What is the title of your latest release?
ASYLUM HOTEL
What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
Aubry, a photographer, meets a fellow trespasser while exploring an abandoned hotel; when he’s found dead the next morning, Aubry feels compelled to find out whether his death could have been caused by the hotel’s alleged “curse” – and if she might be next.
How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
I spend a lot of time in a small town called Gualala, a former Russian fishing village about three hours north of San Francisco. The area is truly beautiful, with a rugged, wild coastline on one side and redwood groves and cow-dotted meadows on the other. It’s a remote area, accessed by a very windy highway which is often closed due to dramatic weather, so the locals tend to be self-sufficient, and have a culture of helping their neighbors. There’s a historic hotel in Gualala, and I often wondered what life must have been like back in the 1920s and 30s…and then I dreamed up a big old hotel up on the mountainside!
Would you hang out with your protagonist in real life?
Oh, definitely! I’d love to see Aubrey’s photos and talk at length about the strange allure of abandoned spaces. Also, she has some fun friends, so I’d love to hang out with the whole gang.
What are three words that describe your protagonist?
Intelligent, adrift, jaded
What’s something you learned while writing this book?
I always do a lot of research for my books – sometimes TOO much! While writing Asylum Hotel, I was most fascinated by the history of poor farms. Back in the day, there were few social safety nets, and many counties built poor farms to accommodate the destitute, the mentally ill, unwanted family members, and societal “misfits” of all sorts. The idea was that these institutions would provide the “inmates” with a safe place to live and give them wholesome work on the farm. While some poor farms lived up to these ideals, others – occupied as they were with the most vulnerable citizens – were rife with abuse. I did SO much research, but only a fraction wound up on the page in the final novel (that’s usually the way of it!)
Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
I try hard to write the first draft straight through to the end before editing. Of course, I revise a bit as I go along, but I believe in the method of allowing oneself to pen a truly crappy first draft, then going back to wrangle all those wrong words into something approximating a novel. And then I revise again, and again.
What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
Thai noodles
Describe your writing space/office!
I am lucky enough to live in a big old house built in 1911. My office is in a former sunporch which was enclosed by former owners. Multi-paned windows along two walls provide plenty of light, and two walls are covered in bookshelves. The neighbor’s black cat, Fernando, comes by every morning for a visit. I love my office!
Who is an author you admire?
Oh, so many! Barbara Kingsolver is one of my favorites: such a great writer, and apparently a great person as well.
Is there a book that changed your life?
I think every book I read changes my life in some way. But the ones I remember as most transformative are the ones I read as a young person: Barbara Micheal’s Amie, Come Home was my first “adult” book, and it left me stunned on several levels. I went on to read everything Michaels (also known as Elizabeth Peters) wrote, and her books established my lifelong love of mystery.
Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published)/Or, for indie authors, when you decided to self-publish.
I remember I had a pizza in the oven -- I was having some work done on my house, and wanted to feed my handyman (and myself). That handyman was the first one to learn that I had sold my book, and he was SO excited for me. I called my sister to let her know, and then I opened a bottle of champagne and my handyman and I had a mini-celebration over pizza!
What’s your favorite genre to read?
That depends entirely on my mood. I read a lot of nonfiction, especially when researching for my books. In fiction I adore mysteries, long character-driven novels, and any book my friends write!
What’s your favorite movie?
Practical Magic
What is your favorite season?
Autumn
How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
I don’t do much for my regular birthdays – usually just a mellow dinner with friends. But on the big decade birthdays I like to do something special. Once I went to Cuba, once I rented a house in rural France for a month. And most recently I had a wild 1920s-era party, complete with costumes, martinis, champagne, and a fancy tiered cake.
What’s a recent tv show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
I really enjoyed The Residence, on Netflix, with Uzo Aduba (I’d watch anything she’s in—I love her!) Recently I’ve been listening to The Telepathy Tapes, which is fascinating.
What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
Asian in general, Thai…Lao…Vietnamese…Japanese…Chinese…
What do you do when you have free time?
Walking is my main form of exercise, and I’m lucky enough to walk around an urban lake if I head in one direction, or into the redwood-covered hills if I head in the opposite direction. I also really enjoy gardening, and painting, and spending time with my boyfriend and friends. My dog died a year ago, but I adore animals, so I often borrow those of my friends and neighbors.
What can readers expect from you next?
I’m currently working on final edits for a novel based in Monterey, tentatively entitled The Séance Garden, which will be coming out in 2026. The protagonist, Harper, is a fish-out-of-water, newly-arrived history professor who specializes in the folklore surrounding witches, vampires, zombies, and the undead of all kinds. It’s sort of dark academia…which is particularly fun to write since my sister is a professor of history!
An architect’s passion for photographing an abandoned hotel pulls her into a murder investigation and the rumored hauntings that have clung to the property for decades.
Aubrey Spencer loves photographing classic old buildings and the abandoned places that hold old secrets. Hotel Seabrink, perched on a cliff overlooking the sea, is one such place. Currently abandoned but scheduled for a major renovation, it has a torrid history. Back in the 1920s it hosted A-list celebrity clientele, and now the locals insist it is haunted by the ghosts of two young women who died there. When Aubrey goes to photograph the site before renovation begins, she bumps into a man named Dimitri Petrov, a minor online celebrity who shares her fascination with old buildings, Hotel Seabrink in particular.
When he is found dead the next day at the base of a cliff, the police are quick to call it accidental. But Aubrey is deeply unsettled by the locals’ claims that it was murder—and that all the deaths are tied to the hotel. As she digs deeper into its dark history (and its origins as an asylum) and Dimitri’s professional rivalries, she becomes mired in an unsolved murder case from several decades earlier, one with eerie parallels to the contemporary case. But someone is determined to keep her from discovering the truth—at any cost.
Paranormal | Mystery [Berkley, On Sale: July 29, 2025, Trade Paperback / e-Book , ISBN: 9780593638248 / eISBN: 9780593638255]
Juliet Blackwell is the New York Times bestselling author of the Witchcraft Mystery series, featuring a powerful witch with a vintage clothes store in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury. She also writes the Haunted Home Renovation Mystery series, about a failed anthropologist who reluctantly takes over her father’s high-end construction company…and finds ghosts behind the walls. As Hailey Lind, Blackwell wrote the Agatha-nominated Art Lover’s Mystery series, in which an ex-art forger attempts to go straight as a faux finisher. She is currently working on a novel about a woman who takes over her uncle’s locksmith shop in Paris, entitled The Paris Key. A former anthropologist and social worker, Juliet has worked in Mexico, Spain, Cuba, Italy, the Philippines, and France.
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