Earlier this week I had the privilege to meet and interview the fantastic ladies of the
Fierce Reads Tour: Cecelia Ahern, Marie Rutkoski, Harriet Reuter Hapgood, and Kami Garcia.
If you haven't read their books yet, do it!
If you get the opportunity to meet them in person, go!
You won't regret it.
Also, a big THANK YOU to Brittany Pearlman at Macmillan for reaching out to me, and Politics and Prose for hosting another successful YA event at the Bethesda Library.
This was tour stop #7 of 8 for the authors, and I figured they'd probably been fielding a lot of the same questions, so I tried to switch it up a bit. Thanks to Brittany, I was able to read the books ahead of time and familiarize myself with the characters.
I came prepared with questions I hoped weren't too lame and Cookie Dough Cupcakes.
If you haven't read their books yet, do it!
If you get the opportunity to meet them in person, go!
You won't regret it.
Also, a big THANK YOU to Brittany Pearlman at Macmillan for reaching out to me, and Politics and Prose for hosting another successful YA event at the Bethesda Library.
This was tour stop #7 of 8 for the authors, and I figured they'd probably been fielding a lot of the same questions, so I tried to switch it up a bit. Thanks to Brittany, I was able to read the books ahead of time and familiarize myself with the characters.
I came prepared with questions I hoped weren't too lame and Cookie Dough Cupcakes.
~ INTERVIEW~
(Kami joined us a little late, so she missed a few questions.)
1) This was the ice breaker...Captain America or Iron Man:
Cecelia: Iron Man
Harriet: Captain America
Marie: Can we just talk about Hamilton? <--Yet another reason I love her.
2) Describe your book in 3 words:
Cecelia: Equality. Love. Self-discovery.
Harriet: Memory. Family. Grief.
Marie: Strategy. Love. Equality. War. Empire.
3) Easiest character to write:
Cecelia: Celestine.
Harriet: Jason.
Marie: Roshar. He has a tiger, so he's also the coolest.
Kami: Marco. <--He's mine. I have proof.
4) What is your writing process like? Do you plot everything out, or just write?
Cecelia: Concept comes first. I think about what kind of character would find themselves in that situation.
Marie: Concept. I wanted to write a story that would match the title, The Winner's Curse. The setting is reminiscent of the Roman empire taking over Greece.
Kami: I plot everything out like a screenplay or a house. The framework of the house is basic at first: plot, characters, and their arc. The second layer is more descriptive; characters mannerisms get added in and so on.
5) Who is your first reader?
Cecelia: My agent. She gives me lots of encouragement during the first draft. <-- Love this!
Harriet: My agent was the first person to ever read The Square Root of Summer. I come from a magazine background. The feedback is immediate and harsh. Nobody really knew what I was writing.
Marie: My writing group.
Kami: My CPs and my agent.
6) How do you balance writing with everyday life?
All of the ladies were in agreement that you have to treat writing like a job. Cecelia, Harriet, and Kami write full-time now, but before, they wrote whenever they could: after work, on weekends, at night, etc. Marie teaches college classes two days a week and has summers off. They also agreed there is no magic formula to follow other than to write. When you're tired, sick, or just don't feel like it. Keep writing.
Thank you, ladies for taking the time to chat with me!
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| L-R: Back: Kami, Me, Cecelia. Front: Marie, Harriet |
Click the author name to find out more about their books:
Cecelia Ahern
Marie Rutkoski
Harriet Reuter Hapgood
Kami Garcia
Cecelia Ahern
Marie Rutkoski
Harriet Reuter Hapgood
Kami Garcia
Fierce Reads is giving readers a chance to win all of the tour titles, be sure to click on the Big Fall Books graphic to enter.
~ GIVEAWAY ~
~ One Winner will receive a signed ARC of Kami Garcia's THE LOVELY RECKLESS
~ US Only
~ Must be 13 years old to enter
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