Dead to You Blog Tour: Q&A with Lisa McMann

Today I am lucky enough to be participating in Simon & Schuster Canada's blog tour for Dead to You by Lisa McMann. I had the pleasure of asking author Lisa McMann a few questions and here is what she had to say.

Many of your books, and especially Dead to You, have a thriller feel to them. What is it about that genre that attracts you to it?

I’m not really sure. All I know is that I like books where the ‘enemies’ are bigger than the ordinary teen, because it’s so freaking awesome when a teen character successfully overcomes it. Often one of those enemies is internal. And I like books with action. Where something’s terribly wrong, and maybe there isn’t a perfect way to make it right, but people will go through strange, sometimes sinister feats to make it right as they can, even if that only makes it more wrong. (Was that deep or what?)

Dead to You is about a boy who returns to his family after having been missing for 9 years. Where did the inspiration come from for writing this story?

The inspiration came from a story in The New Yorker, though I took the concept in a different direction. I think the story title was The Chameleon – don’t Google it if you haven’t read DEAD TO YOU yet, because it will spoil the ending.

How did you go about doing the research for Dead to You? 

I had several conversations with a child/teen social worker and spoke with someone at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. I also did a lot of online research.

Are any of the characters in Dead to You, or any of your other books, based on or inspired by people you know?

I guess all the characters I write have characteristics in them of people I know or have met along the way. Some of them have traits I admire and wish I had. In The Unwanteds, Mr. Today is inspired by a combination of two people I know – a mentor of mine, and a mentor of my daughter’s. In the WAKE trilogy, Captain is a lot like my friend Diane.

How would you describe Dead to You in one sentence for people who haven't heard about it?

DEAD TO YOU is about a boy who was abducted at the age of seven. Now he’s sixteen and he’s found his family back…but he doesn’t really remember them. (Sorry, that was two sentences. J)

Thank you to Lisa McMann for answering my questions, and to Simon & Schuster Canada for letting me be a part of this blog tour. Before you go be sure to check out the trailer for Dead to You below, and if you haven't already be sure to also check out my review to know what I thought of the book.