Konn Lavery - Reptilian Druglords, Demons, and the Fantastic
Konn Lavery is a Canadian author whose award-winning fiction has reached the bestselling charts on Amazon and in his hometown, Edmonton. His work has been described as uncanny and immersive and frequently falls under the Dark Fantasy and Horror genres. Each of his stories is housed within the expanding universe known as the Macrocosm spanning across time and space. He has been recognized by reviewers such as Reader Views, Readers’ Favorite, and Literary Titan, and by award programs such as indieBRAG, The Wishing Shelf Book Awards, eLit Awards, and Dan Poynter’s Global Ebook Awards. His work has also been curated into the Edmonton Public Library’s Capital Press collection. Konn started writing stories at a young age while being a homeschooled vegetarian, enthralled with storytelling. After graduating college, he began professionally pursuing his writing with his first release, Reality, in 2012 while balancing his graphic design business. Konn’s visual communication skills have been transcribed into the formatting and artwork found within his publications, supporting his fascination with transmedia storytelling. As our Author of the Day, he told us all about his book, Crystal Moth Conspiracy.
Please give us a short introduction to what Crystal Moth Conspiracy is about.
Sure thing. A quick one-sentence pitch would be:
Lola Cabello is a fugitive after exposing the law’s connection to the notorious Crystal Moth gang who destroyed her life and family, igniting her need for revenge and descending her into a world of reptilian drug lords, demons, and the fantastic.
What inspired you to write about a fugitive who is fleeing from a notorious gang?
The character of Lola Cabello actually shows up in a previous book I wrote called YEGman. She was a side character in that novel, and the book's end lined up well for expanding on her story.
All of my work is housed in one universe known as The Macrocosm, and the Crystal Moth Conspiracy novel serves as an excellent introduction and flagship series to the bizarre world of terrors, grit, and the supernatural.
An interactive timeline can be found on the homepage of my website https://konnlavery.com/
To introduce readers into this world and my previous works, Lola's story worked as an excellent point of view to follow as she unravels the strangeness of the real world.
Tell us more about Lola. What makes her tick?
Lola is driven by revenge, and she believes it is her main motive throughout the story. She wants facts and wishes to report what the media hides from the people. Lola specialized in journalism when she was in university. Although, that was before her life turned darker as she uncovered the Crystal Moth gang's mysterious new drug, ash.
Your books have received multiple awards. Did you always want to be an author? Tell us more about your journey to becoming an author.
I've wanted to be a writer for as long as I can recall. My writing journey started as a kid creating board games. My fascination with characters and world-building took the focus, and I shifted into writing regularly throughout my life.
You also work as a graphic designer. How has this influenced your writing?
I'm a visual person, and having the graphic design skillset helps a ton while working on new novels and promoting previous ones. Most of my novels have interior artwork with heavy graphic design influence applied to them. The visuals found within the books are always on my mind while writing the next book to help set the mood for the readers.
Besides writing, what other secret skills do you have?
Music is a big hobby of mine. I have put together novel scores, which can be found on my website. I've also recorded lots of songs in the past for my own enjoyment. Like graphic design and visual art, music and sound greatly influence my writing. Even the character Lola Cabello has roots in the industrial, gothic scene, which I am a fan of.
Interesting cover. Do tell us more about the design.
For this cover, I chose to work with an illustrator, unlike my previous works. I have collaborated with illustrators in the past for the original release of my short story Crusaders in a ZINE and the interior illustrations for my Rutherford Manor series.
With the cover for Crystal Moth Conspiracy, I wanted to approach my writing from a new visual lens as the face of the novel. Cover art is one of the most important aspects of pitching a book to new readers, and I hired my good friend Lee Nielsen who has worked in the animation industry, comic industry, and as a fine artist. His work can be found at: http://humanate.com/
He interpreted the character notes and novel synopsis that I provided, along with using the reference photos. I did the typography for the cover, blending in a mix of grit and fantasy.
Do any of your characters ever take off on their own tangent, refusing to do what you had planned for them?
All of them! My writing style combines pansting (writing at the seat of your pants) and plotting. The first draft is like the first time meeting someone; you don't know who they are until you spend more time with them. The plot may have started going one way, and the characters reveal that's not where the story will go.
Readers will find that the four main characters, Lola, Synarion, Iglesias, and Scalebane, go off on their own quite a bit.
Readers say the book was suspenseful throughout. How did you pull this off?
Numerous subplots are going on throughout the story, and all pull into the main plot. Keeping these at the forefront of the readers' journey was vital to ensure the suspense never died. It's quite common for books to have dead spots, a fourth into the story or three fourths into it, which every writer works hard at making sure doesn’t happen.
The three main points of view in the story, Lola, Iglesias, and Scalebane, help keep readers on track as the conspiracy unravels.
What did you have the most fun with when writing this story?
I had fun exploring new characters and roping in previous characters. As mentioned, all of my work is found within The Macrocosm, which allowed me to bring in characters and creatures from previous novels. It was a lot of fun to revisit them and write them in a new light so they don’t alienate new readers. Thankfully I do keep a wiki on my site so I can track all of the characters and their history.
When starting on a new book, what is the first thing you do?
Write chapter one and keep going. That's the pansting side of my writing. Although the actual story is in development long before I put down the first word. They incubate in my mind for a bit, and sometimes I write down notes to revisit years later. Other times, a lot more for short stories, I think about it for a few days and go at it.
Do you have any interesting writing habits? What is an average writing day like for you?
My writing is quite rigid and not too unique from other authors. When writing the first draft, I have a religious ritual of getting up early and using dictation (speech-to-text) to hammer out those words. After the first draft, I revise it in that same morning ritual or at a cafe or a bar. Writing is work, and I try to treat myself to green tea, coffee, beer, or whiskey.
The cat joins me in the morning, sitting on the office chair with me.
Overall I try to write every day while working on the first draft. Then I put it away for at least a couple months before applying revisions.
What are you working on right now?
I just wrapped up the first draft of Ash Born Book Two, so that will sit on the side for a moment while I wrap up a prequel following Synarion and the events that lead up to Crystal Moth Conspiracy Ash Born Book One.
Where can our readers discover more of your work or interact with you?
My work can be found on my website at konnlavery.com, where I have the novels, short story collections, anthologies I am in, and audiobooks. https://konnlavery.com/
If people want to interact with me, I am active on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
My newsletter is also a great way to strike up a conversation or to keep tabs on my work and get exclusive access to stories, The Macrocosm Wiki, and voting privileges on book titles and characters.
Lola Cabello is a fugitive after exposing the law’s connection to the notorious Crystal Moth gang who destroyed her life and family, igniting her need for revenge and descending her into a world of reptilian drug lords, demons, and the fantastic.
