Welcome back, friend! Yesterday, I shared about my latest favorite by Constance Sayers, The Star and the Strange Moon. Today I am beyond thrilled to bring you think interview with one of my favourite authors! 🙂
From the author of A Witch in Time comes a haunting tale of ambition, obsession, and the eternal mystery and magic of film.
1968: Actress Gemma Turner once dreamed of stardom. Unfortunately, she’s on the cusp of slipping into obscurity. When she’s offered the lead in a radical new horror film, Gemma believes her luck has finally changed. But L’Etrange Lune’s set is not what she expected. The director is eccentric, and the script doesn’t make sense.
Gemma is determined to make this work. It’s her last chance to achieve her dream—but that dream is about to derail her life. One night, between the shadows of an alleyway, Gemma disappears on set and is never seen again. Yet, Gemma is still alive. She’s been transported into the film and the script—and the monsters within it—are coming to life. She must play her role perfectly if she hopes to survive.
2015: Gemma Turner’s disappearance is one of film history’s greatest mysteries—one that’s haunted film student Christopher Kent ever since he saw his first screening of L’Étrange Lune. The screenings only happen once a decade and each time there is new, impossible footage of Gemma long after she vanished. Desperate to discover the truth, Christopher risks losing himself. He’ll have to outrun the cursed legacy of the film—or become trapped by it forever.
About the author
Constance Sayers is the author of the #1 Amazon best-selling novel, A Witch in Time (2020 Redhook/Hachette) as well as The Ladies of the Secret Circus (2021 Redhook/Hachette) that received a starred review from Publishers Weekly. A finalist for Alternating Current’s 2016 Luminaire Award for Best Prose, her short stories have appeared in Souvenir and Amazing Graces: Yet Another Collection of Fiction by Washington Area Women as well as The Sky is a Free Country. Her short fiction has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. She received her master of arts in English from George Mason University and graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor of arts in writing from the University of Pittsburgh. She attended The Bread Loaf Writers Conference where she studied with Charles Baxter and Lauren Groff. A media executive, she’s twice been named one of the “Top 100 Media People in America” by Folio and included in their list of “Top Women in Media.” She lives outside of Washington DC. Like her character in The Ladies of the Secret Circus, she was the host of a radio show from midnight to six.
Get to know the author:Â Constance Sayers
Hi Constance! Welcome to Armed with A Book.
You mentioned in the acknowledgements for The Star and The Strange Moon that the idea for this came while you were researching A Witch in Time. Can you please share the starting point for this book?
While I was in Paris doing research for A Witch in Time, I came across a photo of a striking redhaired actress named Françoise Dorléac. Some quick research told a rather tragic story: Dorléac was older sister of Catherine Deneuve, and she was killed in a car accident in 1967. The muse of François Truffaut, her performance in The Soft Skin as a flight attendant who gets caught up in an affair with a married man elevates the entire film. She also pairs up with her sister (and Gene Kelly) in Jacques Demy’s The Young Girls of Rochefort which is a film a bit thin on plot, but so visually striking it’s like Technicolor eye candy. When I began to think of my main character, I always pictured Françoise Dorléac’s face as though I’d cast in the role of Gemma Turner. I hope my book honors her memory and people check out her work. She was a magnificent actress and she breathed life into my main character.
What do you do when you are focused on one project and another one sparks inspiration?
That has been the case with all three books that research for one has opened the idea for the other. Right now, I have three ideas for books swimming in my head. You must stop and focus on the one you’re writing, but the other ones are always in the background simmering, and it always gives me comfort knowing I have a bench of ideas waiting. I’m a big fan of writing 1,000 words a day when I’m in draft mode. That type of pace forces me into the book I’m currently writing.
Do you have a favorite quote or scene from The Star and the Strange Moon that you return to?
My favorite quote comes from Althacazur on the impact of film:
We went through millions of years with no real idea of how people lived, but that all stopped with film. It’s a living time capsule of your tiny little moment on this planet. Thanks to recordings and film, as a creature collective you are now knowable . . . the way you spoke, dressed…Whether you’re worthy of all the film you take up, well, that’s a different question entirely, but it’s all there for the future, who never have to wonder about you.
