Tracy Wolff is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of sixty-four novels that run the gamut from young adult action adventures to new adult romance and from women’s fiction to erotica. A long-time devotee of vampires, dragons, and all things that go bump in the night, Tracy loves nothing more than combining her affection for paranormal creatures with her love of writing tortured heroes and kick-butt heroines. When she’s not writing (which is a rare occurrence), she can be found trying out new recipes, offering make-up tips online, wandering comic book/gaming stores with her sons, and watching movies or plotting stories with her besties. A one- time English professor, she now writes full-time from her home in Austin, Texas, which she shares with her family.
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Voyage: What was the inspiration behind your novel, Covet? What made you want to tell this story?
Tracy Wolff: The inspiration behind the Crave series came from me wanting to write about a girl who was a total outsider to the world that she lives in. I remember feeling like I didn’t fit in in high school, and so many of my female friends have said they felt the same way during their teen years for any number of reasons–being too tall or too short, not being pretty enough, being too smart or not feeling smart enough, having big breasts or not having big enough breasts, having curly hair or having too straight of hair… any number of things that we can’t and shouldn’t want to change. I took that feeling and amplified it for my main character, Grace, who has just lost her parents in a tragic car accident (which is alienating enough), but then added to it by transplanting her to a boarding school in Alaska filled with paranormal creatures she doesn’t understand and didn’t even know existed before she got to Katmere Academy. Grace really is a stranger in a strange land, and despite that, she comes into her power anyway. She saves herself. And, on a different note, I also really, really wanted to write a kick butt vampire book.
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V: When you write your stories, what is the one thing you hope readers will take away?
TW: I hope readers will find their own strength in my stories. I have a myriad of different characters in the Crave series, all flawed but all strong in their own way, and I hope readers recognize their own power and beauty as they watch my characters struggle through both mundane and extraordinary circumstances.
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V: What was the hardest scene of Covet to write?
TW: There are a few scenes at the end of Covet that are the culmination of everything I’ve built through the entire series. Weaving all the different strings together at the end of this two hundred and fifty thousand word book in a way that ties up everything I need to tie up before moving into the final book in the series was challenging, but also exciting.
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V: If you could tell your younger writer self anything, what would it be?
TW: Take a deep breath. It’s all going to be okay. Having a writing career is a marathon not a sprint and you need to pace yourself. There are a lot of hills to climb and a lot of valleys to wade through, but that’s okay, because it is all worth it.
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V: What are your writing must-haves?
TW: I don’t actually have any writing must-haves. I can write anywhere on pretty much anything (paper, laptop, tablet, phone) and when I’m in the zone, I can’t hear anything—even the noise of my three boys locked in our house during Covid quarantine. But what I do have when I sit down to do serious writing, is a quick little routine. I put my hair up in a Pebbles Flintstone type ponytail on the top of my head and do a quick little dance. It’s always the same dance—my time to write dance—and it is the thing that tells my mind it’s time to work.
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Head to our Instagram page (@voyageya) to hear Tracy Wolff read the first page of Covet! Find Tracy’s video under the IGTV tab.