Interview with author Pip Harry #LoveOzYA

I am so happy to introduce Pip Harry to inkcrush. Pip is a #LoveOzYA author who writes contemporary novels for young adults. Her award winning novels are not just faves of mine, but of readers everywhere around the globe. She shares with us a bit about her inspriation for her lastest novel Because of You, her writing process, advice for writers, recent favourite reads and more...

Author Pip Harry

Hello and welcome to inkcrush, Pip Harry :) It's so good to chat with you on here right after the release of your 3rd YA novel Because of You. (I feel honoured for you to be stopping by!)

Hello and thank you lovely Naomi for having me!

You've mentioned before that your best writing comes when you can personally relate on some level to the story. Can you share some of your own life experience that sparked Tiny and Nola's story?

I definitely need to emotionally click into the story on some level, so that’s always a big part of choosing what to write about. It takes me a couple of years to complete a novel, so I have to care deeply about the characters and story to stay interested and engaged!  In my own life I met many tenacious, funny and intelligent homeless people while working as a volunteer once a week in a shelter, helping to facilitate a creative writing program.  My experience with that program and those incredible writers sparked the story of Because of You. We even took our group to the Sydney Writers’ Festival to perform, which echoes a later scene in Because of You!

[N: I think the way you care for your characters reflects in the way readers also come to deeply care for them! And I am so thrilled that the later scene in Because of You was sparked by real events ~ incredible!]

I love both Tiny and Nola, who have not only different backgrounds and circumstances, but have unique voices and ways of looking at the world. Did the voices of Tiny and Nola come to you strongly formed or did it take a while to get to know them before you were able to flesh out their story?

Tiny and Nola couldn’t be more different, so their friendship initially presented me with challenges. How would they first talk? What would they talk about? In the end, I realised they are still teenage girls, so initially they talk about boys and eat baked goods!

Tiny came to me pretty much fully formed and ready for action – but Nola was a problem child. In early drafts, she was coming off as very self-centred and whiny and my beta readers said they couldn’t relate to her as much as Tiny. They were right! I kept a little of Nola’s spoilt side in the final version, but explored her home life and relationships more deeply to give her more edge and depth.

[N: Haha! Yes to boys and baked goods! ;) ]

One of my favourite things about your writing is meeting and falling in love with -- and being inspired by -- your characters. You write characters who are flawed, make mistakes, and struggle with all kinds of conflicting emotions and insecurities. At the same time, these characters are courageous, brave, true, and have moments of startling empathy, wisdom and honesty. How do you approach crafting your characters? (Plus any tips for budding writers?)

Oooh, that’s such nice feedback, thank you! I’m a very flawed person myself and I make all kinds of mistakes and I’m incredibly insecure at times … so all that goes into my characters! You will never find me creating a perfect human in my books, because they just don’t exist. I’m especially careful to write parents who have their own problems and inconsistencies, as I think that’s true to life. Tips for budding writers: don’t be afraid to be honest and get your character’s flaws down on the page, but also allow them to have moments of true courage and emotion. Allow them to be vulnerable and true.

[N: That is so true about parents ~ being one myself ;). It's your vulnerable and courageous characters that make your stories resound long after reading the last page]

I know you're more of a pantser than a plotter. Can you tell us a little bit about how that works for you? Do you get a lot of surprises along the way? (Any awesome surprises while writing Because of You?) Do you fly through your first draft and then face massive structural edits once you have found the story, or do you feel out the story over lots of versions and then plan once you know where you're headed?

Oh yes, always a pantser. I enjoy the surprises along the way, some of the things my characters do are SO unexpected. That keeps it interesting for me. In Because of You, I had no idea Mari (Tiny’s friend) was going to show up in the city. She just popped up! And the poetry was a bit surprising, I’d never really written poetry before.

I do not fly through any stage of writing books. 😉 More accurately I plod along, sometimes speeding up, sometimes dragging my heels, until I can type ‘The End’. I always print out the first draft and force myself to read it in raw form (and it’s usually pretty terrible) then I radically edit and polish before sending it to a few trusted readers. I do feel out the story as I go, and Because of You was changing right up to the final days before printing.

