Project Athena | Author Spotlight

craftychicken

We take great pleasure in featuring craftychicken as our highlighted author this month, celebrating the richness of diverse literature. Her stories offer a fresh and enthralling perspective, adding depth and intrigue to the world of storytelling. Join us as we delve into her unique writing style, and gain valuable insights into her personal journey as an author.

What inspired you to become a writer? When did you first start writing?

I originally became a writer as my best friend when I was fifteen wanted to be an illustrator. I decided to try writing a children's book that she would illustrate later. Sadly that book never got finished and was probably quite terrible.

I discovered Wattpad a few years later and tried writing my first book The Devil Lies Amongst Us for the 2022 Watty's.

How would you describe your writing style and voice? What sets it apart from other writers in your genre?

My writing style is very dialogue-heavy. I dislike books with a heavy amount of description and little to no dialogue. The number one motto writers always share is show don't tell. I think it's much easier to show a character's personality through their dialogue rather than just describing them.

What do you believe are the most important elements of a successful story?

Character development is so important. Seeing a character go on a journey of self-discovery, learning their flaws and weaknesses and working on a way to overcome them or adapt them to help them achieve their hopes and dreams is always so satisfying.

Can you discuss a time when you received constructive criticism about your writing, and how you incorporated it into your work?

For my book Where Our Demons Hide, I received an awful review which ripped the whole story apart. The author even said that it would fit better into the fanfiction genre as it reads like a Hunger Games fanfiction. I do write fanfiction, but to have someone say that an original story of mine should be considered fanfiction, hurts more than I could put into words.

I didn't find too many things helpful in the review. The majority of it was simply something I needed to ignore and move on from. We all need to remember that as much as we try to please everyone, it's an unrealistic goal and there will always be someone who won't enjoy the way we write or what we write about. Just remember that for most of us, this is a hobby. What we write doesn't have to be perfect. Just write what you want to write and as long as it makes you happy, you're doing it right.

How do you approach world-building in your stories? What techniques do you use to create immersive and believable settings?

For me, word building has always been something I like to do in smaller parts. What I mean by that is I don't info dump everything in the first chapter, but instead tell the reader the basics of what they need to know at that moment and wait until the next bit of worldbuilding is necessary or relevant before I bring it up and dropping it into the story. Giving the reader the worldbuilding in bite-sized chunks helps them to not feel overwhelmed and ensures that they don't have to remember things for several chapters as I'm telling them what they need to know only when it's relevant to what's about to happen or to explain what has just occurred.

Can you tell us about a particularly challenging scene or chapter in one of your stories, and how you tackled it?

Ok, this is a big spoiler for Where Our Demons Hide so I'm going to try to keep it spoiler free.

At a rather late point in the book, one of the characters dies. Writing their death scene was so hard. I wanted to make sure that I was keeping all the other characters in character while still making the death seem devastating and written in a way that would pull on the reader's heartstrings.

The way I tackled it really, was just by ensuring that each character stayed true to their personality but still showed some of that devastation from seeing their friend die.

I also think that having seen my grandad die, this was a little easier as I never got to say goodbye to him so really this chapter is what I would have said to my grandad if I could.

I think I succeeded somehow as I still cry every time I reread that chapter.

How do you stay motivated and productive while writing? What strategies do you use to overcome writer's block or other obstacles?

I never really fall into writer's block as I also write fanfiction on A03. This means that whenever I reach a point where I don't feel like working on my own original stories, I can work on fanfiction instead and vice versa. This usually helps me to stay motivated and I just jump back and forth between my two current projects.

What do you think are the benefits and challenges of writing on Wattpad? How has the platform influenced your writing and career?

I would say that meeting other writers is the best part of Wattpad. Finding people with the same hopes and goals as you is great and being able to make friends and watch each other grow will always be my favourite part of the platform.

The main challenge I have faced is simply finding your audience. The right audience for every book on Wattpad is out there somewhere, but sometimes finding it or finding the right readers for your book is very difficult and can take a while to find.

What are your goals for your writing career, both in the short term and long term?

In the short term, I would like to improve the amount of readers I have for my books. Working on keeping readers engaged and keeping them reading on to the next chapter is something I need to work on.

In the long term, I would like to publish a book. Whether through self-publishing or traditional publishing ever since that first story about a sheep wanting to go to the moon I wrote seven years ago, it's been a dream of mine to have a book of my writing get published.

What advice would you give to other emerging writers who are looking to improve their craft and build their readership?

I would say, just don't give up. Many things along your way will try to dissuade you from carrying on but don't give up. Yes, you may not find hundreds of readers right away, but you will build an audience over time. Yes, that review you may have just received might make you want to give up, but if you give up, you'll never see what that story could have become or how your journey on Wattpad might have gone. Keep writing, even if there's no one reading it, because many authors weren't popular when they were even alive. I'm sure that if Charles Dickens, Jane Austen or Shakespeare could see the appreciation their works get today, they'd be proud of themselves. So keep writing, and you never know just where your journey will take you.

We are thrilled to present craftychicken as a featured author in this series! Take a moment to immerse yourself in her captivating stories and show your support.

If you're interested in being featured too, keep honing your craft and submit your work to our reading lists. We're constantly seeking exceptional books to showcase and share with our readers.