AUTHOR INTERVIEW - CONSTANCE PHILLIPS

If you had to choose to be one of your characters in your book/books which would you be? and why?

Monique from Fairproof, hands down. Even though she has some negative traits she works to overcome them throughout the book, There are two huge things I admire about her.

She not afraid to do what she feels has to be done. Monique doesn’t submit to what her family thinks she should do or what Fairy society expects of her, but later, when need be, she stands up and defends the realm and her role in it.

The second trait I admire in Monique is her kind heart. She has the ability to see through to what the other characters are thinking and feeling and she’s sensitive to their wants and needs.

Are there any hidden messages or morals contained in your books? (Morals as in like Aesops Fables type of "The moral of this story is..")

That whether a character (person) is human or fairy, they are more alike than different. I think the separation of Fairy and human could be substituted for any two divisions of the population that are at odds.

What can we expect from you in the future?  ie More books of the same genre? Books of a different genre?

Crescent Moon Press will be releasing a second book (not related to Fairyproof) from me called Resurrecting Harry.  It’s also a paranormal romance. Currently, I’m writing a second book related to Fairyproof with Monique’s brother Keiran as the hero.

Do you think ebooks will ever totally replace printed books?

Totally replace? No. I liken it to what the music industry went through a few years ago. Everyone thought with the advent of iPods and other MP3 devices that the MP3 would wipe CDs, tapes and vinyl right off the face of the earth, but it hasn’t. In fact, there’s been a resurgence of vinyl recently.

I think ebooks are wonderful, and I think we can thank the companies that offer us so many different ebook readers for the proliferation of ebooks, but I think there will always be printed books around.

I don’t see them ever going completely away.

Do you think children at schools these days are encouraged enough to read? and/or do Imaginative writing?

Unfortunately, I think the answer to this question is no. For a while, I worked as an editor for an online magazine. On occasion college students would submit articles and I would be shocked at the level of skill they wrote at. It wasn’t only about commas and the like, but creating full sentences, or worse, sentences that went on and on and on.

Writing and reading are two things my kids have excelled at, but they’ve been encouraged to both from a young age.

Did you read a lot at school and write lots of stories or is being a writer something newer in your life?

Reading was instilled in me as a young girl. We only lived a couple blocks from the library in a small town, and I used to go to there several times a week. I’d bring home two or three books and devour them in a couple days. Then I’d return them and bring home two or three more.

I started writing stories about the same time I learned to string sentences together. In high school, I had the amazing support of a creative writing teacher. Her encouragement was enough to keep chugging away all these years.

What piece of advice would you give to a new writer?

Never give up.

I know it seems a little cliché, but it is the absolute most important advice. Realize you will be told no. It’s inevitable, but you have to keep pushing until you find the person who connects with your work.

Where can readers follow you?

I have a blog and a lot of information about my books and guest appearances at my website.

Your Facebook page? I can also be found at facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ConstancePhillipsRomanceAuthor?ref=hl  

I’m also at Twitter with the handle CPhillips. 

You can also find me at Goodreads....