[N: Oh! The poetry was definitely one of the fave elements of Because of You for me. I reread some of those passages a few times over. You definitely have a poets way of capturing moments and sharing secrets and emotions through verse]

What is it you love most about writing? Was there a writing highlight while working on Because of You?

I love being in another world with my characters and taking them on a journey, and then I love sharing that journey with readers. My highlight while working on Because of You was taking the manuscript to the Djerassi Artists Retreat outside San Francisco. There, I did a YA workshop with 11 other writers and facilitator Nova Ren Suma. It was magical, and set the book on the right path and made me believe in it again.

What is something you struggle with as a writer? 

Starting the first draft is difficult for me, and I always put it off until the characters are screaming at me.  

What is one of your favourite things about writing for teenagers?

Teens are so open to new ideas, so engaged with the writing and super smart. I feel really privileged to write for and about them. I really, really love school visits.

[N: As a teacher-librarian I know how much students love author visits! At a recent author visit for Book Week, one student told me (after talking to the author in a writing workshop) it 'was the best day of his life' :) ~ and students always leave so inspired and affirmed.]

What advice do you have for aspiring writers? 

Do not ever give up or listen to the voice that says you’re no good. That voice is wrong. Keep at it, keep learning and keep writing.

Can you share some of your favourite books? (Everyone loves a good book rec!)

Ooh, yes please! This year I have been blown away by the wonderful romances and relationships in Gabrielle Tozer’s Remind Me How This Ends, Steph Bowe’s Night Swimming and Cath Crowley’s Words in Deep Blue.

[N: Three gorgeous #LoveOzYA novels! Speaking of author visits, my daughter met both Cath Crowley and Steph Bowe in July (a couple of weeks ago!) at a readers/writers festival and came home very inspired and full of excitement. Of course, I made her nearly repeat their sessions verbatim ~ hoping to catch just a sprinkle of their magic!]

What did you do to celebrate the book birthday of Because of You?

The weekend before my book came out I flew to Bali and stayed in a villa with four girlfriends. We raised many a cocktail glass in celebration!

Thank you so much for sharing with us! 

Thank you Nomes! I’ve had so much fun.

[N: Me too! All the best with your writing projects, school visits and continuing to celebrate!]

Pip Harry is the author of YA novels I'll Tell You Mine, Head of the River and Because of You (Aug, 2017). A freelance writer and editor Pip has worked on a stack of women's magazines like Woman's Day, TV Week, New Idea and NW as well as for non-profit organisations. She currently lives in Singapore with her family and eats way too many noodles. When not at a keyboard her favourite things to do are swim laps (really), try variations of eggs and toast in hipster cafes, unravel on a yoga mat and read fiction. Her favourite hashtag is #LoveOzYA. (source: goodreads)

Q & A at #LoveOzYA

Pip Harry's website

Pip Harry @ goodreads

Because of You @ goodreads

Because of you @ UQP (incl. Teacher's Notes)

My reviews for Pip Harry's novels:

Because of You

I'll Tell You Mine

Head of the River

Have you read Pip Harry yet? ;)

Blog tour: A Tangle of Gold by Jaclyn Moriarty ~ Interview and Review #loveozya

Long time inkcrush fans (hello!) will need no introduction to Jaclyn Moriarty. She is, in fact, my all-time, always and forever, favourite author and today she is here chatting with us about authorly life, creativity, her fun family, current writing projects, some of her favourite characters from her books (including her fave character crush) and more. After the interview I also have my review of the much anticipated A Tangle of Gold, the conclusion to the Colours of Madeleine trilogy (out now in Australia!)

Jaclyn Moriarty

Hello Jaclyn and welcome to inkcrush! I’m Nomes, one of your hugest most ridiculously enthusiastic fans and I am so thrilled to get to chat with you :D. I have loved your books and reread them all so many times and each one of them (and the characters inside them) have become highlights of my reading life (Cute fact, my own kids thought for a long time that Cassie and Celia were real-life friends of mine, having heard me talk about them in passing so often, lol). Thanks so much for coming by and having a chat :)  -

Nomes, you are so very, very lovely.  I’ve always been so grateful for your support of my books (and my sisters’ books too), and I love that story of your children thinking Cassie and Celia are real.  J x

1. Your Colours of Madeleine series is so creative with brilliant and unique world building, off-kilter, grin-worthy dialogue, and gloriously perfect, startling plot twists. I imagine your brain is whirring and buzzing as you plot and write and create.  How do you manage living in such a creative space? Do you find it easy to get in a creative flow, or hard to switch off once the lights are out? How do you balance creating and living in your fictional world and coming back to regular life?

