In celebration of my upcoming review of Dearly Departed by Lia Habel later today she kindly agreed to do an author interview at Passion for Novels! I have to say I really enjoyed Dearly Departed and cannot wait for her second instalment!!
So without further ado here she is!!
First off, would you like to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your life.
I'm fairly boring. 50% of the time it's me, my coffee maker, my sweat pants, and my word processor. During this time, I write novels. The other 50% of the time I become a modern-day Victorian, donning horribly complicated clothes in order to attend balls, tea parties, and croquet games. I've always loved the Victorian era, and I love attempting to blend aspects of it with my modern life.
Have you always wanted to be an author or did you just get that magical idea for a novel?
I've always written, but until a few years ago only to amuse myself. I never thought I had the talent or the know-how to publish a book, or to carry off a long fictional work. I knew I was good at academic writing - in fact, it was my academic strength - but I never sort of made the connection between my ability there and the publishing industry. Maybe I was waiting for the right idea to come along, like you say!
Where do you write? Do you have a special place?
I write at my desk (which is currently in my bedroom) on an iMac. I need a desktop - I can't write on a laptop, or outside the house, it just doesn't work for me. Half of my notes are normally kept in notebooks, longhand; the other half are scattered in various files between Word and Evernote. One day I'd love to have a gorgeous office, but I realize that said gorgeous office would likely be ignored 90% of the time. I could write in a cave once I get into the zone, it really doesn't matter.
What authors are your inspirations for writing?
I wish I could wake up and be either Alan Moore, Warren Ellis, or Max Brooks. Of course I would continue to wear my frilly dresses no matter what.
Frankenstein, The Phantom of the Opera, the Jungle Books, A Little Princess, the Series of Unfortunate Events, Jane Eyre...I could go on! Most of my favorite books are Victorian, though. I love picking up obscure pulp novels from antique shops and actually reading them. You've not lived 'till you've read Lord Byron fanfiction from 1904...
How long did it take you to write Dearly Departed and are you finding the second one easier or harder to write?
I wrote D,D in 30-45 days (I've honestly forgotten, at this point), and we revised and edited for over a year. The sequel is harder to write, definitely - because you can't just introduce characters, you've got to dig deeper into them, decide where they want to go and what they want to do. Also there's the whole world to open up, and finding ways to fit that in is challenging. But I enjoy a challenge!
There’s so much vampire fiction around it’s so nice to have a change into the zombie world, what inspired you to write about Zombies?
I love them! I love monsters of all kinds, though, not just the undead. As a little girl I always found myself drawn to the character that had horns or scars or was a full-out beast - I found them so much more fascinating than the "handsome heroes." So I'm really grateful to have the chance to create a character like that, someone we'll see fall apart and waste away even as he clings to his humanity - and is all the more human for it.
Did you do any research into Zombie myths or did you just take your own clichés that you had in your head and adapt them to how you wanted them to be in your novel?
I've watched over 100 zombie movies, and read many novels and comics - so probably my biggest problem was figuring out what direction I wanted to take my zombies in, so that I wouldn't feel like I was copying anyone else. But no, I love research, and I always attempt to make sure that the information I'm working with is at least SOMEWHAT accurate. I do a lot of science research, a lot of Victorian research (I use an actual etiquette book from 1870 for my manners stuff, for instance).
I find it fascinating the way you have developed the Zombies to receive treatment and ways of extending their lives, did you do this purely to extend the likeness of characters? Because if they didn’t last long the reader may struggle to find them as likable and sustainable as humans.
Honestly, a lot of the medical longevity stuff came about because I knew that people likely wouldn't identify with zombie characters that were TOO disgusting! I knew I had to handle issues like rot and smell - that those would stand in the way of people liking the characters. And of course we want them to stick around as long as possible - that's one way of arriving there.
I felt like the novel was split into three individual stories that came together at the end, is this is what you intended when you started writing?
Pretty much. I just can't stick in one "head" too long when I'm creating and drafting - I find it boring. So I ended up skipping around, and thankfully it worked in the final draft.
What made you choose to use four main first person narratives (Bram, Nora, Pamela, Victor)
I knew I wanted to get into Nora and Bram's heads, because they were this potential hetero-mortal couple and I wanted to get both perspectives. Theirs is such a unique relationship, and there are just as many obstacles standing in Bram's way as there are in Nora's - I wanted to give them equal treatment. As a character, Pamela originally came about because I dislike how often in YA fiction the main character is completely stripped of friends and family, and I wanted Nora to have people she'd left behind - and she ended up being a great lens through which to watch the events unfolding in New London. Meanwhile, I just really liked getting into Victor's character, and it would have been difficult to understand his situation if we hadn't had someone there in Bolivia "reporting."
I found Pamela to be more of a female action hero than our protagonist, is this deliberate or can we expect to see more action for Nora in your sequel?
I think it's amusing how some people see Pamela as the action girl, and others see Nora! I think they're equally capable, but in different ways. Nora's much more hot-headed and willing to throw herself into the fight, whereas Pam doesn't necessarily WANT to be the hero. We'll get a lot of this interplay in the sequel, yes. We'll also be seeing the aftermath of all the choices they made, which should be interesting.
Any advice to wannabe writers like me?
Write what you love! Don't obsess over trends or writing something that will "sell" - put your heart into your work, and make it yours. And don't forget to play. You never know what your imagination might come up with!
Thanks for participating in an interview at Passion for Novels Lia!! I'd love to hear any comments!
