Trilina Pucci is the author of the new novel One Killer Night. Her other books include the forthcoming Evil Is Forever.
Q: What inspired you to write One Killer Night, and how did you create your characters Goldie and Noah?
A: I have a deep affection for all things scary movie, even if I watch them through my fingers because I get scared easily.
What I love though, isn’t just the slasher element. I'm in love with that peak time in the 2000s where there was a romantic tie between two characters that existed as a subplot. For example, Jennifer Love Hewitt’s and Freddie Prince Jr.’s characters in I Know What You Did Last Summer.
The idea of mixing romantic tension and that kind of heart-pulsing fear seems like a marriage made in heaven.
Goldie and Noah, however, were born from the song "These Dreams," by Heart.
I heard it playing on my Spotify list and suddenly their first kiss, the entire meet cute sprung into mind. It truly played out like a movie in my head, and I thought it was so hilarious, but the characters also felt like they had bite. Noah and Goldie have grit.
So I knew it wasn't a regular romcom I was envisioning, and when I sat with it longer I just kept thinking how incredible it would be if these two were falling in love in the midst of being the main characters in a scary movie situation.
Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?
A: I always know the end and the beginning of every novel; the middle’s always murky. But I did make changes along the way just to ensure I was planting the right seeds for plot and highlighting what I needed to shine through for the reader. But I always write the end first before anything else.
The follow-up to One Killer Night, Evil Is Forever, is a book that caught me off guard for the first time in my writing career, because the villain changed once I got to the end and I realized I’d been subconsciously laying the groundwork all along.
Q: How would you describe the dynamic between Goldie and Noah?
A: Electric. The chemistry is unmistakable. They’re two people who feel an instant attraction.
It's the kind of attraction that makes it hard to stop smiling when you're looking at the other person. The kind that makes you immediately feel shy, and also hyperaware of every reaction your body is having because the attraction is so in your face.
I also really like them as people, which is strange to say because they're fiction, but they both operate with a similar moral code and an appreciation for family that really bonds them.
They just always felt like two people that if they were real in the world, everyone around them would say, “Those two are meant for each other.”
Q: What do you hope readers take away from the book?
A: I love the idea of people walking away from reading this book remembering that love conquers all. That it’s imperative to fight for the things you love. That the sum of your parts does not define who you are, that definition can only be decided by your character, your humanity, and how you love the others around you.
Also never leave your front door unlocked.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I just closed up the follow-up book, Evil Is Forever. When I tell you it’s a total vibe. It is! The slasher fun continues, new characters get to surprise everyone and there’s a twist nobody will see coming.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: I guess I’d just say that I’m so excited to release this book, and to have this opportunity to expand my readership. I hope everyone enjoys it and has as much fun reading as I did writing it.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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