First, thank you so much for your very kind words about the trilogy, and second, thank you for this great question!  I really like the idea of myself as the kind of person who lives in a mad, creative space, rather than the kind of person who walks around wondering what has happened to the second sink strainer. (It was missing for two weeks. I honestly think I’ve spent the last two weeks wondering about that sink strainer.  It turned out that it was inside the other sink strainer all along. Right there in front of me.  I was so excited to find it last night that I tweeted about it, and I never tweet.)

I guess I have always been a daydreamer, which means I am always getting lost or losing things or tripping over.  If I don’t feel especially creative I go for a long walk, especially a walk near water.  Or I listen to music.  When I was a lawyer I had to train myself not to wake in the night and start worrying about a case, but I always like to think about story and characters as I’m falling asleep, or if I wake in the night.  I find it soothing, and maybe it’s like a bridge from awake to dreams.

2. I have developed such a deep and real affection for so many of the characters in Cello. You write your characters with heart, humour, quirks, intrigue, charm and passion and even passing cameo-characters shine brightly on the page. Yet, despite so many grins-per page, there is a lot of heart-ache and tragedy that many characters face (longing and sorrow and injustice and sadness, to name a few). I would love to know any writing tips on how you to create such real and nuanced characters.

Thank you again: this makes me very happy.  I think the characters come alive for me when I spend time with them inside my head.  I like to let my mind wander, following a character around and seeing what they do and listening to their thoughts.  I once read that the author Joan Aiken started a manila folder for each of her characters and carried these around collecting thoughts, interests, quirks and attributes for them.  So I started doing that too.  I also choose favourite music for the characters and listening to that music always seems to open up various unexpected dimensions of the character for me.

3. I LOVED A Tangle of Gold. It was an exhilarating, genius, daring and utterly happy-making, totally absorbing wild and winsome reading experience. I feel nostalgic thinking about my time spent in Cambridge and Cello and will definitely be going back (in rereads and my imagination) in coming years. Now that Colours of Madeleine is finished I know you are working on a pirate book: “it’s about a girl whose parents ran away to have adventures with pirates when she was just a baby.  They left her with her aunt.”  Already I am thinking it sounds just like the kind of book you would write (and the kind of book I would love to read!)! Have you got any more little tidbits you can share with us about what you are working on (although, it’s okay if it is all very top secret!) or on how the writing is going?

You are a dream.  Thank you so much for such generous words.  

You are right that I’m working on a pirate book (which so far has nothing to do with pirates except that the main character’s parents have run away with them) and I am really enjoying it.  I’ve decided to write the whole thing in many different cafes.

I’m also writing a novel about a woman who signs up to take a series of seminars on the secret of human flight.  It’s about missing people, the self-help industry, single motherhood, and flight. And I’ve written the openings of a time travel novel, and a new Ashbury-Brookfield book.  

I was so excited for this opportunity to have you come and visit on my blog that I have been telling many people about it and amongst all the anticipation and excitement, I extended a tiny invitation for two other long-time, equally crazily-in-love fans to sneak a question each into this interview (I hope you don’t mind!).

First is Flannery, saying hello from Seattle:

My favorite Jaclyn Moriarty book is Finding Cassie Crazy (or The Year of Secret Assignments as it's called in the US). Jaclyn is one author who is consistently funny and it doesn't feel forced. I think it is especially hard to convey emotional subjects in epistolary format yet she manages to do it. Plus, to be completely honest, I love Jaclyn Moriarty's books (as well as a select few other Aussie authors) because they remind me of wonderful friends I've met online while discussing their books. I have a lot of fond memories connected to her books.

4. My question is whether she thinks having siblings sharpened her wit and sense of humor because her dialogue, especially in her epistolary books, is hilarious and on point.

