Interview With D. Gabrielle Jensen

​1) What genres do you write in and why?

I write mostly urban fantasy but occasionally I will dabble in poetry or literary fiction. I was a teenager in the era of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I saw the movie when it was new, and I was fairly impressionable which meant it kind of became my whole identity. I loved the ultra-femme heroine battling against (primarily) male enemies with superhuman strength. She was the kind of girl I thought girls should look up to. At the time, I was writing psychological horror/thrillers a la Fear Street but as I got older, I saw more of that Buffy influence in my writing. All of the elements of horror were still present—shadow creatures, vampires—but in a less horrific way.
It wasn’t until recently, probably in the last ten years or so, that I learned about urban fantasy. Ironically, I learned a lot from reading male protagonists like Harry Dresden but the more I dug, the more I learned, Buffy was the rule, Dresden was the exception. Urban fantasy had come out of a rebellion against the predominately male gatekeeping in high and epic fantasy and as such urban fantasy was predominately female battling against (primarily) male enemies with superhuman strength. In essence, urban fantasy adopted me rather than the other way around.

2) Describe your writing style

I try to keep narration informal and conversational, as if I were telling the story to a friend, adding in bits of humor to keep things from getting too dark. I weave music in wherever I can, as well, through visual allusions to lyrics, character names taken from songs, or characters who are musicians.

3) What inspires you to write?

I get a lot of ideas from dreams and music. Music is probably truly the only thing that has been present in my life longer than stories. I learned to read and play songs on the jukebox about the same time.

4) Who are your favourite authors?

Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and Jim Butcher. I admire the way all of King’s hundreds of stories connect in some way. I love Gaiman’s use of whimsy to offset sometimes extreme darkness. And I have a great appreciation for Butcher’s adaptability. Many only know him for the Dresden Files but he has completed another series of high fantasy called the Codex Alera and it is a completely different style and I only hope I am able to create such notable distinction in my varied series.

5) Tell us something unusual about you

I didn’t learn to ride a bicycle until I was eleven years old and the counsellors at a sleepaway camp didn’t give me a choice. I never got very good at it.

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