Unhinge
Genre: Romantic Psychological Suspense
Author: Calia Read
Release Day: January 12, 2015
With Unravel, Calia Read took readers inside the mind of a tormented young woman confined in Fairfax Mental Institute, seemingly without cause. In her new standalone novel of psychological suspense, UNHINGE (Ballantine Trade Paperback, On Sale 1/12/16), Read takes us back to Fairfax, this time to meet a very different patient, equally trapped, but doubly lost.
Hold your breath and count to ten.
Soon it will be over before it ever began.No matter how many times Victoria Donovan repeats that rhyme to herself, she’s still locked inside a mental institution.
Once upon a time, her life was a fantasy: Wes, the handsome fiancé, a storybook wedding and a white picket fence. But then a picture-perfect marriage warped into something sinister. As Victoria’s world twisted from dream to nightmare, her husband’s jealousy pushed her beyond the breaking point.
Calia Read breaks the mold in this explosive story that grabs hold and doesn’t let go until the shocking truth is revealed. UNHINGE is about a woman trying to reconstruct her past and find the truth somewhere between her memories and her madness with the help of a handsome, mysterious stranger.
PROLOGUE April 2014
Love holds so many secrets.
How it will hit.
When it will attack.
Where it will happen.
We are its playthings, walking around this world unaware that at any moment it will strike.
Don’t try to plan for it. Whether you fight or go willingly, love will wrap itself around you and when it does, you’ll never be free again.
I stared up at the fan slowly swirling above me. It was time to get ready for work. I knew that. But my mind wanted to take a trip down memory lane. I refuse to get sucked into the past and turn my head, but that’s a fool’s mistake because even though my bed was empty, I saw the image of my wife.
She was quietly sleeping. The sheets were drawn around her shoulders. The tips of her lashes brushed against her upper cheeks. One hand was draped across her forehead, the other hanging off the side of the bed.
The moment I met Victoria I should’ve known I was doomed. I should’ve paid attention. Felt the wind against my neck and the goosebumps that prickled my flesh. But I didn’t.
So I fell.
And I fell hard.
You could say our love was unreal.
Everything about Victoria was mysterious yet beguiling. Her smiles spoke of dreams, her lips the promise of something good to come. She held her secrets in one palm and her dreams in the next. And with her eyes dared me to choose one.
Ignoring them both, I went for her heart.
Then she became my wife.
I read Unhinge with my heart in my throat the entire time. It was filled with so many twists and turns, I had no idea which end was up by the end. And it completely sucked me in! So I’m so excited to have Calia Read here at DGR today, talking all things Unhinge and answering all my questions.
DGR: Can we start by having you introduce yourself to readers that may not be familiar with your books yet?
CR: I’m Calia Read! 🙂 I’m Mom to four (pregnant with the fifth) kids and married to a soldier. So basically I move every other year. For me writing (And reading) is the perfect escape from my hectic life. Although when it comes to the Fairfax stories they can be crazier than my real life.
DGR: Unhinge is a standalone but set in the same world you created in Unravel, can you tell us a little more about that?
CR: We first met Victoria (Pretend Mommy) in Unravel. I remember writing scenes with her character, being so intrigued by this woman who constantly hummed, rocked her baby, and seemed to live in this other world. I HAD to know her story and find out why she was at Fairfax.
DGR: The setting and feeling of Unravel and Unhinge are very unique and unlike anything I’ve read before. What sparked your interest in writing such a series?
CR: These characters REALLY gave me something to work with. They didn’t have cookie cutter personalities with fairy tale stories. They had flaws that I was so intrigued by. I had to know what happened in their past that would bring them to where they are in the present. At the end of each of these books I’m always shocked at what someone can go through!
“They say my name is Victoria.
They say I’m twenty-seven.
They say I’ve been in this psych ward for over a year.
They say my husband is dead, and that my daughter is too.
But. Wes visits me almost every night,
and I hold my daughter every day.
They say, they say, they say…
I say, it’s time to untangle the past, and uncover the truth.”
DGR: My interest was piqued just from that intriguing quote. What can you tell us about Victoria’s journey in this book?
CR: From the get-go, Victoria has heavily relied on the people around her to provide answers to questions that she has. And now she’s starting to doubt what they are telling her because it doesn’t line up with what she is seeing. With the help of her therapist and a mysterious stranger, she starts to uncover the truth of what actually brought her to Fairfax.
Victoria is so damaged and she may think she’s ready to accept her reality but when you’ve been away from the truth for so long it can break you even further.
And that’s what she has to deal with —handling her truth without crumbling.
DGR: I’d say Unhinge is a pretty apropos title for this book with everything that Victoria went through. Was it difficult writing from her POV and dipping into her inner psyche?
CR: I’m so glad you asked that because Victoria’s story was more difficult at times than Unravel. With Naomi, she so easily gave her story away. There was no barrier because her psyche allowed that barrier to be down. But with Victoria she was wounded and that wall was up. Big time. She may be a product of my imagination, but I had to push a lot harder to understand Victoria’s pain and what she was really feeling.
DGR: What was your favorite part about writing Unhinge?
CR: There’s nothing better than when you discover something about your character that you didn’t expect or when a scene you’ve been working on, in what feels like forever, finally weaves itself together.
DGR: Now how about the most difficult?
CR: I have to watch EVERYTHING the characters say, how they say it, and when they say it. At times it seems so simple but even normal conversations can be brutal to write because you’re thinking, “Wait. Should I reveal this yet?”
DGR: For readers that may not have read your Fairfax series, can you describe it for us in a few words?
CR: The Fairfax Series is not a typical series. It’s dark, and suspenseful. Yet has its far share (well A LOT) of romance. 🙂 The main characters are completely unreliable and deeply troubled. Their sense of reality is so skewed that nothing is what it seems.
DGR: What are the emotions/ thoughts that you’re hoping to trigger in readers with these books?
CR: I want the readers to question everything that plays out through the story. What appears to be the truth just might be a lie. I want the readers to really feel the characters pain and suffering. And their desperation to leave Fairfax and be what they consider a “normal” person. I want the readers to see that even with everything the character goes through, they’re incredibly strong. It’s always really, really important to me to show the love in these stories because that’s a huge catalyst in helping them move forward and gives them hope.
DGR: So what’s up next for you? Are you going to continue with Fairfax or do you have something different in mind?
CR: Right now I’m currently working on two stories: Lachlan book (the sequel to Unravel) and The Surviving Trace. I’m so excited about them because they’re unique from what’s out there.
DGR: I have to ask, if you will be writing more in Fairfax, will be we getting a book for Reagan?
CR: Oh yes! Besides Lachlan’s book, there will be one more Fairfax story. And that is Reagan’s. J She’s twisted, yet served as comedic relief during Victoria’s story. The very first scene she has with Victoria and I was hooked to her character! I kept wondering, “What is your story? What are you hiding from me?”
I see a bit of her story playing out, and she’s wicked and blunt and out of all the characters she has the darkest story.
DGR: Anything you’d like to leave the readers with?
CR: TRUST ME with Unhinge. 🙂 It will be confusing and you’ll be missing many, many pieces to the puzzle at the beginning but it all comes together at the end. I told someone a few days ago that Unravel well, slowly unraveled, but Unhinge doesn’t. Instead, Victoria gathers each fact and lines them up like dominos. At the end she tips just one fact over and they all go down.
Want to win a paperback of Unhinged? Enter HERE
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