Into the Red Cave, Author, Victoria Townsend Talks About Her New Book
I’m
sitting here with the author and artist of the graphic novel, Into the Red
Cave, A Horrific Comedy, Victoria Townsend. She’s a quiet woman casually
dressed and holding a mug of hot tea. We are outside on her back porch this
afternoon in the brisk air with the warm sun on our left side.
Her
book centers on the main character, Guy, who finds himself on a volcanic island
in the middle of the ocean. He meets three women who force him to do a
dangerous task, while struggling to stay alive in a harsh environment of
freezing temperatures and hot volcanic gases. He must rely on these women to
send him home or be abandoned for the rest of his life. This story has intrigued
me for its storytelling, and as a short story in one book.
Thank
you for meeting with me, are you ready?
Yes,
fire away.
Why
this story? How did you come up with this?
It
started as separate ideas on paper during the past ten years. I didn’t start
putting it together until last year. It’s a story for people to relate to as
they deal with their own difficulties and find a positive experience from the
story.
A
horror story?
It
is a horror story, but I added some light comedy as well, so it’s not so dark.
There are many emotions the characters experience such as shock, anger, rage,
hope, love, and despair. I don’t want to give too much away.
Yes,
there are three elements to the story, the illustrations that tell the story,
the text, and the word puzzles hidden within the text. I wanted the reader to
linger on the page instead of flipping through the book, so I set a challenge
for them. There’s no answer sheet for the puzzles so the challenge is harder. I
didn’t want to make it easy.
Is there a way to showcase their answers?
I thought about that and decided to leave it to the readers. There is a solution to the puzzle if you’re stuck. One word with its letters are scattered over one paragraph, The next word is done the same way in the next paragraph. Another way to find the answers is to use scrabble tiles (if you have Scrabble). That way you can move the letters around or write the letters on pieces of paper and use this method to find the answers.
I can see you left out the puzzle in the e-book version.
I
had trouble with the e-book conversion app, so I left it out and made sure to
tell readers before they brought the book.
Last
question, why self-publishing?
I’ve
been burned too many times in the past due to inexperience. My work has been
rejected without a clear explanation, taken as a donation without payment, or
someone else puts their name on my manuscript. With self-publishing, I know my
work still belongs to me and I have complete control of how the manuscript is
created and published. There will still be mistakes, yes, but I keep ownership
of my work.
I’ve studied how a book is put together
from the copyright page of another book. For example, ISBN stands for International
Standard Book Number and LCCN is Library of Congress Catalog
Number. This person created this typeface (text) or that person created the
Calibri font. You also do your own editing and make sure it looks professional.
I have someone to assist me with that. Selling your work, every step of the way
is up to the author. It has been a huge learning experience for me. To make a
book is time consuming and costly but well worth it. This is a project I’m
proud of.
Thank
you for the time and the tea, it was good meeting you.
Below
I have provided links for her book, Into the Red Cave, A Horrific Comedy
Print Book Print/ E-Book Ingramspark Amazon
