Hello and Welcome All!
Today I’m very lucky to be interviewing Melanie Snow author of Witch’s Tail.
Hi Melanie, thank you for agreeing to this interview. For those readers not familiar with you, would you please tell us a bit about yourself?
I am one of those people who has done a lot in my life. I could make a huge list but I promise to spare you with a list of e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g. I have taken on some very cool things from being a professional apple picker to running with wild wolves.
Throughout my life animals have been tightly seated in my core. They have guided me, kept me safe (even the wolf that followed me in minus sixty degrees), and have lent moments of balance when challenged with many life decisions.
I say tightly seated because animals are my inspiration, intuition, and my life’s direction. Without them my work as an author, animal medium and communicator would be extremely different.
I live deep in the woods with my husband, dog, and the wild animals that pass by daily in front of the windows in my writing studio. Moose have made snuffle prints on my windows while I meditated, momma hawks have taught their babies to fly while I watched, and coyotes have howled while I write. Nature keeps me happy and balanced . . . which is important to me as a writer.
No matter where or what I write my life experiences are there. Right there—honest and alive—my paranormal cozy mystery series are based on some of my experiences!
What do you do when you are not writing?
I’m a full-time author. But I’m also a professional animal communicator and medium. I work with people all over the world helping them with their animals, supporting them on their pet loss grief journey, and increasing their understanding of the human-animal bond utilizing an insightful and intuitive tradition.
When I am not writing or communicating with animals I read, hike with my doggo Addie, swim long-distance in open water until the water hits about fifty degrees, and cook yummy healthy meals. As a full-time author, I make sure I include all of those in my daily self-care.
What are some books you have enjoyed recently?
Herb Magic by Patti Wigington
Green Witchcraft by Paige Vanderbeck
Tarot: Mastering the Art of Intuitive Reading by Theresa Reed
How do you relax?
My favorite way to relax is to make a bee-line to my screened in porch whenever I can. Of course, I’m in my pjs—totally necessary. But the best part is when I curl up with a cup of tea, my dog Addie, and a paranormal cozy in the dark.
Witch’s Tail
Tell us all about your main characters — Who are they? What make them tick?
I have a few main characters in The Spellwood Witches series but my protagonist Sarah Spellwood was a lot of fun to write. Watching her transform and grow with each book was an amazing experience as an author. I loved hanging out with her. It’s always nice to appreciate a character’s journey.
Sarah is all about living for a higher purpose and rekindling her true nature to be wise and discerning. She is extremely instinctual but it takes her self-acceptance and self-evaluation to reach her mission. As long as Sarah can advocate and make the world a better place, she is good. But when things don’t go as planned her world is wonky.
One of the main characters is Sarah’s familiar and dog Addie. Addie’s main goal is to help Sarah feel content with her choices. However, Addie isn’t about making it easy for Sarah. As a familiar she strives to support Sarah but also reminds her when she is getting obsessive and too orderly.
How did you come up with the title?
I spend a significant amount of time with the paranormal. When I write I go to my magical place where I learn new and exciting lessons from my characters as well as their names and titles for the books. Everyone has a say with the title. If one character doesn’t like the choice I made, I find out why. I keep working the title up until the point where everyone agrees.
What was your favorite chapter (or part) to write and why?
This is a tough one. Honestly, each chapter was a blast to write so I can’t pick one—because each one had a special quality and excitement to it. As I was writing each chapter, each character gave me the choice to get to know them better. I made a promise to each of them that I would share their opinions, their side of the stories, and their needs and wants. This became a remarkable experience for me therefore each chapter had favorite parts to experience and write.
However, the prologue was very exciting. I was making a commitment to begin telling the tail (yes spelled correctly) of The Spellwood Witches. A journey very near and dear to my soul.
What did you enjoy most about writing this book?
I love every part of writing each book in my series. But I have to admit it’s super special when my characters talk to me about their needs, wants, and desires. When I was brainstorming The Spellwood Witches. I was hiking on my favorite mountain, which of course is in the series, sporting its paranormal name. When I got to the top and I was working on character development with my intuitive spirit team, I caught a glimpse of some tiny little bits of energy hanging out on a low bush. I hung out with that energy for a while and suddenly, I “saw” these little faeries. The main one was the most vocal. When she revealed herself—whoa—she was snarky, fun, and full of opinions. She demanded to be in the series. Hence, Addie and I got the entire download in one sitting. It was super fun.
Thank you very much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to take part in this interview.
