Royal Interviews

Bloomers' Winner Interview (Elena)

Welcome to the talks with the winners! We present to you the winners of Bloomers Category Awards 2023-24.

Starting with High_Priestess_Elena who is the winner of Category Blurb in the awards. Here's an interesting interview with them:

I: Interviewer
Elena: Interviewee

🏆🏆

I: Welcome here, Elena! Congratulations on this win. To begin with, tell us something about yourself and your writing journey.

Elena: Oh gosh, I always find those very open questions hard 😂 But well, think I was about ten, if not even younger, when I started writing my first story ever. I have it still saved on a computer that runs on Windows 2000 and I read it now and then again. Have to say I'm kind of impressed with how good it is considering that it was written by a ten year old 😂 I do, without a doubt, belong to those people that have always had a passion for creating stories. I used to have a hard time falling asleep as a kid and would tell myself stories to make it easier. It's a habit I still have, though now I'm so exhausted from working all day that I only get like one or two sentences in before I'm fast asleep. I do also though think that a big contributing factor to why writing, and reading, has had such a big place in my life is that I'm stubborn and has dyslexia. I wasn't diagnosed with dyslexia until I was an adult, but obviously that caused me to have a hard time learning to read and write. As a result I was often told that I "couldn't" or that I was "dumb". But being stubborn as I am, that in itself made me go "I'll show them". Of course, if I hadn't enjoyed both reading and writing stories, I probably wouldn't have turned that "I'll show them" into falling more in love with writing, but I did so I've always just kept writing.

I: I mean, I am stunned! Even with the problems you initially had to go through, you stand strong as a reader and an amazing writer! Very inspiring.

When did you get to know about Wattpad and decide to hit that publish button for the first time?

Elena: I actually have no idea when I first heard of Wattpad. I wasn't ever on it when I was younger, but have plenty of friends that were. So it's just come up in conversations now and then. I joined it myself in September last year with the sole purpose to publish. What prompted that decision was a friend that I had sent the book to. Originally I never meant to publish this book anywhere. I wrote it for fun when I needed break from my more serious writing projects. That friend is from another country than me, so she doesn't speak my native language, which all my other writing is in. But she really wanted to read something, so I sent it to her when I had completed it. And she loved it. Enough so to make me feel that my silly and for fun project might be worth sharing on a larger scale.

I: Wow! The story that got you the winner's tag, could you tell me more about it? What was the inspiration, how did it all work out?

Elena: So first of, it's the first in a serie that'll contain six books. The inspiration of the whole series came from a period when I found shifter-mate-books and ended up reading a ton of them 😅 I really do enjoy the mate, or well soulmate, concept and reading all of those got me thinking of writing my own story about mates. But I've always been more of a witch-person, "Charmed" was my favourite TV-show growing up, so felt natural to write one with witches being in the MCs instead. I also do like the "chosen one"-trope, but more so do I like the idea of several "chosen ones" coming together to fight the "big bad evil". And from those two things the whole series was born. The first thing I wrote in it is what actually will be the prologue for book number six. I also learnt from past experience in writing, that it's so easy to make it all just confusing for a reader if you have multiple MCs in one story. It risks becoming too many characters to get to know at once. So I decided that give all of the "chosen ones" one book each before they come together to fight the "big bad evil", so a reader that has followed the whole series then know all of them and has found reasons to root for them individually before.

I: The backstory of your series can be a good book in itself! how do you manage your work as well as writing?

Elena: The truth is, I don't really. I used to be good and write as I commuted to and from work, but I seldomly find the energy for that anymore. What I do have is a lot of writing already done to publish. I didn't begin publishing the first book until I only had editing left on the second and gotten a good part of the third written. Right now I'm in the process of publishing the second, editing the third, and writing the fourth, but I have barely written since Christmas. When I do have vacation however, I tend to write a lot. I'm myself really looking forward to my ten day vacation around Easter to hopefully manage to finish the first draft of the fourth book.

I: I just learnt that planning the publishing and writing of the book is as important as working out the plot🙌
How do you deal with writer's block?

Elena: That definitely depends a bit on why I have it. Like for instance know, I guess some would say that I'm in writer's block. I have had time during weekends and so to actually continue writing, but I've just not been able to get anywhere. But this block is definitely mainly due to me just being too tired and occupied with other things, plus what I am writing right now is kind of emotionally draining, so also not something that's easy to write when you're not properly rested. But I know all of that will be solved when I've had some proper rest. The other type I've encountered is more of one where I just feel meh about the story and not really sure how to proceed. In those cases, I just push through. I know what I'm writing then probably won't be that great. But that's what editing is for. It's more important to just force myself forward because eventually, as I write, that block will disappear and the words will flow again.

I: I wish we all had this clarity about these blocks. What is something that you would want to say to your readers and supporters?

Elena: Simply that I appreciate every single one of them. It always puts a smile on my face when I get home from work and check how much the number of reads has increased since I went to bed the day before. I've also definitely lost sleep from waking up, for one reason or another, in the middle of the night and deciding to check on Wattpad just to see new comments that I obviously have to read immediately 🙈 This has all actually become a much bigger part of my life compared to what I thought when I began publishing and a part I'm thoroughly enjoying, and this wouldn't be the case without my readers and supporters ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️

I: All this just feels like cherry on the cake of writing, absolutely. What advice would you like to give to new writers?

Elena: Write what you want to write, not what you think others want to read. And your first draft won't be perfect, but that's okay, you can always edit it later. Oh and actually also, specifically for Wattpad, don't worry about the number of reads when you just start publishing, just focus on writing the story you want to tell.

I: That sounds very helpful and motivating. lastly, how was your experience with our community? Did you like the awards and this space? Any suggestion or feedback that we can work upon?

Elena: Everyone's been really nice and sweet! Helped judge also, and thought that all went pretty smooth and was clearly structured 😊

I: So glad to know you think so! It was a pleasure having this conversation with you, Elena. Loads of love and power to you!✨

Elena: Likewise ❤️