Gemma wanted to collaborate with her director and she got her wish in a twisted manner. Can you please provide details about Althacazur? Who is he? Where does he come from?
Althacazur appears in all three of my books. If you blink, you’ll miss him in A Witch in Time. He is the demon who comes to create the curse for Juliet’s mother. In The Ladies of the Secret Circus, he has a starring role as one of the major demons who creates Le Cirque Secret to contain his twin daughters. He’s bad, but you do root for him because he’s over the top and quite funny. My demons have a real Lord Byron-type of Victorian sensibility. Readers have confessed that he is their favourite characters (and they feel bad about it because, well…he’s a demon.) One of the princes of Hell, Althacazur is considered one of the most powerful demons, often called “Hell’s king,” primarily due to representing carnal pleasures, vanity, and lust. He also commands the eighth layer of Hell where the River Styx flows, making him very powerful in that other demons must pay a toll to cross the main river of the underworld. This power has put him crossways with Lucifer and they have a bitter rivalry in that the other demons of Hell think he’s too powerful. In his human form, he’s quite handsome and this has resulted in love affairs with two human women, both romances have ended tragically. If you liked Althacazur, his story is told in The Ladies of the Secret Circus. He deserves his own book.
I enjoy your take on horror. What attracts you to write about curses?
I worry about calling my books horror in the traditional sense because they don’t strike all the conventions that readers of that genre expect, so I worry fans will be disappointed by the amount of time the vampires on the page. They’re probably more fantasy or even magical realism with a touch of horror. The Star and the Strange Moon takes place on the set of a horror film, so I think this third book touches on the horror genre more than my last two books. Curses because they’re deals with the devil or his proxy and usually show the folly of humans which is always fun to explore as a writer.
The Star and The Strange Moon is a tribute to the film industry of the 1960s, going into the perils of show business as well as the evolution in technology over time through Christopher’s narrative. What kind of questions were you trying to answer in your research?
Throughout history, many people were superstitious that photos could “steal your soul” Film creates “magic” but is the actual act of filming magic? This idea was swirling around in my head and a major theme began to form: Could a film steal your soul? I loved setting the film in the 1960s French New Wave period because it was a such a pivotal moment in film where so many techniques like a handheld camera and jump cuts were used. The 1960s also gave us gothic Hammer films featuring Christopher Lee and TVs Dark Shadows. It’s such a pivotal period that I wanted to shine a light on that era in film history.
If you could go back in time, which year would you choose and why?
Probably the 1930s Hollywood. That time haunts me. I love Carole Lombard, Jean Harlow and William Powell.
In A Witch in Time, The Ladies of the Secret Circus as well as The Star and the Strange Moon, you explore multiple time periods. How do you decide which years to pick?
I usually chose a period that interests me, one that I want to explore further. I really love Belle Epoque Paris, 1930s Hollywood and the 1960s so those are my favorite times and I’ve done so much research that I feel comfortable in those settings, so I do return to them.
Do you have another book in the works already?
I do. I have about three swirling around but one that has made its way to my agent. It’s about the Grim Reaper.
I am excited for it! 🙂 What are some of your favorite books? I would love recommendations on what to pick up next.
I love the Mayfair Witches series by Anne Rice, Night Film by Marisha Pessl and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt (made me want to be a writer). I also just finished Red Rabbit by Alex Grecian and loved it. It’s a paranormal western about a bunch of outlaws in search of a witch with a bounty on her head. I haven’t read anything like it. I’ll also put two books on your radar for 2024: The Devil and Mrs. Davenport (Lake Union, March) by Paulette Kennedy about a housewife in the 1950s who begins hearing voices and Django Wexler’s How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying (Orbit, May) about a woman fed up with saving humanity and decides to become the Dark Lord herself.
Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me and sharing with my readers. 🙂
Thank you so much for joining us for the interview! Connect with Constance on Goodreads, her website, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. Add her book to your Goodreads and read my review here.
Also big thanks to the wonderful folks at Spark Point Studio for the opportunity to review an advanced copy of The Star and the Strange Moon and to interview Constance.
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