Rachel Koller Croft is the USA TODAY bestselling author of We Love the Nightlife and Stone Cold Fox. She is also the WGA award-nominated screenwriter of Torn Hearts. She’s currently developing her novels for film and television. Rachel lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Charles, and their rescue pitbull, Juniper.
Tell us about your latest book, We Love the Nightlife.
The short pitch: London disco vampires! But at its heart, We Love the Nightlife is about a decades-long friendship that’s grown toxic between two women and in an effort to save what’s left between them, they decide to open a nightclub together in London that’s reminiscent of their glory days in 1979…and they just happen to be vampires.
What inspired you to dive into writing about vampires?
It was actually the last piece of the puzzle. I was thinking about how to make the story of a friendship breakup more compelling and high stakes – forgive the pun, I never mean it – and vampirism really played well into the themes I wanted to explore. Plus, I love horror and spooky stuff in general so it was exciting to dive headfirst into a supernatural realm for my second novel.
This book focuses a lot on female friendship. What made you want to put that relationship at the core?
Every single woman I know has an awful friendship breakup story that still haunts them. And there’s not a specific language for it in the way that there is for a romantic breakup, but it can hurt just as much. So I wanted to explore the rise and fall of a formative female friendship, the highs, the lows and everything in between.
You get to play around with some historical fiction elements in the book, what did the research for that look like?
Yes, that was a real treat! I was living in London at the time I pitched the story to my editor and initially I thought I’d set it in New York or LA. But because I found London so inspiring, I changed course, which really helped the vampiric elements of the story, too. Every place mentioned in the novel is somewhere I spent time or frequented – except for Tramp, but maybe next visit. Also, I asked two of my English friends for voice passes where Nicola was concerned, as well as my father-in-law who is a Yorkshireman. I wanted the trip to feel like a trip to the UK and readers seem to agree! All this to say, the research was very boots-on-the-ground.
What are some of your favorite vampire stories?
All iterations of Interview with the Vampire, True Blood and the Sookie Stackhouse books it’s based on, and this really weird, amazing Nicolas Cage movie, Vampire’s Kiss.
Who is the best vampire of all time (besides the ones you’ve written)?
For me, it’s gotta be Alexander Skarsgard as Eric Northman. WOW. I also love Lestat.
Describe how you get into the cozy, fall reader/writing zone.
I live in Los Angeles so sometimes the weather doesn’t exactly cooperate, but I’m very into luxury fragrance, a soft robe, the “Nancy Meyers’ Kitchen” playlist on Spotify and a nice glass of wine when cracking into a new book. I’m also a mood reader so I tend to read sweeping family sagas or melancholy literary fiction in the colder months.
As for writing, my home office is spooky season all the time. I call the vibe Beetlejuice meets The Secret Garden. I have a lot of oddities in my space that inspire me and it’s a really great room for being creative.
In your debut, Stone Cold Fox, the movie you wrote, Torn Hearts, and now your latest novel, you tend to feature “wicked” women. What draws you to the darker side of the female experience?
I don’t know if I’d call it the darker side, but perhaps a reckoning with a realistic side? We all contain multitudes. And what I find the most fascinating about my characters is that they are largely underdogs or women that are aiming higher than their station in life. And they will do anything to get it. Literally anything. That’s exciting to read about and to write about. So some may call them wicked but I call them passionate – and scrappy!
What are you working on next?
I’m working on a novel that explores a marriage – that’s all I’m going to say for now!
We Love the Nightlife by Rachel Koller Croft
Is anything bloodier than a female friendship turned toxic? For two vampires, one centuries old, the other her more recently turned partner for fifty years, the 70s disco era that fueled their connection has fallen flat. But now, the younger wants out from the other’s grasp after a terrible betrayal, but the escape could be dangerous and would certainly turn deadly if she is caught.
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