That’s a brilliant question (partly because it incorporates praise and I like praise).  On the one hand, I find myself reluctant to share the credit for any sense of humour that I might have; on the other hand,that makes no sense.  I guess everybody’s sense of humour is developed by the people around them - as well as the books they read, the movies they see, the strange experiences that they have - but at the same time is an intrinsic part of their nature.  (My 9-year-old has found very specific things to be hilarious from the time he was a baby, even when other babies did not get the joke.)  

My family and I laugh together a lot, and being together is usually about trying to make the others laugh.  My dad tells hilarious stories, but he’s also very discerning with his laughter: you know how little kids tell a dumb joke and grown-ups laugh obligingly? My dad never did that.  He only laughed if he actually found you properly funny.  He is still the same and it still makes me feel proud if I can get Dad to laugh.  I think that kind of audience really helps you finesse your humour.    On the other hand, my sister Liane is quick to laugh a big, beautiful laugh, so you want to try to keep being crazy around her so that you’ll keep hearing the laugh.  She’s also very funny herself, as are all my other siblings.  My mother is sensible and kind and more of a straight man, but she has sudden darts of wicked humour that are so much funnier because they’re unexpected. 

I was just thinking aloud there so thanks for the interesting question.

And my second interviewer-guest is Deborah saying hi from Brisbane:

5. You write so many fascinating characters who have extraordinary adventures. So my questions are a bit like one of those online quizzes where you usually have to nominate your real-life friends as an answer to each question, but on this quiz, you have to nominate one of your book characters as an answer to each question (and explain why/elaborate if you feel like it):

1. Character who is most like you:   

Elizabeth Clarry (because I imagined myself into her shoes a lot of the time), Listen Taylor (for the shyness) and (I really hate to admit this, and I hope I am not too much like her but marks were way too important to me in high school and I often felt a strange, passionate disconnection from other people:) Bindy Mackenzie.  But every single one of my characters is like me in some way, because I imagine myself into all of them at least a little bit.

2. Character who would drive you the most crazy if you were their mother:  

Bindy Mackenzie (it’s when you recognise your own flaws in your child that they drive you maddest); Keira (when she’s in her dark moods - but you can’t blame her for her moods)

3. Character you would most like to have as your best friend: 

I’m finding this one strangely difficult because all the main characters have too much of me in them, so I feel like I’m imagining being friends with my reflection.  Maybe Sergio  - actually there’s a Sergio in Bindy Mackenzie and a Sergio in the Colours of Madeleine trilogy and I like them both.  So I will choose Sergio.  I’d also like to be friend with Gabe from Tangle of Gold as he is great at farming and can predict the weather.  

4. Character who would be your teen crush:  

Elliot Baranski (also Finnegan Blond from  Bindy Mackenzie)

5. Character you would like to switch places with for a day (a la Freaky Friday)....and which day in their life you would pick:  

Keira, when she and the others are in the Turquoise Rain in Cracks in the Kingdom (but without having the particular backstory issues that are getting her down that day).

Thanks so much for coming and I hope you’ve enjoyed chatting on here :) And I’ll be looking out for you as you continue visiting other blogs on the tour (so exciting!). I wish you all the best as you keep writing and finding cool cafes and colours everywhere you go!  

Thank you, again, Nomes - that was a lot of fun, and like I said, you are lovely.  Thanks also to Flannery and Deborah.

Ahh, isn't Jaclyn the best!!?! Thanks for answering our fangirl-y questions so wonderfully! Check out the breathtaking cover for A Tangle of Gold and also my review below... (and also, even further down ~ new editions for the Colours of Madeleine series. So much love for the new covers!)

Cello is in crisis. Princess Ko's deception of her people has emerged and the Kingdom is outraged: The Jagged Edge Elite have taken control, placing the Princess and two members of the Royal Youth Alliance under arrest and ordering their execution; the King's attempts to negotiate their release have failed. Color storms are rampant, and nobody has heard the Cello wind blowing in months.

Meanwhile, Madeleine fears she's about to lose the Kingdom of Cello forever. Plans are in place to bring the remaining Royals home, and after that, all communication between Cello and the World will cease. That means she'll also lose Elliot, now back in Cello and being held captive by a branch of Hostiles. And there's nothing he can do to help his friends unless he can escape the Hostile compound.

Worlds apart and with time running out, Madeleine and Elliot find themselves on a collision course to save the Kingdom they love, and maybe even save each other.