Her mentor died fighting to save an enchanted forest. Can she solve his murder before she’s bewitched?
The Spellwood Witches
Book One
Melanie Snow
Genre: Paranormal Cozy Mystery
Publisher: Spirit Paw Press, LLC
Date of Publication: September 8, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-7324375-6-2
ASIN:
Number of pages: 220
Word Count: 46,311
Cover Artist: Molly Burton
Book Description:
Can she awaken her dormant powers and stop a desperate killer destroying the forest?
Sarah Spellwood feels she’s hit bottom. Divorced and jobless, she relocates to the enchanting village of Witchland intent on solving the murder of her late mentor. But as she pursues clues buried in the man’s fight to save the endangered forest-dwelling lynx, she makes an enemy of a ruthless land developer.
Encountering fairies in the woods, Sarah discovers she’s been repressing unique gifts passed down from her ancestor and founding witch, Lativia Spellwood. But though she can now hear her deceased friend’s dog speak, she isn’t sure her abilities are enough to expose the greed and corruption covering a killer’s lies.
Can Sarah work with the magical beings to bring a murderer to justice?
Witch’s Tail is the charming first book in the light-hearted The Spellwood Witches cozy mystery series. If you like paranormal puzzles, delightful canine companions, and environmental enlightenment, then you’ll love Melaine Snow’s wagging-ly fun whodunit.
Buy Witch’s Tail to set a snare for an assassin today!
Prologue
Lativia Spellwood sat on her ghostly throne of branches on the summit of Mount Katribus, with many other ghosts swarming around her reminiscing about life and drinking wine.
The ghosts of Witchland residents always came to this clearing after they died to stay near Lativia for guidance and to wait until they were ready to pass on to the afterlife. Lativia had been dead for hundreds of years but had still not passed on, for her work overlooking Witchland and its forest was not yet done. One day, it would be, and she was beginning to welcome that time, for she was growing very tired.
A tiny troop of Leekin faeries moved about the arms and legs of Lativia’s throne, placing flowers into the holes between the woven boughs. They did that every day, as a way to honor her as Queen of the Forest.
Lativia sipped from a goblet of ghost wine, enjoying the blue fire as it spread down her throat, engulfing her in tingly warmth. Being a ghost was always cold; the magic wine was one of the few momentary sources of warmth that she could cherish.
“What else do you need, my queen?” chirped one of the Leekins, buzzing on tiny brown wings before her nose.
Lativia smiled. “I think it’s time I checked on Sarah, don’t you agree?”
The Leekin nodded excitedly and flew off into the woods. A huge bunch of Leekins soon returned, flying in formation to carry the weight of a glowing crystal ball. They lowered it to Lativia’s lap, where it sank through the spectral outlines of her legs. Lativia could pass through things, and things could pass through her, for her physical body was long gone and all that remained was her powerful soul
Lativia smiled even more broadly and began to draw her transparent ghostly hands over the ball, summoning the blood bond she shared with her descendent, Sarah Spellwood.
Gradually, the fog inside the ball began to clear and an image of Sarah’s frizzy explosion of red curls filled it. Lativia drew back a few feet with her mind and saw Sarah was at a coffee shop ordering a vegan sandwich. Sarah’s love and respect for animals always made Lativia proud. She noticed there was a conspicuous pale and indented band of skin on Sarah’s ring finger where her huge diamond wedding ring had once been. “That no-good husband of hers is finally gone!” Lativia crowed with delight. But then she noticed that there were bags under Sarah’s eyes, the bags of someone who had been up all night crying. Sarah must be heartbroken, Lativia thought with a heavy heart.
The barista serving Sarah froze when she saw Sarah’s last name on the credit card receipt. “Um, are you related to . . . ?”
Sarah drearily raised her hand. “Yep, I’m descended from Lativa Spellwood.”
“That’s amazing! I mean, have you ever been to Witchland and looked at the Lativia memorabilia?” The barista’s pigtails wiggled with her excited body language, and Lativia felt a swell of pride that people still remembered and even revered her. It had been four centuries and she was still honored as the greatest witch of New England, the one who had turned into a wolf and fought her way free of her captors at the Salem Witch Trials!
“Yep,” Sarah said, her voice full of annoyance. It was clear she was ready to dash out of the coffee shop.
As good of a lawyer as Sarah was, Lativia noticed how awkward she was around most people, and how little she liked to disclose personal details, especially of her magical ancestry.
