Author Interview: Sarah Kay Moll

Today I'd like to welcome Sarah Kay Moll, author of the LGBT+ crime thriller Dark City (I can't wait to read it!) She was kind enough to answer some of my questions.

When did you know you wanted to be a writer?

As a kid, I wanted to be everything from an actress to an astronaut. It wasn't until I got to college and started writing seriously that I thought of it as a possible career option, but even then I was more interested in becoming a clinical psychologist or a librarian. When I came up with the idea for Dark City, though, then I knew I had found
something that was worth devoting my time to, and I wanted to be the author that would create this book. 

What was your inspiration for Dark City?

My inspiration for Dark City is all over the place. I love all sorts of books, from literary fiction to comic books, and have eclectic taste in movies and video games as well. A lot of the inspiration for Dark City did come from Batman, and the city is very similar to Gotham, particularly as it's portrayed in the Christopher Nolan movies. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara, my absolute favorite book, was also a huge source of inspiration, though there aren't a lot of obvious similarities between her work and mine. 

If you could jump into the world of any book, which would it be and why?

There are a lot of books I absolutely love but wouldn't want to jump into the world of--Game of Thrones springs to mind! But there are some I'd love to visit. If I could, I would jump into the world of the Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss. I would love to just sit in a tavern and hear Kvothe play and tell some stories. 

What advice do you have for aspiring writers?

Most writing advice is really just personal preference. The beauty of writing is that you can do just about anything, in just about any way you want to, as long as you do it well and with enough confidence. The only two rules a writer must follow are that you must write and that you must read. If you don't read, your stories and your prose will become stale. 

What is your favorite and least favorite thing about being a writer?

My favorite thing by far is that feeling I get when I'm writing. When the words are flowing and the story is shining, it's so intoxicating it's almost like being high. I chase that feeling every day when I sit down to write. My least favorite thing has got to be the marketing. It's really, really hard to sell a book. I understand this because as a reader I'm pretty skeptical when I go to buy, but as an author it's very difficult to get your work out there and find an audience, particularly when you write in an ill-defined genre like I do. 

What are you currently reading?

I am currently reading three books, which is about normal for me. The first is Metro 2033, which is translated from the original Russian, and is a post-apocalyptic thriller about a world where humanity has been driven underground and struggles to survive in the Moscow Metro. The second is called Sonny Montes and Mexican American Activism in Oregon. It's nonfiction about the Chicano movement as it arose from farmworker communities in western Oregon, right near Portland, where I live. I work for a small nonprofit that serves farmworkers (among others) here in the Portland metro area, so I've found it really interesting. The third book I'm reading is called Amigos, and it's a romance novel and (hopefully) the first "grown-up" book I'll finish reading entirely in Spanish. 

About Dark City:

Jude has a tender heart. Yet he was born into a criminal empire and groomed from childhood to step into his father's violent footsteps. To survive, he created a second personality. Ras is everything Jude isn't--cruel, remorseless, and utterly without fear, as incapable of love as Jude is of malice.

But when Ras meets a ruthless socialite, he begins to feel a strange stirring of emotion, a brush of Jude's passion against his own dark heart. Meanwhile, Jude finds himself with a knife in his hand, the evil in Ras's soul bleeding into his own.

As the walls between them crumble, they could lose everything--their lovers, their family, and their hold on the dark city itself.

Coming together could break them...or make them whole.

Check it out on Amazon

About Sarah Kay Moll:

Sarah Kay Moll is a wordsmith and an amateur homemaker. She's good with metaphors and bad with coffee stains, both of which result from a writing habit she hasn't been able to quit. She lives a mostly solitary life, and as a result, might never say the right thing at parties. She's passionate about books, and has about five hundred on her to-read pile. When she does go out, it's probably to the library, the theater, or the non-profit where she works.

Sarah lives in a beautiful corner of western Oregon where the trees are still changing color at the end of November and the mornings are misty and mysterious. She spends her free time playing video games and catering to her cat's every whim.

Disclosure: this post contains links to an affiliate program (Amazon), for which I receive a few cents if you make purchases.