Eric Still (he/him) is a dark fantasy author from Los Angeles California. If he’s not writing, he’s gaming, reading, or cuddling his cat, Grim. Loves horror, cooking, and showing love and support to his loved ones!
Author Links
Website: www.ericstill.com
Instagram and Threads: @eric_authority
Linktree: linktr.ee/eric_authority
Tell us a little about your series “Blood Creed”, and your latest release, Genesis. What inspired this story and did you always plan this to be a series?
There are a lot of things that inspired the series as a whole, but the biggest ones would have to be the mythological adaptations in Percy Jackson and the dark and nefarious premise of Marvel’s Blade.
I always intended for Blood Creed to be a series, given the character arcs and sheer extent of the lore require more pages than one book would permit.
Genesis and the Blood Creed series deals a lot with philosophies around existence and the nature of sin – what philosophies did you include in the story, and how do these questions play out in the book(s)?
I love this question! So, the beginning of chapter 1 starts with a brief narrativization alluding to the primary theme of sin as a whole as it pertains to humanity. However, the series as a whole is really going to dig into it all.
Genesis, specifically, challenges the nature of being, and where the root of sin and virtue reside. There is an immediate presumption that demons are sinful, and there are seeds that challenge this and presents sin more holistically and with a forlorn consideration as to if it ought to be demonized, pun very much intended!
While planning the series, have any characters surprised you in terms of their arcs and development, or has everything so far gone according to plan?
So, I primarily outline, but in “sticking to the plan,” I adapt and come upon really amazing ideas and discoveries.
It is in viewing something more complete that I find myself able to bolster it the most, and especially in Genesis, I ended up building a character up and granting a paradoxical sympathy to in order to really have the teeth of their situation pierce deeper into the reader.
Less of a one-and-done and more of a challenge to the conception of the aforementioned topic of sin and the nature of a being.
What drew you to New Adult for this series – did you consider YA at any point, or ageing up further to Adult, or did you always feel NA was the right range, and why?
I considered this topic upon finishing the book, namely my beta readers and editors. It isn’t really clear cut, but given this is the Genesis of the series and the main characters are either adults or turning to adults, I the argument for it being YA was significantly weaker considering the dark themes of the book, and the series gets darker and bloodier, so New Adult is more appropriate to me at least.
What other primary themes run through your work that appear in Genesis, and what informs your writing on these themes?
This book is chock-full of several references and themes, but the primary themes I should mention would be the complex nature of what spurs “evil” and how considerations toward that evolve and spur growth in others.
I wrote the book in omniscient, and given lore details I won’t spoil here, I am going to judiciously use that to flesh out characters sooner forgotten as to subvert pervasive formulas while granting them their due respect.
I will guarantee that if you come to enjoy the villains I write, they WILL be done justice under this premise I am abiding by. Gotta develop our villains just like we do our protagonists, I say!
What are you most looking forward to writing in the future books in the Blood Creed series?
I am sure every author hyperfixates and fantasizes about that “one” scene that inspired their story, and I am pridefully included in that cliche. I have SEVERAL I have had in my head for over a decade, which was when I first started making lore, but … Book two is going to be the “heaviest” book in the series, and a particular chapter I am going to write is one that I am most anxious to do right for several reasons.
I love darkness as much as the next edgelord, but I am tasteful and don’t wish to romanticize elements of trauma, merely to encapsulate and immerse my readers in it. If anybody ever reads this interview after reading book two, when I publish it, they will know the chapter/scene I am referring to.
Another mention would have to be what I have in mind for book 4, and the allegorical significance that book will bring with it. Either way, I am super excited to bring this series to life!
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