Louisa Ellemind

Posted On October 7, 2019

• What lead you to write?

My love for stories and words. My parents were highly encouraging when it came to my reading and my writing, and so was my teacher, so that definitely played a big part in it.

•  Was there a particular person that influenced you to pursue writing?

My teacher when I was six. I think it was the first story we had ever been asked to write. She seemed really excited by mine. I didn’t really get it. I knew heaps of stories and mine wasn’t as good as any of them. But she thought I was good at it, so that was a major confidence boost and made me keep writing.

• What is your preferred genre to write?

I love writing about children with problems, magic, and mental health. Whatever I write usually has different aspects of different genres, and I often don’t know what the main genres are. My test readers help me with that.

• What is your favorite genre to read?

Probably YA, but I’m up for anything, really.

•     What are your favorite activities or hobbies outside of work/writing?

I’m also a singer/songwriter and love making music. I’m planning on publishing my first EP in November. I’m also in a theatre group and in a debating society.

•   Who is your favorite author and what do you enjoy about their writing style?

Andrew Solomon is my favourite non-fiction author. His wording is beautiful, what he writes is important, and he puts a lot of himself into his work. My favourite fiction author is Diana Wynne Jones. Her books are constructed like dreams. At least that’s my experience of them.

•     What is one major struggle you have with writing?

Location. I don’t have a good sense of location in the best of circumstances, but, because I live in Germany and most of my stories are set in Britain, it’s even harder to convey a convincing sense of location.

•    Out of all of your stories, which one did you most enjoy writing?

Probably one called ‘A Billion Times Me’. It was the first longer book that I finished writing, and definitely the first I thought would have a chance of publication. It has elements of science-fiction and mystery. People start disappearing, others wake up with personalities completely different from their own… It’s not been published yet, but you never know!

• What projects are you currently working on?

Other than an EP of original songs that I’m planning on releasing in November, I’m currently working on a children’s novel aimed at children aged 10-12, about two very different sisters who are both witches. It’s called ‘The Seers Sisters’ and I’m planning on releasing it in February.

•     Do you place any of your life experiences into your stories

Never directly. Occasionally I take a characteristic from someone I know, or myself (whom I also know) and embellish it.

And it’s never intentional, and I never know it’s happening while I write the story, but I did somewhat include some of my life in some of my stories:

Selective or complete muteness is a topic that frequently appears in my stories. This relates to me, because I used to be selectively mute in school lessons for a while. For those who don’t know, selective muteness is not something where you CHOOSE to be mute, instead, the word ‘selective’ relates to the fact that you’re only mute in certain contexts.

Panic attacks or metaphors for panic attacks, as well as metaphors for depression often appear in my stories.

I also once wrote a book in which one of the main characters was bisexual, and a little afterwards I realized that I was bisexual.

•     If you had enough money to travel anywhere in the world, where would you go?

Iceland! I’ve always wanted to go to Iceland!

• What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

‘Your first book won’t be your best one.’ It helped me shift my perspective from ‘This book has to be perfect’ to ‘This book has to be good’.

• What part of your writing is the most complimented?

The uniqueness of it. Most of my readers have never read something like it before, which makes it hard to market, but the readers usually really like that part of it. And that the characters were unique, interesting and well-developed.

• What part of your writing, do you feel, needs strengthening?

Sense of location. I have trouble imagining realistic locations sometimes, especially since I live in Germany and most of my stories are set in Britain. Landscape of cities is NOT my strong suit.

• What is one of your most cherished items in your writing space?

My laptop, Meredith.

• What is one thing in anything you’ve read that stood out to you? (Could be meaning or even just sentence structure.)

Far From the Tree, by Andrew Solomon, is a non-fiction book about children who differ from their parents, and it’s one of my absolute favourite books. The language used is beautiful, personal, honest, and loving.

• What advice would you give to someone trying to start building their platform and market their work?

The best advice I can give is to not focus on numbers. Don’t focus on the number of followers, or book sales. Those are not in your control. What’s in your control is how much time you spend on marketing your book. And, if you’re able, how much money. Set a fixed amount of time that you want to use to market your book, maybe half an hour a day, depending on your circumstances, set a timer, do the work, do something else.


Website: louisaellemind.com

Twitter: @LouiLae

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/100775527-louisa-ellemind
Amazon Page: https://www.amazon.com/author/louisaellemind