One of the great aspects of the book are the characters Aaron and Hannah who so are believable and credible. Where did the inspiration in creating these
characters come from?
This is a really hard question. I think
people think they know the sort of teenager that gets pregnant and with Hannah I wanted to subvert that expectation and show that’s not necessarily the case.
With Aaron, he’s a little bit like some of the boys I knew when I
was growing up.
The
book deals with lots of real issues like pregnancy and death. Why was important
to you to write about these issues?
The issues that was most important for me
to write about was teen sex because when I fourteen that’s what I wanted to read about. I also think it's fun to question people’s prejudices, especially about teen
pregnancy. After that everything just sort of snowballed from there. I didn’t
actually set out to write about death at all, it just happened.
A
lot of YA fiction, revolves around boy meets girl scenarios. One of great aspects of 'Trouble' is that is focuses on a wide range of relationships. Do you think that
more YA writing should focus on more than just romance and boys?
YA is a great space for girls. I think we
focus too much on a romantic ideal whereby the fit boys will see you for who
you really are and they don’t need you to be 'hot'. I would like to see more books where
it’s like ‘ having a relationship is really hard, you need to put in a lot of
work' and I’d quite like to see what happens after you get together.
When
writing Trouble did you have any moments of ‘Oh God this is awful, I should
just give this up?' or were you confident about what you were doing?
Writing is the one area where I don’t feel any
area of self doubt. I have been writing since I was fourteen. Even if I’d
never got published, I’d still be writing anyway. I have to write, so I do.
Your background is publishing, was that a help or a hindrance when it came to
writing?
I think it's really helpful. I think working
in publishing lowers your expectations wonderfully. Publishing is my space so I
felt comfortable in going out talking to agents, talking to editors and never
feeling uncomfortable talking to these people because they’re me. It’s
something I wish authors would understand, you're all on the some team.
Tell us a bit about your creative process.
So you have an idea and I have to know the first line and the last line. I might have an idea for a scene and write my favourite bits first . In 'Trouble', there’s a scene where the popular girl Marcy spits in Hannah’s face and that’s half way through the book but it was the first scene I wrote . There was also a big hole where Aaron’s past was. I knew he’d done something bad but he’s backstory was a bit flimsy at first. One piece of advice, know your characters' backstory.
Are
you planning to write anything else soon and if you are could you tell us a bit
more about it?
I’m writing a book called ‘Remix’ which is
about two girls, two best mates Kaz and Ruby. They’ve just broken up with
they’re boyfriends and it’s the summer after their GSCE’S and they’re going to
a music festival called remix and the plan is to get away from home, get away
from their ex boyfriends, put their troubles behind them, move on and it
doesn’t work in the slightest.
What
are you reading at the moment?
I’m currently reading ‘My Heart and Other
Black Holes’ by Jasmine Warga. This is about a girl named Aysel who wants
to commit suicide but can’t do it herself. I have to stop to cry, it’s just so sad; it’s beautiful but sad.
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