London, Goldsmiths College, studied psychology, then became a teacher. She immigrated to Canada and lives in Winnipeg with her husband and two children. There she also studied writing under her mentor, Pulitzer Prize winning author, Carol Shields.
She loves writing for all ages and in many genres—suspense, historical, sci-fi for teens. She's also a screenwriter with several pilot projects in progress.
DeLuca enjoys teaching workshops in Creative Writing and the writing process.
She applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, The Night Side, and reported the following:
From page 69:Visit M.M. DeLuca's website.Ida went to touch Marsha’s arm but she flinched as if the hand was white hot. “I can help you. I sense something – a darkness surrounding you. A dense and troubling aura. Something or someone that wishes harm on you.”The Page 69 Test works, because this page actually touches on the central conflict of the story, the toxic mother/daughter relationship between Ida, a self-professed medium and con-artist and her young daughter, Ruby, who Ida manipulates into unwillingly participating in her many scams. This scene also shows Ida’s uncanny ability to spot her vulnerable future targets, approach them directly on the street, and awaken their deep-seated fears so they feel compelled to look to her for help. In this particular case, Marsha is a lonely single mother with a disabled daughter, deserted by a violent husband and father. Ida drags Ruby along with her even though she hates the whole “game” of luring in potential “clients”. Ruby is a girl with a vivid imagination who is terrified by the suggestion of demons, curses and loose spirits, but her mother ignores her protests. Ruby spends her childhood dreaming of escaping Ida and all her evil machinations.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about. Just gibberish like on them TV shows,” said Marsha shaking her off. “C’mon Marion. We don’t need your advice, so get out of my way.”
Ida tailed her along the street, even though Ruby pulled at her jacket to stop her.
“We can help. Me and my daughter. We have the gift…”
Unlike legitimate psychics and card readers who provide a reasonably priced service to willing customers, these fraudulent psychics I refer to in the novel, apply high pressure tactics to their victims and often rope them into highly-priced services, then make threats about future bad consequences if the “client” doesn’t keep on paying. Ida is a forceful and charismatic character who intimidates her weakened clients, as are many of these fraudulent psychics. I was inspired to create the characters of Ida and Ruby when I read an article about a scammer who used her teenage daughter to lure in clients by doing a faltering initial reading, then the mother would swoop in and forcefully take over the session. I wondered what that young teen’s life was like. What about her hopes? Her dreams? And so, the character of Ruby was born.
My Book, The Movie: The Night Side.
--Marshal Zeringue