Chantelle
Atkins
Chantelle Atkins was born and raised in Bournemouth, Dorset and still resides there now with her husband, children and various animals. She writes in both the Young Adult and Adult genre, and describes her work as gritty and character driven.
WORK /LIFE BALANCE
In
the day I don't get any actual writing done but I do go online and do
bits and bobs - emails or promo stuff, whatever the baby allows.
Then I don't get on again till he's in bed. It's just solid then
until I go to bed – 3 or 4 writing hours maybe.
My other three children are all a bit older so they know once the baby's in
bed it's my writing time. But I feel guilty all the time. But they
understand that a bit because it's the only time I have until he
wakes up. The day goes so quickly. When the baby was teeny tiny I
got loads done because he was just asleep or I could have him with me
and carried on so it was brilliant. I have Saturday nights off
because it's family time. I do sneak on during the day on Saturdays.
The kids did ask me the other day if I could give them 2 nights a
week. And I said, “Well okay.”
WRITING
IMPETUS
I'm
mostly character driven because it starts as a person in my head;
their problems and dilemmas are coming through then the plot will
come after that. The only book I did know the plot for more than the
character was The Tree of Rebels and that's the one I
struggled with the most because it's not the way I normally do it.
I'm not sure about it yet.
Usually
my books are set in the Bournemouth, Dorset area where I've grown up.
I'll leave place names the same and in the rewrite I tweak it and
change place names in case anyone gets offended.
MUSIC
It
always creeps into my writing. It runs right the way through The Boy with the Thorn in his
Side – his journey through music was mine - what I got
into first, the whole Brit Pop and Grunge thing. In The Mess of Me,
Joe's really into music and with This is Nowhere it's the mum who has disappeared who's into music.
It's definitely a big part of me. I've always got music on when I'm
writing so this probably influences what goes into the book at the
time.
WRITER'S
READS
Primarily
I read anything that is character driven. I do like that. If
nothing much happens but I love the characters then I'm happy. My
favourite book ever is The Catcher in The Rye. But I'll read
anything. When I was growing up I was obsessed with horror books and
Steven King was my favourite author for years and years. I'm not
overly keen on Romance. I like a love story but I don't like the
Romance genre as such. I wouldn't seek it out. With Sci Fi it
really depends but I'll give anything a go.
SOCIAL
MEDIA
Facebook
is my main one. I go on twitter but I don't have time to read
everyone else's tweets. Pinterest I really love but I don't have time
to go on there every day. The more boards you have the better. They
show you all these catalogues. I've started putting together vision
story boards for the different books. It doesn't work with all my
books but with the more visual ones it's great. I've had a few
people follow me from there onto other sites so it's got that whole
thing of linking up which is what you're meant to do. I've been on
loads then just slacked off and decided I'll stick to these main ones
and the blog.
To find out more about Chantelle and her books read her blog, LIKE her author page or follow her on Pinterest.
Comments
Post a Comment
Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. It's much appreciated as is the time you take to write a comment.