Sep 23, 2013
Diego Marano, UK Manager for Kobo Writing Life interviews Chele Cooke, author of Dead & Buryd. Diego is joined by KWL Director Mark Lefebvre.
The trio discuss the following:
- Chele’s start of writing when she moved, at the age of 14, to San Francisco, where she began writing fan fiction in the Harry Potter universe
- How Chele’s degree in creative writing opened her up to different types and styles of fiction
- The effect of being short-listed for the Wicked Young Writers Award (http://www.wickedyoungwriters.com/)
- Some mistakes made early in a writing career and how that helps a writer to learn
- Chele’s previous challenge of piles of unfinished manuscripts and HOW she overcame that during NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month – November) by investing some time in outlining rather than just sitting down and writing without planning
- OUTLINING was the key to Chele’s success in completing a novel
- Chele’s plans to write the sequel to Dead & Buryd during NaNoWriMo this year (and the fact that Kobo Writing Life is a proud sponsor of NaNaWriMo 2013)
- How being new in self-publishing is like being the new kid in school
- The full story of how Chele & Mark met at London Book Fair, with zombies in the park, spontaneous hugs with strangers and Kobo Writing Life swag
- One of Chele’s favourite characters in Dead & Buryd and how she looked forward to writing scenes involving this character
- Embracing the challenge of killing off main characters and killing off the words in one’s first draft
- How Chele wrote 21,000 words in three days (again, thanks to the aforementioned outline)
- Chele’s book launch on October 5th at Big Green Book Shop (show up for a chance to win a Kobo eReader courtesy of Kobo Writing Life)
After the interview Mark talks about the importance of personal relationships and networking for a writer’s success. He calls out attending workshops, conferences and other in person events in order to make important connections. You never know when that connection you made might lead to a beautiful thing. Mark also talks about why looking for what you can do to help other writers is a great long term strategy for success.
LINKS/RESOURCES
Chele's Pinterest page for Dead & Buryd