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Book Blog Editor Angela Wilson chats it up with romantic suspense author Jordan Dane about life, writing and where she’s headed next.

Q - Who is Jordan Dane?

A - Wow! How existential of you! And a little Sybil. Jordan Dane is my alter ego. A persona I created to distance myself from being a writer. She delves into the subjects I fear to tread. And while I sleep, she focuses her mind on my books 24/7. Jordan hangs tough in the seedy underbelly of the worlds I create, generously becoming my eyes and ears. I couldn’t write without her.

Q - You started seriously pursuing publication five years ago. What did you do before that?

A – I got swept up in a different life. My degree is in Accounting, if you can believe it. And I had a wonderful career in the oil and gas industry as a sales manager. With the job, I got to live in many places, including Alaska for ten years. (In my next series, you’ll see me writing about places in that great state. My heart is still there.)

Being a practical person, I never thought I could make money writing full time. But somewhere along the way, practicality got shoved aside for the passion that always lurked in my mind and manifested itself in peculiar ways, like my crazy annual Christmas letter. It’s a mix of “what I did on my summer vacation” sprinkled with pure fiction, sarcasm and/or political satire.

I never forgot the joy that came with writing so I decided in 2003 that I’d try to get published. I researched the commercial fiction industry and joined some writers’ organizations then applied butt to chair every day. And three and a half years later—after I’d made up my mind that I had to write whether I got published or not—I sold in 2006 in auction. Man, what a rush! In my wildest dreams, I would not have imagined that to happen.

Q - Your cover copy says everybody heard you scream when your first novel, No One Heard Her Scream, was picked up. What was that moment like for you?

A – Actually all three of my books sold in the same auction. I had two already written and sold the last book in the series based on a synopsis. And since I worked full time, it took me six months to finish that third book, but afterwards I had time on my hands and nearly a year and a half before my books would be released. (The delay was due to the timing of releasing three books back to back and finding a hole in Avon’s schedule.) So I was fortunate enough to sell another three books in 2007, thanks to the faith my wonderful editor Lucia Macro had in me. So six books sold and not one on the shelf. What a way to start a career!

The auction process was amazing too—ten days of pure hell and absolute ecstasy. Being a commodity trader, I knew about trading and negotiating, but this was a real thrill. I also got to chat with the bidding editors to help me decide which house to choose—asking what they liked about my debut book, how they planned on marketing my series and how I would fit into their line. Invaluable input from publishing professionals.

But my FIRST SALE story is on my website for anyone wanting the real skinny. I like to tell people that I sacrificed a body part to write NO ONE HEARD HER SCREAM. Everyone thinks I’m kidding until after they read my story. And I owe my first big step to NYT best seller Sharon Sala. She’s my dream catcher.

Q - Tell us about your two latest romantic suspense novels – No One Left to Tell and No One Lives Forever.

A - In No One Left to Tell, a hit man’s body serves as a message from the past, unraveling the lives of people touched by an unsolved crime. A woman detective must sift through the tragic memories of a reluctant man—the prime suspect—whose past holds the key to finding a killer.

And in the sequel, No One Lives Forever, a mysterious woman assassin barges into a man’s Chicago flat, attempting to collect an old marker, begging his help to free a man kidnapped in Brazil. He’s got seven days to attempt an impossible rescue of the father he never knew.

Although these books read as standalone stories, characters and a continuing story line connect them. The first book is told through the eyes of Raven Mackenzie, the woman detective. And the next book is Christian Delacorte’s story set in the exotic locale of Brazil, complete with voodoo, genetics research, police corruption and greed.

Q - When you started to tell the story of Raven and Christian, did you know it would carry over into two full-length novels?

A - No One Left to Tell was too big a story to let go with one book. And when I got to the end, even though it reads as a standalone story, I knew my protagonist Christian Delacorte had a loose end in his life that he’d have to resolve before he could move on and put his tragic past behind him. So I started writing No One Lives Forever and got six chapters into it before I set it aside. (I also wrote a synopsis that I could later use as a guidepost since I’m not a plotter). But I set aside the story because I wasn’t sure I should spend time on a sequel to a book I hadn’t sold yet. And being the practical writer, I wanted to have inventory for a publishing house to buy if they came looking. So I started No One Heard Her Scream, which jump-started the auction process and resulted in the sale of my first 3-book series. It was a gamble that paid off. In hindsight, I look like a genius with a crystal ball, but nothing could be further from the truth.

Q - Your villains were mean, nasty, and had their own special blend of vengeful violence. Was it difficult to get into their heads?

A – If I say NO, does that scare you? I spend as much time fleshing out my villains as I do my protagonists. After all, they are the heroes to their own stories. I’ll admit up front that people in my books sometimes get away with murder. I’m a fan of morally challenged anti-heroes and occasionally my villains do the right thing for all the wrong reasons.

Case in point, Nicholas “Nicky” Charboneau is a crime boss in No One Left to Tell. I pictured him as a sexy Tony Soprano who can order someone killed with remorseless ease yet maintain a fierce loyalty for people he loves. His dark humored sidekick is the beautiful and exotic Jasmine Lee—Nicky’s bodyguard, lover, and assassin (when it suits him). They are both fascinated by death and they love their work. A match made in heaven in my world.

Nicky is the epitome of the powerful bad boy in designer threads with expensive and deviant tastes. And Jasmine is intensely devoted to her employer and secretly in love with him. As you might have guessed, these two are not the hero and heroine in my story—quite the contrary—yet they have seduced me from the start. No One Left to Tell sets the stage for Nicky’s story of a misguided vengeance infused with his twisted brand of love and loyalty—the driver behind the plot. And in the sequel No One Lives Forever, everything Nicky values is at risk after he’s kidnapped, forcing him to examine his life’s choices in the harsh light of what he has become.

