Spotlight & Giveaway: Violet Thistlewaite is Not a Villain Anymore by Emily Krempholtz

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Emily Krempholtz to HJ!

Hi Emily and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Violet Thistlewaite is Not a Villain Anymore!

 
Hi, thank you so much for having me!
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

VIOLET THISTLEWAITE IS NOT A VILLAIN ANYMORE tells the story of a powerful plant witch who has spent her life as the right-hand minion (and adoptive daughter) to an evil sorcerer. After he’s defeated, Violet decides to turn over a new leaf with a new identity, this time as someone good. With the help of her nature magic, she opens a flower shop in the small town of Dragon’s Rest. The tight-knit community welcomes her with open arms whether she thinks she deserves it or not—and with the constant temptation of her dark magic hanging over her shoulders, Violet isn’t exactly comfortable with coming face to face with many of the people who were directly or indirectly hurt by her former life. One notable exception to the welcome wagon, however, is Nathaniel Marsh, a grumpy alchemist who owns the apothecary next door, with whom Violet is forced to share a greenhouse. But when a magical blight threatens her new community, Violet has to put aside their rivalry—and growing feelings—and face her dark past to determine whether a former villain like her ever truly deserves her own happily ever after.
 

Please share your favorite line(s) or quote from this book:

“After all, love had nothing to do with holding on tight for fear of letting it escape. Love needed space to grow, to put down roots, to blossom.”

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

INSPIRATION:
The idea for VIOLET first came while joking around with my partner while he was playing video games! He was defeating some big bad evil guy who had all these lesser minions, and I started riffing, “What did these little guys do to you? Maybe they’re just here because they’re trying to put their kid through college! Maybe that one is saving up so he can leave this all behind and go open a flower shop!”
It got me thinking about villainy and the choices that we make and the nature of change, and snowballed from there. The next morning, I pulled my partner out of bed and said, “I need you to go on a walk with me and let me talk at you about a story idea and you can’t talk, you just need to listen to me yap.” I bought him a coffee and we walked for hours while I outlined the story, the characters, and the world they lived in, then we came home and I outlined the whole thing in Post-it notes on my living room coffee table.

SOME OF MY REJECTED IDEAS FOR THE NAME OF VIOLET’S FLOWER SHOP:
Grow Your Own Way
All You Seed Is Love
I Beg Your Garden
Peony For Your Thoughts
(Rough Around the Hedges ended up being the winner)

A FEW SONGS ON MY PLAYLIST WHEN I WAS WRITING VIOLET:
I always love finding the unique musical mood of the books I write as I work on them. I build my playlists as I write, listening to them pretty exclusively whenever I work on the book until those songs become intrinsically linked with the story and the characters for me. The overall flavor of the music on my VIOLET playlist ended up being more folky than the playlists for other books I’ve written. The full playlist for the book is about 8 hours long, and some of it is more about the vibes of the music being right for writing than it was about the actual meaning of the songs themselves, but here are a few I played on repeat while I was writing:

● Blossoms by The Amazing Devil
● The Garden by the Crane Wives
● Villains Aren’t Born (They’re Made) by PEGGY
● Rule #4 by Fish in a Birdcage
● Wildflowers by Tom Petty
● as good a reason by Paris Paloma
● King and Lionheart by Of Monsters and Men
● It’s All True by MALINDA
● Inkpot Gods by The Amazing Devil (Yes they’re on here twice, honestly I had practically their entire discography on this playlist)

What first attracts your Hero to the Heroine and vice versa?

Nathaniel is such a simp for Violet from almost the start, though he’s stubborn enough that he refuses to admit it for awhile. She’s like a kernel stuck between his teeth, a song he can’t get out of his head, and it drives him mad because as an analytical person he can’t logic away the way he thinks about her. Whether he’ll admit it at first or not, the first thing he really starts to admire about her is her sense of hope and optimism, something of which he’s in short supply.