A Tangle of Gold found it's way into my greedy hands and, as to a hot buttered bun in a spinning tea-cup, it was beyond amazing. Look, this series is stunning and creative and wild and heart-felt and deliciously winsome. Those who have read A Corner of White and The Cracks in the Kingdom and have fallen in love with Madeleine and Elliot and Cello know just how brilliant this series is. 

What you may not know is that the final book reveals a whole new level of genius-like revelations that will leave you in suspense and awe. There are twisty-twists I did not see coming, suspicions and heartbreak, and reveals that take the series as a whole and raised it, to, like, the next 100 levels of plotting-artistry and flair. I knew I would be blown away by the conclusion to the series, but I was still unprepared for the sheer scope and awesomeness of pretty much everything.

 When I find a book that is so brilliant and falls into my absolute fave (of all time) category, it's hard to do justice to the entirety of the book and my feelings for it. So, I just want to say: this book made me so happy. It provided everything a bibliophile could ever possibly crave from a reading experience. It captured my imagination, had me in suspense, left me reeling and grinning and staying up all night turning the pages. I fell in love with the characters and their world and spending time with them enriched my own life (LOL, corny, but true!).

It felt so nostalgic, going back to Cambridge and Cello. I'm actually rather bereft that the adventures of Cambridge and Cello are over for now (although I do plan on revisiting all my mates there often). A Tangle of Gold was brilliant, it whisked me away and a tiny piece of my heart kind of believes Cello is real - I just need some smoke and mirrors...

Thanks to Jaclyn Moriarty for gifting me with one of the literary highlights of my reading life with The Colours of Madeleine <3

My reviews of

A Corner of White

Cracks in the Kingdom

A Tangle of Gold @ goodreads

Jaclyn Moriarty's website (looking very new and snazzy!)

Jaclyn Moriarty on instagram

Jaclyn Moriarty on facebook

Jaclyn Moriarty on twitter

Jaclyn Moriarty on tumblr

Have you guys seen these must-have editions!!?! WOW <3 See them in giant form @ Jaclyn's website (or click on this image).

Jaclyn is blog-touring all over the place so check out where else she has been (and where she is still to come!)

Interview with Aussie author Ambelin Kwaymullina :)

It's my privilege to have here with me on the blog Aussie author Ambelin Kwaymullina. Her Young Adult debut, The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf is an original, adrenalin-packed and thought-provoking sci-fi/fantasy, post-apocalyptic/dystopia with a gorgeous Aussie flavour. (make sure you check out the book trailer at the end of this post!)

Nomes: There are so many things to love about The Interrogation of Ashala
Wolf but the thing that struck me the most was how vividly the entire
book played out in my mind. I am huge visual person and I loved the
richness of the setting. You have a talent for not only describing a place,
but for transporting readers there. I am really curious about how you
crafted your setting and if visual inspiration played a big role in bringing
your story to life.

The setting in your book is so full of life it seems to be a character
unto itself. The Firstwood brims with life and a strong sense of history.
Are there any locations you imagined while bringing the Firstwood to
life?

Ambelin: When I’m writing, I see everything happening in my head. Because of that,
its really important to me that I describe everything as well as I possibly can
– I want my readers to see what I see, or rather, what Ashala sees, since the
book is told from her perspective. I drew much of the ecology of the Firstwood
from tuart forests, which grow in WA, and are one of the rarest forests on
earth. There were once thousands of hectares of tuart trees, and now the last
of them survive in remnant forests. It seemed right to me that these tough
old trees would live through the end of the world, to grow again into the vast
forest that Ashala lives in. Some of the other plants in the Firstwood exist in
this world too - the ‘’stumpy black trunk with long grasses spraying out the
top” is a grass tree, and the “shrub hung with brown pods filled with black
seeds” is a red-eyed wattle.

Of course, the ecology has changed somewhat, being as the Firstwood exists
three hundred years after the end of the world, when the tectonic plates have
shifted and formed a new, single continent. So there are animals around that
don’t exist now (saurs and sabers) and others that don’t live in Australia, like
wolves (although form the description in the book, wolves are more like a
cross between a dingo and a coyote than wolves as we know them now). I’m
really looking forward to having the chance to explore the Firstwood more in
the next book in the series.

