We’re very excited to be on the blog tour for Jeff Giles upcoming The Edge of Everything, and we have a great Q&A with Jeff to share, but first, here are the details!
The Edge of Everything by Jeff Giles (Twitter, Goodreads)Published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA on January 31st 2017
Genres: Action & Adventure, Fantasy & Magic, General, Love & Romance, Young Adult
Pages: 368
It's been a shattering year for seventeen-year-old Zoe, who's still reeling from her father's shockingly sudden death in a caving accident and her neighbors' mysterious disappearance from their own home. Then on a terrifying sub-zero, blizzardy night in Montana, she and her brother are brutally attacked in a cabin in the woods--only to be rescued by a mysterious bounty hunter they call X.
X is no ordinary bounty hunter. He is from a hell called the Lowlands, sent to claim the soul of Zoe's evil attacker and others like him. Forbidden to reveal himself to anyone other than his victims, X casts aside the Lowlands' rules for Zoe. As X and Zoe learn more about their different worlds, they begin to question the past, their fate, and their future. But escaping the Lowlands and the ties that bind X might mean the ultimate sacrifice for both of them.
Describe THE EDGE OF EVERYTHING in 5 words.
Love makes Hell break loose.
How did THE EDGE OF EVERYTHING come about, what was your inspiration? What made you think you had to write this story?
I wanted to write a love story but I also wanted to tell the story of a family whose love for each other withstands all kinds of tests and tragedies.
The inspiration for “The Edge of Everything” came one day when I was working as an editor at Entertainment Weekly. I got a mental image of a girl in the woods during a blizzard. She’s trying to find her brother and their dogs and get them home safely when she stumbles onto a murder on a frozen lake: a young, otherworldly-looking guy is trying to drown a man through a hole in the ice. I knew that the girl would put a stop to it—but I didn’t know anything else.
It turned out that the girl was named Zoe, and that she was from Montana and grieving the loss of her dad. The otherworldly young man was a bounty hunter from a place like Hell, and he’d come to collect a soul. He has no name so Zoe names him X. Then she tries to convince him to never go back.
Can you share (without spoilers) a line or section of THE EDGE OF EVERYTHING that is your favorite?
Picking a favorite is too much pressure! But here are some wistful sentences I like the sound of:
“Zoe scanned the darkness for X—and kept looking for him long past the point where it was clear that he wasn’t there. She felt as if she were watching his absence walk toward her. She felt sadness hollowing out her heart so it could lie down for a while.”
What upcoming 2017 release (not your own!) are you most excited to read?
Only ONE? Nooooo! I can’t choose between my friends’ novels, so I’ll pick a book by someone I don’t know personally: “Strange the Dreamer,” by Laini Taylor. I read an excerpt months ago, and I can still feel the story circulating in my blood. It’s about a librarian, named Lazlo, who’s obsessed with a legendary, lost city called Weep. He starts dreaming about a blue-skinned girl from the city who lives on plums and rain—and, I mean, I am all in. Taylor wrote “The Daughter of Smoke and Bone” series, of course. Her brain is a wonderland.
Do you have any strange writing habits?
I hate writing when it’s dark outside—so I get a lot less done in the winter!
What are you currently reading?
There’s always a tower of books on my bedside table, and it always falls over whenever I turn the lamp on or off. Right now, I’m rereading “Joan of Arc: In Her Own Words,” partly for research and partly because she’s just SO badass: “Abandon your forts and depart into your own country, or I shall raise such a war-cry against you as shall be remembered forever.” I just started Laurie Forest’s upcoming YA debut, “The Black Witch,” and I’m loving it. And I’m about 100 pages into a “grown-up” novel that EVERYONE raved about not long ago. I won’t mention the title because so far I kinda can’t stand it. Maybe it’s just me.
Any advice for aspiring writers?
Turn off the WiFi when you write. Try not to eat too much candy and, when you DO eat too much candy, forgive yourself. Read novels by authors who are nothing whatsoever like you.
What one YA Novel do you wish you had when you were a teen?
Lately, I’ve been obsessing over A.S. King’s new novel, “Still Life with Tornado.” It’s incredibly honest about what it’s like to grow up in a home that feels unsafe, but it’s ALSO got an affirming, optimistic message about how you can eventually find the holy trinity of peace, love and understanding. The book has some magical realism in it, and the main character, Sarah, keeps meeting herself at different ages. By talking to Sarahs from the past and future, she begins to figure out her toxic family. As a teen, I would have loved-loved those bits of fantasy, and I’d have been grateful to hear that there was reason for hope.
What’s next for you? Are you working on anything right now that you can tell us about?
I’ve written most of the sequel to “The Edge of Everything.” X, the bounty hunter, goes back to the underworld and searches for his parents, who he’s never known.
Tell us 3 random facts about you.
1) When my daughter was little, I used to cut her sandwiches into really weird, uneven shapes so she’d laugh when she opened her lunchbox. Once I used a cookie cutter to cut a star out of the middle.
2) I was an extra in “The Lord of the Rings.”
3) I’ve never had a cup of coffee. I don’t like the way it smells. How can ANYONE like the way it smells?
Favorites
Favorite Song (right now): “Vice,” by Miranda Lambert.
Favorite Book (right now): “Where’d You Go, Bernadette” by Maria Semple.
Favorite TV show: “Dr. Who,” the David Tennant and Matt Smith years.
Favorite Word: Humane.
Favorite Color: Green. I like it so much that I don’t even HAVE a second favorite.
Favorite Curse Word: Honestly, I like most of them.
About Jeff Giles
eff Giles is a writer based in Montana. He was previously the Deputy Editor of Entertainment Weekly, where he oversaw all coverage of movies and books. Prior to EW, Giles was an arts writer and editor at Newsweek, where, among other things, he served as a Rohan Army extra in “Lord of the Rings” while chronicling the trilogy from start to finish (Peter Jackson shot a close-up of him, then cut it, saying he “looked silly.”) Giles has freelanced for many outlets, including Rolling Stone and The New York Times Book Review.
Jeff’s debut novel, THE EDGE OF EVERYTHING (Bloomsbury Kids, January 31, 2017) is a Young Adult Contemporary/Fantasy. A Montana girl, who’s grieving after the mysterious death of her dad, chases her little brother into a blizzard—and stumbles on a bounty hunter from the underworld who’s come to take a soul. She tries to help him escape his life before all hell breaks loose.
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