My first interview :)

Autoarea Lou Morgan mi-a raspuns la e-mail si mi-a oferit un mic interviu. Sunt noua la asta, asa ca intrebarile nu sunt extraordinare, dar sunt super incantata :)
Puteti citi recenzia mea AICI. Goodreads link
Hi Antonia,
Thanks very much for your email: sorry about the delay in replying to you. I'm in the middle of editing the sequel to "Blood and Feathers" and it's taking up most of my time at the moment - it's called "Blood and Feathers: Rebellion", and as it's being published this summer, there's a lot to do!
Ati auzit asta? Volumul 2 apare in varaaa <3

1. Tell us something about yourself. Did you always wanted to be a writer?
 - Yes, I think I did. I still have some of the stories I wrote when I was very small, even if most of them are pretty short. I was always reading and making stories up, so I think that it was inevitable I'd carry on doing it when I grew up. I never really believed I'd be lucky enough to be able to do it as my job, though!

2. If you would be a flower, what flower would you be?
 - Probably something spiky and poisonous ;)

3. Let's say you're not a writer. What else would you want to be?
 - I always liked the idea of being an actor. I think there's definitely a connection between writing fiction and acting - there's something about writing which means you have to "become" someone else for a while, just like actors do. Weirdly, I know a lot of writers who act and actors who write, so there's obviously something about the two which go together. Given that I'm not sure how good my acting is, though, I'm not sure I'd have done that well. 
I almost studied law at university, so if I'd carried on with that there's a good chance I would have ended up as a lawyer.

4. Do you like animals? What is your favourite animal, why?
 - I'm fond of a lot of different animals. There's not many I don't like - although I'm scared of squid and octopi (it's something about the tentacles.) My favourites, though, are probably bats and hawks. I guess I'm really not that much of a "fluffy kittens" kind of person - although I do have a soft spot for hares, too.

5. What inspired you to write Blood and Feathers. Well, beside the songs :)?
 - I wanted to write a story about a girl who was lost; who didn't really know who she was (both literally, in that there were things about her family that she'd never been told, and metaphorically: Alice at the start of the story is kind of a mess and she's stuck that way) and about how she came to terms with her own identity and her past. It was kind of about getting over the death of her mother and the journey she had to take to move past that on a couple of levels. 
I've also been fascinated by angels and the way they're represented, especially in art, for a long time. In medieval paintings or carvings, you see them as soldiers and warriors - and we don't do that so much now. 
I wondered what would happen if you took one of those warrior-angels and put him together with a young woman who desperately needed a guardian angel... and "Blood and Feathers" was what came out of it!
The songs were a big part of writing it, too: I listen to a lot of music and I love bands like Linkin Park. Sometimes, a song can give you an idea - it's hard to say how it works because there's no real connection between the song and the story, but maybe it'll start you thinking or trigger an image in your mind and you take it from there. All the songs I put on the book's playlist did that to some extent.

6. Do you identify yourself with any character from this book?
 - There's probably a bit of me in Alice, Mallory and Vin, the three main characters. At a push, I'm probably more like Mallory than any of the others - grumpy, untidy and not very good with people or authority figures. I am, however, considerably less heroic, and less likely to shoot people. And I don't have wings ;)


7. Do you think unicorns are real?
 - I can't say I'm convinced on that one. Mind you, if they are, I bet they're a lot less pleasant than we imagine them to be. I certainly wouldn't want to tangle with one: I've been kicked by a horse in the past (ouch) and I'm not keen on the idea of repeating the experience. Besides, those horns look *sharp*...


8. Have you ever heard of Romania? Say something for Romanian people :)
 - Some of my family come from Balkan states, so I have indeed heard of Romania! You have an amazing history and culture which has a lot of influence over writers in other countries - even if you don't always see it. It's incredibly cool to know that "Blood and Feathers" has got as far as Romania - maybe someday we'll be able to give you an edition in Romanian, too. Mersi!

Thank you so much for answering me, it's been amazing:) I can't wait for the second book to come up :)