Happy Halloween! We’re so pleased to have author Selina Kray with us today to celebrate the release of the second book in the Stoker & Bash series, The Fruit of the Poisonous Tree. She’s here today to chat about her fascination with cults, and there’s also a giveaway so be sure to check out those details below.

Welcome, Selina!

Hi! I’m Selina Kray, and this is the first stop on the blog tour celebrating the release of Stoker & Bash: The Fruit of the Poisonous Tree. A huge thanks to Lisa for hosting me today!

The People’s Temple. Heaven’s Gate. The Family. The Branch Davidians. NXIVM. Voldemort. For as long as I can remember, I’ve had a fascination with cults. What lures people to them. What makes people dedicate their lives to such flawed, abusive leaders, against their better judgment. The fact that even if someone manages to leave a cult, they can’t ever really shed the long-lasting effects of their experience. The simplest, most natural decision in the world—to befriend a group of people—marks you for life.

[Note: There is no Voldemort cult. But the one I’m referring to, the one everyone knows about that has major celebrity ties, is very, very scary and is very good at harassing people, so I won’t mention them by name. See? Cults are *fascinating*.]

So when I came across mention of Joanna Southcott and The Panacea Society in my research into important Victorian era figures, I knew I had to work her messianic cult into one of the Stoker & Bash books.

In the late 1700s, 18-year-old Joanna Southcott became convinced that she possessed supernatural abilities and began to compose prophecies in rhyme. She grew a following of believers in her prophetic powers after being invited to preach in London. She is most renowned for two things: declaring she was pregnant with the new Messiah at age 64, and for her Great Box of sealed prophecies.

Needless to say, the Messiah never saw the light of day, and Southcott fell into a “trance” (probably a coma) and died two months later. But that was not the end of her legend because she left behind her Great Box. In 1919, Mabel Baltrop founded the Panacea Society, a group of widows and unmarried women dedicated to Southcott’s teachings. Mabel declared herself a “daughter of God,” took the name Octavia, and believed herself to be the Messiah of Southcott’s prophecies. They built a compound called Castleside in Bedford, UK, which, according to them, was the site of the Garden of Eden. One of the Panaceans’ aims was to gather the 24 bishops of the Church of England together to open the Great Box and bring about the apocalypse.

To no one’s surprise, they did not succeed, although enough donations and interest poured in to keep the Society afloat until 2012. And like any worthy cult, there are all sorts of weird little details about their activities. They sent handkerchiefs that Octavia had kissed to members all around the world as blessings. They kept an entire house ready and waiting for Jesus’ return. One intrepid reporter allegedly got his hands on the Great Box (though the Panaceans dispute its authenticity), which contained a starter pistol, a lottery ticket, and other junk. In the end, the Panacea Society was so flush that they opened a museum in Bedford on the Castleside compound and established a charitable trust.

If you made this stuff up, no one would believe you. So I’ve tried my hand at fictionalizing it. In Stoker & Bash: The Fruit of the Poisonous Tree, you’ll meet a cult of women, the Daughters of Eden, who worship the prophecies of Rebecca Northcote, led by the impish and manipulative Sister Juliet. In their lush, menacing garden, Stoker & Bash find something rotten—murder.

I hope you have as much fun reading about the Daughters of Eden as I had writing about them. And if you, like me, love a deep dive into the world of cults, check out the Panacea Society documentary called Maidens of the Lost Ark.

About the Book

Buy Links: Amazon US | Amazon UK
Length: 100,000 words approx.
Cover Design: Tiferet Design
Stoker & Bash Series: Book #1 – The Fangs Of Scavo – Amazon US | Amazon UK
Blurb: When will She open Rebecca Northcote’s box?

Finding lost poodles and retrieving stolen baubles is not how DI Tim Stoker envisioned his partnership with his lover, Hieronymus Bash. So when the police commissioner’s son goes missing, he’s determined to help, no matter what secrets he has to keep, or from whom.

When a family member is kidnapped, Hiero moves heaven and earth to rescue them. Even if that means infiltrating the Daughters of Eden, a cult of wealthy widows devoted to the teachings of Rebecca Northcote and the mysterious contents of her box. The Daughters’ goodwill toward London’s fallen women has given them a saintly reputation, but Hiero has a nose for sniffing out a fraud. He will need to draw on some divine inspiration to rattle the pious Daughters.

Like weeds gnarling the roots of Eden’s fabled tree, Tim and Hiero’s cases intertwine. Serpents, secrets, and echoes from Hiero’s past lurk behind every branch. Giving in to temptation could bind them closer together—or sever their partnership forever.

About the Author

Selina Kray is the nom de plume of an author and English editor. Professionally she has covered all the artsy-fartsy bases, having worked in a bookstore, at a cinema, in children’s television, and in television distribution, up to her latest incarnation as a subtitle editor and grammar nerd (though she may have always been a grammar nerd). A self-proclaimed geek and pop culture junkie who sometimes manages to pry herself away from the review sites and gossip blogs to write fiction of her own, she is a voracious consumer of art with both a capital and lowercase A.

Selina’s aim is to write genre-spanning romances with intricate plots, complex characters, and lots of heart. Whether she has achieved this goal is for you, gentle readers, to decide. At present she is hard at work on future novels at home in Montreal, Quebec, with her wee corgi serving as both foot warmer and in-house critic.

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