Tuart Forest (wikipedia)

Nomes: You mention in an earlier interview how connected you feel to your
country - "For me it is the purple hills, red earth and endless blue sky
of the Pilbara region of Western Australia where my people, the Palyku,
are from. (This sounds incredibly moving and gorgeous!)" (source). Do
you think this strong connection you feel influenced the setting in your
novel and how Ashala feels about the land?

Aboriginal people, like Indigenous people elsewhere in the world, have a
strong connection to their homelands, their country. Ashala’s ancestors were
Aboriginal people, although she lives three hundred years after the world
ended when people no longer distinguish between themselves on the basis of
race. But she carries that inheritance, and she has that same love and deep

connection to the Firstwood that Aboriginal people have to their country now.
I wanted to capture in the book that feeling inside that Aboriginal people
have for their homelands, and that I have for the country of my people in the
Pilbara.

Some stunning pics of Ambelin's heritage, the Pilbara Region in Western Australia:

Nomes: I love how you contrast the stark facility in which Ashala is detained
against the wild and free (though still somewhat deadly) landscape of
the Firstwood. Did the contrast evolve naturally or was it a conscious
decision to develop it that way?

Ambelin: I think it evolved as the book was written. But it was also a product of the
kind of place the centre is. There’s actually parts of the centre that are trying
to look a bit more friendly, like the little houses where they’re putting the
detainees, and the park. But the government fails miserably to make it seem
like anything other than the prison it is. We’re seeing the centre from Ashala’s
perspective, too, and she’s unconsciously contrasting it with the freedom she
associates with the trees and open sky of the Firstwood.

Nomes: While The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf is set in the future, it also has
a strong sense of the past. It was easy to picture how the world was
before, during and after The Reckoning. You've captured the changing
nature of landscapes and how that affects people beautifully—how do
you feel about the way we treat the land now? And what we can do to be
better, as caretakers?

Ambelin: It breaks my heart to see the ancient places of the earth destroyed. And
we are putting, not just the many ecosystems of the planet, but our own
species in jeopardy. For some time now, scientists have been warning us
about reaching ecological ‘tipping points’, where human beings will have
done irreversible damage to the planet that sustains us. And I think the
way for each of us to start being better caretakers is to simply be informed,
and get involved. In the age of the internet, most of us have easy access
to information. It’s not difficult to find out about small improvements we can
all make to our daily existence to live in a more sustainable way, or about
campaigns we can get involved in to protect forests or oceans, or about big
ideas that will change the world.

In any given day, we all make a thousand choices, and those choices create
the future. As long as we know that, we can all change the world.

Nomes: I love the saurs in your book. I know they are powerful and
deadly but a part of me imagined them as a little bit cute. Did you have
any images in mind that helped you bring them to life?

Ambelin: I think they are cute, in their way – and certainly mischievous, although you
wouldn’t want to get on their bad side! I very loosely based the saurs on a
species of megafauna, megalania prisca – big carnivorous lizards that lived
in Australia thousands of years ago (although I gave the saurs much longer
necks). To get an idea of how they might move, I looked at perentie lizards,
which can grow up to two metres long. If you’ve ever seen a perentie stalk

along the ground, I imagine the saurs would move in pretty much the same
way.

megalania prisca

Will the Tribe survive the interrogation of Ashala Wolf?

"There will come a day when a thousand Illegals descend on your detention centres. Boomers will breach the walls. Skychangers will send lightning to strike you all down from above, and Rumblers will open the earth to swallow you up from below ... And when that day comes, Justin Connor, think of me." Ashala Wolf has been captured by Chief Administrator Neville Rose. A man who is intent on destroying Ashala s Tribe - the runaway Illegals hiding in the Firstwood. Injured and vulnerable and with her Sleepwalker ability blocked, Ashala is forced to succumb to the machine that will pull secrets from her mind. And right beside her is Justin Connor, her betrayer, watching her every move. Will the Tribe survive the interrogation of Ashala Wolf?

Official Website

The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf @ Walker Books
The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf @ @ goodreads

Ambelin Kwaymullina

Ambelin Star Kwaymullina is a Palyku person whose family comes from the north-west of Western Australia. She was born in Perth in 1975 and is both a writer and illustrator. Currently she works as a Lecturer in the Law School at the University of Western Australia. (source)