when I got the invite to read fan service and interview Rosie Danan, I couldn’t say yes fast enough. I have loved all of Rosie’s books and I was beyond eager to read her take on fandom. (spoiler alert: it was everything I wanted.)
before we get to Rosie’s answers, let’s check out the book.
Title: Fan Service
Author: Rosie Danan
Pages: 448
Pub Date: March 11, 2025
Publisher: Berkley Romance
Find it: PRH | Bookshop | GoodreadsSynopsis: The only place small-town outcast Alex Lawson fits in is the online fan forum she built for The Arcane Files, a long-running werewolf detective show. Her dedication to archiving fictional supernatural lore made her Internet-famous, even if she harbors a secret disdain for the show’s star, Devin Ashwood. (Never meet your heroes – sometimes they turn out to be The Worst.)
Ever since his show went off the air, Devin and his career have spiralled, but waking up naked in the woods outside his LA home with no memory of the night before is a new low. It must have been a coincidence that the once-in-a-century Wolf Blood Moon crested last night. The claws, fangs, and howling are a little more difficult to explain away. Desperate for answers, Devin finds Alex – the closest thing to an expert that exists. If only he could convince her to stop hating his guts long enough to help…
Once he makes her an offer she can’t refuse, these reluctant allies lower their guards trying to wrangle his inner beast. Unfortunately, getting up close and personal quickly comes back to bite them.
sounds good, right?
1. Please give the elevator pitch for Fan Service.
When an actor who used to play a werewolf on tv starts turning into one IRL, the only person who believes him is the former fangirl who was once internet famous for cataloging the show’s lore.
2. Which came first: the characters or the plot line?
In this case, I do think that character and plot were immediately intertwined. I needed an actor that was enough of a self-important himbo that he would—famously—become so attached to playing a werewolf that people wouldn’t believe him if he started turning into one because they would simply assume it was a desperate bid for attention.
Because Devin and that situation are so extreme, it took longer to find Alex as the love interest and his perfect complement.
3. Why do you love Alex and Devin and why should readers root for them?
I love that they are both a mess in different ways. I prefer to have characters that are complete opposites on-paper, but when you dig deeper, you notice the similarities. I think Alicia Thompson said it really well in her blurb for this book which is something like “these are two people that have found very different ways of hiding from the world, finally being seen by someone.”
Also! I do love the interplay of a fan turned hater and a crush turned into someone who desperately needs you. There’s such extreme pivots there in terms of emotions and accessibility that create a lot of internal and external conflict for both characters.
Finally, I think they’re really funny together. They have a version of a black cat/golden retriever dynamic, which I think lends itself really well to both banter and situational humor.
4. Were there any weird things you googled while researching?
You know, rather than Googling this time around, I actually was lucky enough to have friends that are veterinarians and vet techs and so I asked them a lot of weird subject-matter expert questions about horse tranquilizers and animal pheromones and stuff that would probably not have been good to have on my computer.
5. Without spoilers, which scene was your favorite to write?
There’s a set of scenes that take place at a local carnival that were originally pretty self-indulgent and not super linked to the plot at the drafting stage, but they ended up becoming really essential to the emotional development of the characters and the arc of their relationship. They were scenes that evolved over every draft of the novel even through copy-edits so I think only the finished copies have them in their most complete form but I grew to really love them. It became such a pivotal moment in the book. So they were both really fun to work on, but also, a good reminder to me as an author to not underestimate softer, quieter moments of character development in favor of big tent-pole plot moments.
Speed(ish) round:
1. You find out you’re being published for the first time. Describe the next 5 minutes.
I genuinely think I just sat in silence with my head in my hands trying to process, and then maybe called my mom? To be fair, it was April Fools’ Day! So, I was half waiting for my agent to call back and be like “Just kidding!” Thankfully, she did not but I think of it every year on the anniversary of that call.
2. What 3 things would you take to a desert island?
My natural inclination to answer this is SO BORING. Immediately, I’m like “medical encyclopedia, hatchet, and matches in a waterproof box.”
If I force myself to think beyond rational answers and try to be interesting, I guess I would say “the complete works of William Shakespeare, a hatchet, and matches in a waterproof box.”
I’m sorry!!! I have watched too many seasons of Survivor.
3. You can only read one book for the rest of your life. What is it?
Can I say the complete works of William Shakespeare here? It does come in one book.
4. What is the one thing about publishing you wish someone would have told you?
Not every book idea that you have is the right idea to write and publish at that exact time. Sometimes you really need to sit with and test and live with an idea for a while to figure out whether it’s the right one to pursue. If it feels bad consistently to be working on a project, it’s not the right project.
5. You wake up and discover that you are Bella in Twilight. You know how it plays out. What do you do differently?
I think I would’ve been more likely to ask for help than Bella. I would have been like “Dad, Edward, listen up.” Even though she is explicitly told not to. Bella is really independent and more likely to keep secrets than I am. I definitely would have made the book worse.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rosie Danan is the award-winning, bestselling author of contemporary and paranormal rom-coms including The Roommate and the upcoming Fan Service. Her work has been optioned for film as well as translated into nine different languages and counting. The New York Times describes her writing as “warmly funny and gorgeously sexy.”
When not working on her next book, Rosie enjoys jogging slowly to fast music, petting other people’s dogs, and competing against herself in rounds of Chopped using the miscellaneous ingredients occupying her fridge. website | instagram
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Huge thanks to Berkley for the opportunity and to Rosie for taking the time. Fan Service is out today and buy links are above.
Have you read this book or will you?
Leave a Reply