We've been super excited to have Anne Greenwood Brown visiting us this week! Anne's been chatting it up on her board about her new book Lies Beneath, all things mermaids, Lake Superior, and morbid inspirations!

Here's what we learned from Anne:

• Lies Beneath originally started out as a contemporary novel. Calder was supposed to be a ferry captain.
• Anne decided to change the direction of Lies Beneath when she kept having a reoccurring dream of the male protagonist repeatedly diving into the water - until one night he burst out of the water with a silver tail
• Lies Beneath is the first in a trilogy - the sequel, Deep Betrayal, is supposed to come out 2013 through Lily's POV!
• Anne majored in Medieval Studies in college
• Calder's sister Maris had her name changed halfway through the book
• The first line of the book came to Anne in a dream
• Anne's idea for having her mermaids kill by absorbing positive energy was inspired by a Chinese legend about mermaids who smelled like happiness
• Anne is terrified of two things: fish and scary movies
• Anne is a major planner - she uses a specific method for her "layering" where she layers in dialogue, setting, narration, piece by piece.
• When writing, Anne will write the parts she feels like writing, depending on her mood.
• If someone starts to hum the theme from JAWS when Anne's in water, she has to get out immediately
• Anne is very familiar with Lake Superior, so it was only right she wrote about it
• Anne researched basic legends and myths about mermaids from various cultures and countries, and she even did research on hypothermia and drowning
• Before Anne started writing Lies Beneath, a gunman broke into an Amish school and gunned down dozens of schoolgirls. Anne was inspired by the Amish community's willingness to forgive - hence the theme of forgiveness in Lies Beneath
• Anne would like to spend a day hanging out with Pavati
• Calder and his sister's names come from Celtic, Latin, and Native American languages
• Calder's story of falling out of a sailboat as a toddler was actually Anne's
• Anne's favorite part of writing is writing dialogue
• Anne's favorite paranormal creatures are mermaids and werewolves
• Anne can't listen to music while writing because it's too distracting
• When writing Anne likes to drink red wine in the winter and Gin and Tonics in the summer. She'll eat Peanut M & Ms all year round.
• The inspiration for Calder is a clean shaven Darren Criss
• The meanings behind the names of Anne's mermraids:Calder-(Welsh) a stream running away from a larger body of water; Maris - (Latin) of the sea;Pavati (Native American) clear water; Tallulah (Native American) leaping water
• To get into the voice of Calder, Anne listened to a lot of Violent Femmes before writing
• Lake Superior is gigantic - it's the size of Maine!
• When Anne was little, she was convinced that her family was made up of aliens who would contact the mother ship when she was sleeping.
• The meaning behind the saying "Lake Superior does not give up its dead" - "Lake Superior doesn't give up its dead" is because the water is so cold, bacteria doesn't grow, which means dead bodies don't bloat, which means they don't float. There are accounts of dead bodies, perfectly preserved, in sunken ships.
• One thing Anne learned in her research is that drowning is a silent event, rather than a scream and splashy thing - as the muscles tire, all the oxygen goes there, which makes it impossible to speak or shout out.

That's just a little bit of what we learned about Anne! To see the rest of her very in-depth answers and responses, visit her board! Anne was gracious enough to share real life inspiration photos of Lake Superior with us, which you can check out here! She also explained her very intricate percentage method when writing in her guest post. Curious about Lies Beneath? Check out one Buzzer's review of it, or read how other Buzzers would fight off killer mermaids!

Missed Anne's visit this week? Don't fret! Next week, author Lauren Kate is visiting us to talk about her new book Rapture, the last of her Fallen series! We're giving away copies of Rapture, so stop by Lauren's board and leave her a question now!