Golden Blood’s Gemma Dishes Her Teen Time Travel Guide, with Author Melissa Pearl

My name is Gemma Louise Hart and yes, I can travel through time. Freaky, I know.

Man, I can’t believe I just told you that! My parents would kill me. I’m not supposed to tell anybody what I can do. It all goes back to this ancient oath. You see the first of my kind, the chosen seven… the electus. They appeared on the earth in like 100BC and were adopted by Quintus and Lucia. When the kids hit puberty, that’s the first time it happened. It’s like the body suddenly clicks into traveling mode or something. According to legend, Lucia died and when the kids found her they disintegrated to gold dust.

That’s how it happens… we disintegrate. I know, gold dust sounds pretty cool and everything, but it’s no picnic. It really hurts. You feel like your body is being torn apart and then stitched back together one particle at a time. We always recover quickly, but I can’t help resenting the pain just a little.

So back to my story… the electus disappeared then reappeared moments later. Quintus went rushing into the woods where Lucia had been hurt and there she was, sitting like a stunned mullet, having just witnessed her seven children appear naked out of nowhere, fight off the wolf pack that was about to attack her and then evaporate into gold dust again.

Everything changed after that. The whole village was sworn to secrecy… and the electus finally understood what they were put on this earth to do. You see, we… time spirits, travel to save others. We rewrite history for them. I don’t really have a say in the matter, my father decides, but I guess it’s kinda cool. I like that we can help people. I just… I mean I don’t want to sound ungrateful or anything, my gifts are pretty amazing – I just never asked for them.

And don’t even get me started on the whole naked thing. I’d love to ask whoever designed us, “Would it have really been that hard to include clothing in the traveling gig?” It’s SO embarrassing! I always run to the bathroom when I feel the travel coming on, that way I can’t get caught. I do always worry that I’m not going to make it one of these days and someone will see me. I often wonder what would happen if someone ever did. Would they freak out? They’d see me naked. That would freak ME out.

So, what else do you need to know? Oh yeah, when we’re “across the line” time is different. One hour over there is only a minute in the real world. I don’t know why it’s set up that way, probably so normal humans don’t wonder where we’ve gone to. A five-hour trip is just like a toilet stop in the real world, nothing suspicious about that.

So that’s a brief guide to my life. I stick to myself mostly, because I never know when I’m going to be ripped from this time and space. It gets lonely sometimes, but I’d rather deal with that than risk telling people the truth. At least this loneliness is self-imposed.

Hey Gemma, thanks for stopping by, and don’t worry we won’t tell a soul! [I’ll never look at gold dust the same again]

Here’s Gemma’s good friend, author of Golden Blood, Melissa Pearl:

The imagination is a magical place. I love hanging out in different worlds with characters I’ve created. I fall in love with each of them and they become so real. All my life, I’ve had stories dancing around between my ears. My mind’s eye can picture them all so clearly.

I remember hiding in my room or playing in the backyard, acting out scenes from stories I was creating. I never thought to write any of them down, funnily enough. It wasn’t until my bestie said she wanted to read one of my stories and suggested I write a book. I instantly loved the idea and when I got home that night, sat down and wrote the first five chapters. It was totally addictive. Suddenly any spare minute I had was given to bringing this story to life. It was the first time I had ever done anything that made me forget about time… and eating 🙂

Since then I have started to study the craft, improve my skills and learn to write what people really want to read. My goal is to continually write “impossible to put down” stories that capture the imagination and gift people that joy of stepping out of reality for a while. You just can’t beat that feeling.

Click here to join Melissa on Goodreads!