I first had the idea to write Benandante after I watched Penny Dreadful. I fell in love with that show and wasn't ready to let the world go. There was one thing I felt they got wrong though. The relationship between Vanessa and Ethan. To me, it should have stayed a lingering feeling of possibility between them. That was partly why I decided to make my FMC a recent widow. I don't remember exactly how I came across the benandanti folklore, but once I did, there was no other witch I wanted Mrs. Euphemia Beaufort to be.

There are many tales about the seventh son of a seventh son possessing supernatural abilites. This was the obvious way to give Mr. Ezra Morgan a power that could assist Mrs. Beaufort without making him her direct enemy or ally. And why not make him a gifted pianist and aspiring composer?

As for the idea of the Netherworld, that came from a Russian movie called Night Watch. Having a space between our world and the hell-like area called the Abyss, where souls for good and evil fight, was a layer I wanted to include. My Netherworld is like a shadow of our world. Only Benandanti, Streghe, and other supernatural beings can access it.

Now I just needed a story to use these settings and characters in. I happened to read the Sumerian myth of Inanna's Descent. The translation I read made Inanna cold toward her lover. She had no qualms about sending him to the underworld to take her place. So, I thought what if Mrs. Beaufort's husband had killed Jack the Ripper and Jack the Ripper ended up being a lord of the Abyss. And his wife thinks revenge will heal the hole in her heart. So, the Mistress of the Abyss sends ancient evils to London to capture the Benandante responsible, but that proves more difficult than she thought.

Who will soothe the grief of the Mistress of the Abyss by staying with her? You'll have to read the book to find out.

Benandante is an Edwardian fantasy releasing 9/15/26.