Belief in Fairies and Ghosts Inspires
Melissa Marr's New Adult Novel

Graveminder, A Novel
(William Morrow/
Harpercollins, June 2011)


Melissa Marr, New York
Times Bestselling Author

Melissa Marr

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New York Times bestselling author Melissa Marr, author of the WICKED LOVELY young adult series and other works, talks to Authorlink about her latest novel, GRAVEMINDER, and about her rise to success as a novelist.

In the gripping dark fantasy, GRAVEMINDER, Rebekkah Barrow never forgot the attention her grandmother Maylene bestowed upon the dead of Claysville, the small town where Bek spent her adolescence. There wasn't a funeral that Maylene didn't attend, and at each one Rebekkah watched as Maylene performed the same unusual ritual: She took three sips from a silver flask and spoke the words "Sleep well, and stay where I put you." Now Maylene is dead, and Bek must go back to the place she left a decade earlier. She soon discovers that Claysville is not just the sleepy town she remembers, and that Maylene had good reason for her odd traditions.

Anyone who adores dark fantasy and paranormal suspense will love this haunting tale of the walking dead. But it wasn't always easy for Melissa Marr to become a bestselling author. She studied and taught college literature for 12 years, and says she received more rejections than for the number of queries she sent out. She believes they sent the extra ones just for good measure. But when she finally landed an agent, her WICKED LOVELY novel sold within days.

Melissa Marr grew up believing in faeries, ghosts, and various other creatures. After her teaching career, she applied her fascination with folklore to writing. WICKED LOVELY was her first novel. Currently, Marr lives in the Washington, D.C., area, writes full-time, and still believes in faeries and ghosts.

--Doris Booth