Token Interviews

@xFakingaSmilex

Interviewee: xFakingaSmilex [REPOST]
Interviewer:Reviewly

Reviewly: What is your name/pen-name?

Smiles: I'm Stephanie, auto-correct calls me Steeply, I write under xFakingaSmilex, and most people call me Smiles.

Reviewly: Can you tell us a little about yourself?

Smiles: I'm 22, Australian, I have two Birman cats (Lilah and Jasper), I've been with my boyfriend for 5 years and I'm a qualified childcare assistant. Writing-wise, I've written over thirty books (short stories, novellas and novels etc), I've had seven books featured on Wattpad, I won a Watty in 2015, I've written for Coca-Cola and Cure for Wellness, I joined the Wattpad Star team in 2015, and have been an Ambassador for four-ish years now.

Reviewly: Are the books you write based off real experiences?

Smiles: Yes, seems rather inevitable! Baby Steps was written when I was completing my cert 3 in Early Childhood Education and Care, The Masked Singer when I decided I wanted to work in music, Roots through my plant/unemployed period etc.

Reviewly: What inspired you to write?

Smiles: I've always told stories to entertain people, and then I started reading stories online by authors my own age and decided I wanted to give it a try because I thought it would be fun. Turns out it's super addictive.

Reviewly: What type of books do you write? Why?

Smiles: Romance and Young Adult because I adore those genres! I have no idea why I'm obsessed with love, but everything I write needs to have some kind of romantic element, even if one is getting killed off.

Reviewly: How do you come up with your stories?

Smiles: I write what I want to read/piece ideas together. Take Roots, for example, I was obsessed with plants, my job provider told me to apply for every job, no matter what it was, which got me thinking when she suggested a website which seemed iffy, then I read an article about a group of people who dug into a mountain and had this elaborate plant scheme going on, oh, and I love drama/action in romance/gang stories. Those core ideas came together and I ended up with Tikera, a young twenty-something-year-old looking for a job on a suspicious website, she's hired as a gardener but ends up babysitting weed plants in a hole under a house. Each chapter is named after a plant which is mentioned in the chapter. I'm rather proud of this book and how well I've been able to throw it together.

Reviewly: Who are your favorite authors on and off Wattpad?

Smiles: Published, Gayle Forman (author of if i stay), because I love her writing style. On Wattpad, one of the reasons I'm here is @emofly39. If I owned a physical copy of any of her books, it would be so damn worn out.

Reviewly: What's your favorite part about the writing process?

Smiles: Creating/writing because I do that more than editing.

Reviewly: When did you first start writing? How old were you?

Smiles: Outside of school, I was fifteen!