Violet isn’t in Dragon’s Rest for romance, she’s here for a new life entirely. She wants Nathaniel to like her because she wants everyone to like her, and she’s frustrated when she can’t easily break through his shell. She tries being relentlessly friendly, which doesn’t work and only makes her more determined. The first time she really sees through Nathaniel’s mask and catches a glimpse of who he really is as a person, though, is in the woods when they find Daisy. It’s there that she’s first able to see behind the crusty, grumpy shell to the man beneath—and it’s there that she starts to think maybe she likes what she sees.

Did any scene have you blushing, crying or laughing while writing it? And Why?

Okay, so some of my favorite scenes to write are closer to the end of the book, so I’ll just have to leave those for when you read the book, but all I will say is that the scene where Nathaniel bursts into the town meeting was a lot of fun to write, and the group conversation directly after the climactic sequence was also

In less spoilery terms, I tend to love scenes that catch characters off-guard, like the scene where Violet and Nathaniel meet in the woods—Nathaniel is fresh off having, ahem, a rather salacious dream about her, and Violet, completely unknowingly, uses language that mirrors the dream and completely flusters him.

I also had a lot of fun writing the scene where Pru crashes Violet’s excursion to Shadowfade Castle, armed with a completely inappropriate basket of pastries, for much the same reasons—Violet is emotionally girding herself for a completely different trip, and she’s also not quite prepared to have a frank conversation with Nathaniel’s sister so soon after things have, erm, blossomed between Violet and Nathaniel. Maybe I’m a mean author, but I have a lot of fun making my characters squirm.

Readers should read this book….

• If they want a story that’s cozy and whimsical
• If they think puns are the highest form of humor
• If they aren’t afraid of a few slightly darker themes just beyond the warm, cozy glow of the story
• If they like a little dash of spice in their cozy fantasy

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have in the works?

I’m currently on book 2, which will be out Fall 2026. It’s another standalone but it takes place in the same world as VIOLET and you’ll recognize a few faces.
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: 1 finished copy of VIOLET THISTLEWAITE IS NOT A VILLAIN ANYMORE (18+, U.S. only)

To enter Giveaway: To enter Giveaway, please share this post (FB – Twitter) and Leave a comment to this Q: If you could leave it all behind and start over with a business of your own, what kind of life would you want to create for yourself?

This giveaway closes 3 days from the date of this post.

Book Info:

A powerful plant witch and grumpy alchemist must work together to save their quiet town from a magical plague in this debut cozy fantasy romance about starting over, redemption, and what it really means to be a good person.

Guy Shadowfade is dead, and after a lifetime as the dark sorcerer’s right-hand, Violet Thistlewaite is determined to start over—not as the fearsome Thornwitch, but as someone kind. Someone better. Someone good.

The quaint town of Dragon’s Rest, Violet decides, will be her second chance—she’ll set down roots, open a flower shop, keep her sentient (mildly homicidal) houseplant in check, and prune dark magic from the twisted boughs of her life.

Violet’s vibrant bouquets and cheerful enchantments soon charm the welcoming townsfolk, though nothing seems to impress the prickly yet dashingly handsome Nathaniel Marsh, an alchemist sharing her greenhouse. With a struggling business and his own second chance seemingly out of reach, Nathaniel has no time for flowers or frippery—and certainly none for the intriguing witch next door.

When a mysterious blight threatens every living plant in Dragon’s Rest, Violet and Nathaniel must work together through their fears, pasts, and growing feelings for one another to save their community. But with a figure from her past knocking at her door and her secrets threatening to uproot everything she’s worked so hard to grow, Violet can’t help but wonder…does a former villain truly deserve a happily-ever-after?
 
 

Meet the Author:

Emily Krempholtz has never quit her day job to open a flower shop, but that’s because she’s already doing what she loves. As a bestselling ghostwriter, editor, and book coach, Emily spends all day every day in the world of books and is delighted to finally have one with her own name on the cover.

When she’s not writing or reading, Emily bakes cakes that look like book covers and changes her hair color like some kind of mood ring. She lives in sunny Colorado, where you’ll often find her in the mountains—either hiking (and pretending to be a character in a novel) or curled up in a hammock with a book (also pretending to be a character in a novel). She’s on a lifelong quest to discover the magic in the world and has a sneaking suspicion the written word is where she’ll find it.
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