Interviewing The Wattpad Angels

Interview with @AlexMcGilvery

@AlexMcGilvery is the author of 'Sparkles and Blood' which is now featured list of Wattpad. He has also written 'Getting to Carnegie Hall' which presents a small writing excercise in each chapter. The link to this story is provided in the external link.

Enjoy !

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1. What do they call you?

 A. Alex McGilvery

2. For how long have you been writing?

A. I wrote my first novel in middle school, so that means about 40 years.

(wow..that kinda makes us all seem like babies in the writing field lol!)

3. Which part of writing a story, do you enjoy the most? (Creating characters, the plot and the subplots, the beginning/ending or the middle)

A. I tend to build stories up from an image or series of images. I like watching the story take shape as I write. Old school photographers will understand when I say it is like watching a photograph develop.

4. Have you faced any embarrassing moments, in terms of writing?

A. Oh, plenty. Whenever I find a mistake in my work. I had one story in which I spelled the MC's love interest three different ways.

5. Which is your favorite color? Have you made any reference to it in your story/stories?

A. While my favourite colour for decorating is green, I often wear burnt orange and other strong colours. I don't use colour exclusively, but try to build in all five senses when I write.

6. Out of the stories you have written on Wattpad, which is the most memorable one?

A. At the moment I'd have to say Sparkles and Blood which was a featured book for a couple of weeks and jumped to 21,000 reads. It was something I wrote for a contest to write about old school vampires.

7. Are you planning on publishing soon?

A. I have two books published independently and I'm working up a third for the ABNA. I'm bringing out an e-book with my short novels in June.

8. Which is your favorite book/series on Wattpad?

A. I don't have any real favourites. I tend to read a lot, 50 or 60 books a year for reviewing, plus what I read on Wattpad. One book that I found was a very pleasant surprise was @adam_and_jane's Obsession. It is a fanfic, and if all fanfic's were that kind of quality I might read more of them.

9. What kind of help do you provide - critiques, free advice or editing?

A. I have a series of articles on writing. I also do a lot of critiquing and try to encourage other people to critique too with my Critiquing Challenge.

10. Which author do you idolize (off Wattpad)?

A. I don't idolize people. When you've been around as long as I have you don't bother with the pedestals.

11. If you were a newbie, which part of the story would you focus on most?

A. The problem with focusing on one part of the story is that the rest gets weak in comparison, but if I was going to choose one essential to learn first it would be empathetic characters. After you have good characters to you need to work on a plot to match.

(that's true :))

12. Which is your favorite character (off Wattpad) ?

A. I read enough that I don't have favourites. When I'm reviewing I have to leave each book behind and come to the next one with an open mind. I don't want to be comparing this character with that one.

13. If you were given a choice to become one character (of your story posted on Wattpad) which one would you be and why?

A. If you held a gun to my head and forced me to choose, I would say Frank Madison from Madison's Meteor. He's just an ordinary guy who happens to change people around him.

(lol! I wouldn't hold a gun to your head. If I haunt you..would that do the trick? :))

14. Do you prefer dark romance or the usual?

A. Romance is one of the genres that I don't read much. I'll critique it, but I find the narrow focus on relationship as the only plot structure a bit claustrophobic.

15. Where do you look for your inspiration?

A. I work from images, sometimes they are from dreams, sometimes from stories that I hear from people.

16. What’s your favorite TV show?

A. I don't watch TV. I would rather write.

(said like a true writer :))

17. Do you prefer more reads, votes or comments?

A. I'm a sucker for good comments. I like the new statistics that lets me see the distribution of reads on a book so I can see where I'm losing readers.

18. Imagine the world is collapsing around you, what would you choose to save – technology or books?

A. If you save the right books, you are saving technology, but to tell you the truth. I'd probably save my scotch collection.

19. What is the best advice you have given and received?

A. Write. Write when you don't want to, write when you do. If you don't write you will never finish the story.

20. Any extra tips for our young writers?

A. That bit above about writing. I read somewhere that a professional author will write a million words before they start getting recognized.

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I hope you enjoyed the interview guys !