen quartet, now published for the first time in two action-packed bind-ups, chronicles an epic struggle, where the fate of the world rests on the outcome of one teen’s monumental quest. The Fallen 1

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