For me, I want to capture the depth of every character, including my bad guys. And if I happen to fall in love with them along the way, that makes the story richer for me. I hope my readers will agree. So in No One Left to Tell and its sequel No One Lives Forever, I welcome readers to Nicky and Jasmine’s world where ethics and morality are only handicaps.

Q - What type of research did you do for the novels?

A – I do tons and tons of research on forensics, crime scene analysis, police procedure, weapons and explosives. I read, I take courses, I do tours of facilities, and I consult with technical advisors on various aspects of each book.

I have a small resource library of forensics books, among other materials. To date, my favorite crime science books are the ones recommended by an online instructor I had in 2005, Robert Genna, Director of the Suffolk Crime Laboratory in New York. The books: Crime Science—Methods of Forensics Detection by Joe Nickell and John F. Fischer and Introduction to Forensic Sciences (Second Edition), edited by William G. Eckert.

But one of my most memorable research activities was when I took 45+ hours of presentations with my local police department. What a thrill! Especially the day we spent on the firing range, shooting and blowing up stuff with the bomb squad. And one of the lieutenants who ran the program, a real larger than life character himself, became my technical advisor on No One Left to Tell. He knew I wanted to use a flashbang grenade (a diversionary device used by police tactical teams in hostage rescue) and he set one off near me so I could get a sense of how it felt. And only an author (fanatical for research) would think this was a good thing.

Q - Do you credit anyone or a particular writing group with helping you make such a strong showing so early in the business?

A – Sharon Sala helped bring me to the attention of my savvy agent Meredith Bernstein who orchestrated the auction process. Sharon is my guardian angel and a very generous mentor. But I also credit the resources of the Romance Writers of America who are well suited to help the beginning author. I belong to many other writer organizations, but RWA gave me a great foundation in craft. Plus, the acknowledgement pages of my books are filled with names and organizations I credit depending on the technical advisers I need for each story. And it takes a village to create a book.

Q - What inspires you?

A - Real crime usually inspires me. And unfortunately for the whole of humanity, there’s always plenty of ‘inspiration’. I read newspapers, watch TV and search the Internet for stories that strike me and keep notes in a file for later—anything from genetic anomalies and man-eating plants to the whimsical world of serial killers. Many times I weave more than one crime story together into a plot. As an author, I love a challenge.

For my debut book No One Heard Her Scream, the Natalee Holloway case got my attention when speculators on the Internet believed she might have been trafficked into Venezuela off the nearby island of Aruba. Seeing this poor family’s drama being played out on the small screen broke my heart. I did my best to capture the emotion of that ordeal in my book, as seen through the grief-stricken eyes of my woman detective Rebecca Montgomery after her younger sister Danielle was abducted and believed murdered—without a body for closure. It was my take on the destruction of a family in crisis.

And lately, I’ve been fascinated by international and cyberspace crimes that cross over jurisdictions and international borders, making them harder to prosecute. In my novels, I have no such jurisdictions and can pursue criminals as I see fit to find justice. It gives me a certain amount of satisfaction to know I’m shedding light on these crimes too.

Q - Who are you reading?

A – Right now, I’m reading a debut thriller author Leighton Gage – Blood of the Wicked. And I love his book. The plot sucks you in and the man knows how to craft a page-turner. Leighton lives in Brazil and his Mario Silva thriller series is based there. Since my book NO ONE LIVES FOREVER is set in Brazil too, I wanted to read more about the fascinating country I had researched. Leighton also helped me with some colorful local language for my book. (Okay, the curse words.) He and I are both members of the International Thriller Writers Class of 2008 for debut authors and I’m so proud to be a part of this talented group. And NYT bestseller Lee Child is our fearless leader. For more information on this program, go to this link.

Q - What’s next for you?

A - I am so jazzed about my upcoming romantic thriller series that I’m currently writing for Avon. I sold the 3-book “Sweet Justice” series in 2007 and turned in my first book in December—Evil Without a Face. And I’m busy on the second book, The Wrong Side of Dead. But here is an overview of the series as published in Publishers Weekly when the deal was struck:

“An illusive web of imposters on the Internet lures a deluded teen from her Alaskan home and launches a chain reaction collision course with an unlikely tangle of heroes. This is the initial driver to the new 3-book “Sweet Justice” series from author Jordan Dane and Avon HarperCollins. With an international setting, these romantic thrillers will focus on the lives and loves of three women—a bounty hunter operating outside the law, an ambitious vice cop, and a former international operative with a mysterious past. These women give Lady Justice a new reason to wear blinders”

Since I lived in Alaska, I love that Evil Without A Face weaves in and out of that setting. It’s an ambitious plot and very fast paced, based on a real crime that happened in 2004 in Florida. And I’m particularly fond of the main character in this first book, my Fugitive Recovery Agent Jessica Beckett. She’s scarred both physically and mentally by her past, yet her inner strength is so resilient. Her scars are the imperfections in us all. But one of her most endearing traits is that she’s a real smart-ass. Normally, I fall in love with my male characters, but this woman has stolen my heart on so many levels. This new series electrifies me.

Q - Where can we find you on the Web?

A – My website is www.jordandane.com and it’s filled with special features, news and behind the scenes exclusives. And since I love to hear from readers, they can send me an email using my CONTACT page.

To join my MAILING LIST, I reward this behavior with special exclusive offerings & contests and my quarterly newsletter has excerpt teasers and other fun stuff. I also have a Myspace blog. And I’ve just built a great site at HarperCollins full of fun tidbits.