Marie Mistry lives in rainy Britain but spends most of her time escaping into imaginary worlds, whether that is in books or video games. She writes paranormal romance, but has written books in other genres in the past. She has a mild obsession with happily ever after and true love which she blames on a childhood full of Disney goodness.
Are you a morning person or a night owl?
I’m writing this at 1:42 am. Does that answer the question?
What’s your favourite app on your phone?
Forest. It plants trees when I focus and I like seeing virtual representations of my working hours.
If the NSA were to look at your Google search history, what’s the weirdest thing they’d find?
Haha, I’ve ALREADY been in trouble for my search history. When I was in school, writing my first series, I decided to put demons in it and, thorough newbie writer that I was, I decided to really do my research and use the names of “real” demons. I was using school wifi on my laptop and obviously my searches flagged something with IT, because I was summoned into the office and interrogated about why I was looking up the Lesser Key of Solomon among other things. They actually thought I was such an edgy teenager that I wanted to summon real life demons! Ha! Nowadays I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how much faster a horse walks than a person.
Who’s your favourite character from a TV show, movie, or book and why?
Bit obscure, but there’s a film called the Mists of Avalon. I really liked Morgaine in that, because even though her entire life was filled with tragedy and people trying to manipulate her, she did her best to be true to herself. I can’t watch the film without crying, but that character really stuck with me.
How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?
Four published when I was 16-18 but they’re gathering dust under a failed pen name. A finished unpublished YA fantasy duology which I actually really liked but I wrote it when I was trying to get traditionally published and no agent would take it. One unfinished NA mf which I wrote as a books which wasn’t supposed to have an ending and eventually moved on from. One mostly finished mf alien book which was written for NaNoWriMo, got a bit weird and I became really dissatisfied with. Oh, and one really cool mf angel novel that got saved on a memory stick, left somewhere and lost and now I cannot rewrite it without being frustrated at myself losing the first copy! Wow the list actually is quite long! In my defence, the first three were written before I turned twenty and are questionable quality.
How do you select the names of your characters?
Main characters tend to come to me naturally, or I will scroll pinterest for inspiration. Secondary characters I find by trawling baby name websites. I swear the internet must think I’m having five billion babies with the amount of time I spend on them.
What comes first for you: the plot or the characters, and why?
Neither! What tends to happen is I get the first scene stuck in my head for weeks, then I worldbuild from that. The characters have basic bones when I put pen to paper, but the world is the most fleshed out. Then the plot comes as I write because I’m a pantser. I know the vague direction things are going in but not much more than that.
Would you and your main character get along?
I’m pretty sure my main characters would band together and overthrow me if they got the chance! They’d probably want payback for all the hell I put them through.
What is something about your hero/ine that only you know?
I give each of my heroines exactly one trait from me. Usually really little things that no one else would notice.
What is the one thing you wished you could tell your readers?
Every time someone recs my books, posts about them or even just comments saying they liked them, I glow for an hour, sometimes more. More than that, once I’ve read it, it motivates me to write and I actually enjoy it more just for someone saying “hey, this girl’s books were really cool”. You guys give me purpose and I love every one of my readers.
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