Meet Naomi Clark, urban fantasy author

Naomi's latest release, at Ethereal Tales


Hi Naomi. Welcome to Writing Space.


Tell us a bit about you, something that will surprise us?

My hair was completely grey before I turned twenty. That always surprises people! What else can I say… I’m a writer hoping to make it big, as we all are. I like cocktails and sea monsters, B movies and chocolate, and I’m an incurable worrier. My favourite band is AFI and I have a not-so-secret passion for cartoons from the 80s and early 90s. I’m a voracious reader (my TBR pile is almost taller than me) and I have a tank full of catfish in my bedroom.

Why do you write, what is it that makes you do it?

I’ve always done it. I really don’t remember a time when I wasn’t writing stories. I wrote a lot of bad, angsty poetry in my early teens, then a few bad, flouncy high fantasy novels later on, complete with talking swords and dragons. I’m not sure why I do it, but my head is always full of characters and stories, and getting them down on paper seems like the only thing to do with them.

Who is your favorite character from one of your books, and why?

There are so many… I’ll go with Ethan Banning from AFTERLIFE. He’s a private eye who finds himself caught up in a conspiracy of dead girls, necromancers and wraiths. He thinks he’s Sam Spade and he’s completely unable to accept he’s way out of his depth. And he’s always ready with a quick quip and a pre-rolled cigarette, just like a PI should be.

If you could have dinner with six people, alive or dead (LOL), who would they be?

Hmm… Oscar Wilde would be one. Matt Berry would definitely be another. I think I’d take the four members of AFI as my last guests, so they could perform after-dinner music.

Tell us a bit about your writing process

Because I work a full-time day job, most of my writing is done in the evenings and weekends. I generally curl up on the sofa or my bed with my laptop, stick on some background noise (usually episodes of American Dad or whatever playlist I have for my WIP) and just hammer out as much as I can before bedtime! BUT I really don’t recommend sofas and beds to other writers – I have terrible chronic nerve damage in my right arm caused by years of typing and bad posture. I am trying to train myself to use a desk, but it’s not working. I have three desks in my bedroom and none of them are used for writing.

What is your current release? And how did this book come about.

My only current release is the short story, WOLF STRAP, which is available from QueeredFiction in their Queer Wolf anthology. This is an urban fantasy about a werewolf returning home for her cousin’s funeral and finding herself on the trail of a monster. It’s a story born of my love of werewolves and a chance email from a friend, and because of it, I’m now contracted for three novels with QueeredFiction, which I’m very excited about 

My next release is AFTERLIFE, coming December 1st from Damnation Books. It’s dark urban fantasy featuring hot jazz, cold cocktails, and dead girls. I wrote most of it for Nanowrimo 2007 and, because I thought it would never see the light of day, I threw in a whole weird mix of stuff just to please myself – ghosts, private eyes, necromancers, jazz bars, snakes… Luckily, it is now seeing the light of day, and I hope everyone finds it as much fun to read as I did to write.
Summer’s coming… where would you like to go on vacation?

I’ve always wanted to go to South America. I’d love to do one of those volunteer holidays, where you go off to Ecuador and look after baby turtles or something. Failing that, Paris would be good. I’ve got this fantasy about sitting in a café, wearing a beret and writing poetry. Even though my poetry is terrible.

How can readers find you?

I’m attempting to be everywhere! My website is Naomi Clark , and my LiveJournal is Naomi on LJ and I’m on Twitter at Naomi on Twitter