Sarah was a woman of facts and logic, which is why she fought the magical powers pulsing through her like a current, trying to pull her back to her destiny. Her resistance to her true self and her stubborn adherence to logical facts made her unpopular with many people. Lativia yearned to watch Sarah blossom into her beautiful potential.
“Don’t you see?” Lativia cried. “You are not meant to be in New York! You should be here, following your calling, completing my work as a witch! You’re not happy there!” But Sarah couldn’t hear these words.
“Yes, yes,” several Leekins agreed. A ghost who was standing near Lativia also nodded his head.
Sarah trudged out of the coffee shop, carrying her drink and the sandwich in a paper bag. A man in a trench coat bumped into her, and she hastily checked her pockets to ensure he had not pickpocketed anything. Then she continued on to her office, a massive steel gray prison with spikes in the window ledges to repel pigeons. There was no sign of life anywhere but for the scraggly maple planted out front of the building and a few waxy tropical plants blooming inside the lobby. Lativia groaned, feeling the despair and coldness of the place.
“It’s time for you to come here, to your destined home,” Lativia declared. “My Leekins have told me about the Hunter tracking lynx and the land surveyors, and I sense that there is about to be trouble in the forest.”
At the mention of the Hunter, the Leekins gathered around her throne began to turn blue and tremble in terror.
“I am not strong enough to fight these battles much longer, so I need you to come home, to come into your true self. Your marriage fell apart of its own accord, and I sense your job is about to unravel on its own, too. You can’t fight destiny,” Lativia said, giving the group of hovering Leekins their crystal ball back and shutting her eyes. “I could use magic to bring you to your destiny sooner, but it is evil to interfere with one’s life that way. I can only hope you don’t take much longer.”
She opened her eyes as the Leekins cried, “We need her!”
Melanie Snow is the pen name for Wendy Van de Poll, a bestselling author, pet loss grief coach, and animal medium. She is the author of The Spellwood Witches, a paranormal cozy mystery series.
Her books weave together positive magic, snarky forest faeries, and insightful animals with fun and eclectic humor. True life adventures and intuition are woven into her stories laced with unbridled imagination.
She has been followed by wild wolves in minus 60 degrees, hissed at by a mama bobcat, and played ball with a wild owl—among other animal encounters.
Find out more about her work: Website – Facebook – Instagram – Facebook Group – Amazon – Goodreads
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heather
October 6, 2020 at 6:06 pm
Where do you get your inspiration for writing?
BookLady
October 6, 2020 at 2:37 pm
Love the cover! Thanks for sharing.
Elizabeth H.
October 5, 2020 at 6:21 pm
Super cute cover! The book sounds great! Thank you for sharing it!
BookLady
October 5, 2020 at 6:04 pm
Congrats on the new release! Great interview and excerpt. I’d love to read more.
heather
October 5, 2020 at 4:46 pm
This sounds like a fun read for this time of year.
Daniel M
October 5, 2020 at 3:14 pm
sounds like a fun one
Marisela Zuniga
October 5, 2020 at 1:54 pm
I enjoyed the interview. this book looks great
Mary West
October 5, 2020 at 12:37 pm
This sounds like a really good book!
Julie Waldron
October 5, 2020 at 12:32 pm
I love the fun covers!
Kim
October 5, 2020 at 11:55 am
I really like the cover. I also enjoyed the interview.
Ken Ohl
October 5, 2020 at 11:41 am
this looks intriguing how do you develop a script for your books
Elaine G
October 5, 2020 at 11:35 am
Enjoyed reading the post. This sounds like a good book and great cover.
Lynn Brown
October 5, 2020 at 11:28 am
I love the cover, especially the dog. I love the paranormal genre. Thanks for the chance. Book sounds good.
Karen M
October 5, 2020 at 9:39 am
Sarah and Addie are a pair I will add to my TBR. Thank you for sharing your insight.
shelly peterson
October 5, 2020 at 9:16 am
This sounds really good.
Rita Wray
October 5, 2020 at 8:07 am
Sounds like a good read.
Melanie Snow
October 5, 2020 at 6:02 am
Thank you for such a fabulous time. I enjoyed my interview with you. And what a beautiful presentation on your website. A huge thank you and virtual hug.
Love,
Melanie
Angela
October 5, 2020 at 7:37 am
Good day Melanie,
It was my pleasure to have you visit and share about yourself and your book. I’m glad you enjoyed the presentation and thank you for visiting my site.
Angela