Author Interview Number 2 – Young Adult/Fantasy Author Diana Wicker

Hi and welcome to the Library of Erana, a place of words and of their magic. Words are power, they are knowledge and they are freedom.

Welcome to Diana Wicker.

Please tell us a little about yourself.

I am an Indie author from the United States.  I wear many hats throughout my day, as I think many people do, but I try to steal a little bit of time from my busy schedule each day to work on my writing.  Writing is one of my favorite ways to relax and express creativity.  I also enjoy reading, sewing, and playing immersive RPG video games.

I do not keep a blog or website for my writing at this time, but I do have a facebook page for the series: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Tales-from-Feyron-The-Ripples-of-Power/421079171274185

Please tell us a little about your writing – for example genre, title, etc.

My current works are primarily young adult fiction in the fantasy/magic and coming of age genres, although I have dabbled in other genres when writing for pure fun.  I am hoping for an ongoing series of stories under the Series Title Tales from Feyron – the Ripples of Power.

The series will be divided into sets of stories from the different historical ages of the Realm of Feyron.  Feyron is the land of magic.  It is the beginning point of all magic and the axis point where all worlds meet.  I was originally inspired by my daughter and her love for storytelling role playing to create this land as a place that she and her friends could tell their tales, and it has taken on a life of its own and continued to grow from there.

The first book, The Dreamweaver’s Journey – The Age of Awakenings Book 1, introduces the Age of Awakenings and the return of spring to the Realms of Light, the lands where the Faiekin and the Guardians of magic live.  The second book, The Guardian Child’s Return – The Age of Awakenings Book 2, is currently in the proof stage, and I hope to have it live in time for the Midsummer Solstice in June.  I have several other works in progress, including a tales of lore collection and a second historical age.

Where can readers find your book?

Amazon.com – both as an ebook and paperback http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A111KL6

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00A111KL6

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Dreamweavers-Journey-Awakenings-Ripples/dp/1480166804

http://www.amazon.com/The-Dreamweavers-Journey-Awakenings-Ripples/dp/1480166804

Book 2  is now also available on Kindle

http://www.amazon.com/The-Guardian-Childs-Return-Awakenings/dp/1484171802

How long have you been writing and what, if anything, made you choose the genre in which you write?

I cannot actually remember a time where I was not a storyteller.  I began making up stories to tell to my younger family members and friends as a child.  In fact, the first stories I can remember making up had to do with an old chimney standing in the field behind the primary school where I attended, so that had to be kindergarten or first grade (age 5 or 6).  As a child I kept notebooks in drawers of stories that came to mind of places I had been or movies I had watched, so I was making “fan fic” long before I even knew that was a genre of writing.

Now, the reason I chose my current genre is that I had a particular audience of young people I was storytelling to, my children and their friends.  If the older children enjoy reading the story, and the younger children enjoy listening to the stories as they are read aloud, then I feel like I have done a good job on the story and pleasing my audience.  I hope other readers discover the stories and enjoy them as well.

Who or what are your inspirations/influences?

I’d have to say my inspiration comes from many places.  I have always loved a good story no matter how it is presented.  I love listening to stories, reading stories, watching stories, and even playing a well written role playing game so that I can interact with the story.  I enjoy reading from many different genres and have collected books containing fables, myths, and legends from around the world.

I have found that my writing seems to take on the feel of whatever I am absorbed in for relaxation while I am working on the tale.  Sometimes the plots for the stories or characters within them have theme songs that play through my mind while I write.  I find that these relaxing influences often become very important to helping hold together the flavor of that plot or character as I write.

Can you name a positive experience from your writing and a negative one?

One night as I was reading the draft of book 2 to my son, he looked up and me and smiled brightly and whispered, “Mama, it’s too bad your books aren’t on TV yet.  They’re my favorite thing.”  I cannot think of anything that has made me feel happier since I started down this journey of becoming a writer.

I cannot really think of any truly negative experiences related to my writing.  I have certainly had my fair share of frustration in getting stuck on a story or redoing passages or even entire chapters when the story just would not come together, but I do not see that as necessarily a negative thing.  It is just a part of growing as a writer and gaining experience, and sometimes simply of learning to be quiet and listen for the storyteller instead of trying to drag her along to places she does not wish to go.

With the rise of e-books do you still publish in print as well? Is this medium important and why?

I do publish paperbacks through CreateSpace.  There are many readers who do not have access to e-readers, or who still prefer the feel of a real book in their hands.  And really, there is a wonderful pleasure to picking up that paperback, opening the cover, and writing a message to someone on the page below my name and handing them the book with a smile while I think to myself, “I wrote this.  I am an author.”  It is a little complicated to sign someone’s e-reader.

Do you listen to music or watch TV whilst you write?

I tend to prefer silence, if I can get it, and dim lighting.  I find my most vivid ideas seem to come in that relaxed state of half sleep late in the evening or early in the morning, and that many times my stories sort of play out in visions like a movie or an anime or RPG style CGI video game.

Books are important, why is this the case? What can a book provide that say a video game cannot?

Books hold our past and our present.  They remind us of who we are, where we have been, and often point us forward to where we may someday be.  Sometimes going back to read stories from the past can become an eerily enlightening experience when we see what our world has become in the present.

I think the second question could almost go both ways.  A book can educate, enlighten, uplift, and take you places that you’ve never been; but then again, a well written interactive role playing video game often feels like you are creating the story as you go by offering choices, outcomes, and consequences.  This leads to a sense of wonder, escape, fantasy, and adventure and be just as rewarding and uplifting as reading a good story.  Who knows, perhaps generations from now people may look back on the video games we have left behind and draw conclusions about our societies and cultures much as we might by sitting down to a book of tales from cultures past.

Can you give us a silly fact about yourself?

According to my daughter, I randomly burst into song.  This odd habit comes from a game I used to play with my friends in school – Can you go all day and converse only in song?  No talking, just pulling lines from songs to get your point across.  I used to combine lines from songs to make poems as well.  I have a small collection of these musical poems.  My friends used to try to go through, line by line, and pick out each song borrowed from, as every line was from a different song.