Interview with Tiffany Trent!

Today is my first interview on this blog, and I'm very excited to say it is with the fabulous Tiffany Trent!

Tiffany is the author of the Hallowmere series, and currently has a few other projects in the works! She's graciously come out of her current Internet Hiatus to answer some questions for me. Enjoy!


KF: Are you a musically-inspired writer or do you need silence? If you write to music, care to share any of your fave writing songs/singers/groups?

TT: VERY musically oriented. I practically need music to write. It just sets the perfect mood. I love soundtracks especially because they usually have a dramatic arc that helps with the action of the stories. But I do also have a few bands I'm partial to—early Duran Duran is practically on repeat including rarer tracks like "Secret Oktober," "The Seventh Stranger," and "Night Boat." I also love Snow Patrol—"Run," "Chasing Cars," and "Set the Fire to the Third Bar." Mute Math is my most newfound love—"Noticed" and "Control" are among faves there. And then there are old standbys like Sia, Massive Attack, Fiona Apple, Rachael Yamagata, and Imogen Heap. I could go on, but probably should stop now, eh?


KF: Is there any writing advice you wish you’d never heard?

TT: I was strongly dissuaded from writing genre early on because it was creepy, fantastic, and…*genre*. I wish I'd never listened to that, though in truth working in literary nonfiction circles for a while probably did strengthen many aspects of my fiction.


KF:Come clean: Out of all your characters, which one is your favorite? No fair saying all of them, but if you’d rather turn it around and say your least favorite, I suppose I'll forgive you.

TT: My favorite character is one very few people have met, so I'll just talk about published characters. I admit that probably my favorite character thus far is Euan, the Fey Prince in Hallowmere. I still kind of want to write a book from his PoV. ETA KF: Ha! Yes! *want*


KF: You write a lot of historically-based fantasy- how do you balance the need to have relate-able characters with social constraints of any particular time period that we might not really understand now?

TT: That's really, really hard. I'm a bit of a stickler for historical accuracy. I worried endlessly over whether I'd gotten all those details right with Hallowmere, thinking everyone would call me on them and never dreaming that people would take issue with the books because I was being *too* accurate. I found myself often having to defend the main character's choices and actions because she really was acting as a sheltered girl of the 1860s would have. Some people saw her as weak because she didn't forge straight ahead and take control, but I knew for a fact that a girl of her situation would not have been equipped to take charge like that. She had to learn how, and that was meant to be a big part of her arc throughout the books.


KF: I know you have a martial arts background- do you think you'll ever write any books based around those experiences?

TT: I already have, actually, with my first (unpublished) novel. I'd like to someday return to those books and re-tool them for YA. They're adult right now and fraught with problems, but I think a YA version would be really fun. Also, I suspect that my next contemporary novel will feature a teen martial artist. And of course I can't help wishing I could get some martial arts novels in graphic novel form, as homage to my wuxia novel predecessors.


KF: Can you tell us anything about what you're working on now? According to your Twitter, your word count keeps going up, up, up!

TT: I'm working on a contemporary paranormal that I’m calling MARKED, for now, though I'd guess that title will change. Through a series of chance encounters with a hell-bent Muse, a young violinist could be the salvation or destruction of the world's greatest band. This is one of those novels that you just write for the love, because it won't stop beating at your backbrain. When this one is out my system, I will go back to my book about Darwin and the secret history of his voyage on the Beagle.

KF: You've done a lot of revision lately, so this question comes from Travis M.: What is your most successful revision technique?

TT: As I'm writing, I realize and accept that I'm most likely leaving holes. Of late, I've had more success getting through the first draft and on to revision if I just give myself permission to note what needs to happen in a subsequent draft and move forward. This may make for a real mess later, but it keeps me moving. Just getting to the revision seems to be the big hurdle for me. Once I'm there, I'm fine. So giving myself permission to wait until revision to work out a kink is a very good way to tilt me toward the process.


KF: And, because I've wondered this about some of your characters, this question from Kitty: Where do you find the names for your characters?

TT: Etymology. If you want to see what my characters are going to do, look up what their names mean. Corrine, for example, means "Light Bearer." One of the names I chose for Euan actually means "Son of the Dark Fairy." I don't do this with all of them, but the majority of them I do. And sometimes the name just comes to me. Lately, all names seem to be courtesy of the Letter V—Vespa from my most recent novel and Velvet in the current novel. I'm hoping to explore more of the alphabet soon. :-)



Thanks for the great answers, Tiffany!