Read the following interview to learn more about Victoria's "Barber Shop Incident", her stories, the book she dedicated to her late brother, and also her tips for writers and writing. 

Client: CroodsGirl

Interviewer: SI_Mitchy

I'm SI, an Interviewer from the Gemme Community, may I get an introduction?

My name is Catherine Victoria Christie, but I go by Victoria or Viktoria. Viktoria is derived from my Russian name, Viktoria Fyodorova. I've been writing since 4th grade and have written over 200 short stories, three series, and seven books. My favourite genre to write is Fantasy. I hope to become a published author in the future. I'm very kind, and I love to help undiscovered authors. My dream is to either become a Creative Writing teacher or go into the movie business.

Nice to meet you, Viktoria. I must say you have really nice dreams and I can see you're really working to achieve them. Going through your books, I saw that your writing career started in a Barbing shop, very interesting if I may add, where do you think you would have been if that encounter never happened?

I call it the Barber Shop Incident. If it never happened, I would not be where I am today. I knew I was an imaginative person when I was young, but I did not know where it would get me in life. I never expected to be a writer. It just hit me the day at the barber shop. I don't know what happened, and I don't think I ever will. If it didn't happen, though, then I would not be going to school to become a writer, and all the stories I've written would never exist. That I know for sure.

I'm really hoping everyone gets to have their own "Barber Shop Incident" also. Anyways before I go on, I should congratulate you for getting your books approved for publishing by Royal Road.

Oh, thank you! I didn't expect it, since I didn't get approved by Radish, so it was a nice surprise.

You must be excited with the news and if I may add, Radish just missed out on the chance to publish a great book like yours. Do you have any specific reason for submitting those three books out of your 18 works on Wattpad?

The Green Guardian, Wait! I Wrote That?, and The Descendant of Evil are my best works on Wattpad--the ones I've put the most time and effort into. They're the ones I've applied to become Paid Stories, because they each hold a special place in my heart. The Green Guardian is written in honor of my older brother, who died in August 2021, so it only makes sense to try it to get his story known.

Wait! I Wrote That? is an interactive memoir that combines memoir with storytelling, in order to paint a picture of my writing career in my reader's head. That one is definitely something you do not see often, so I really wanted to try to encourage people to not be shy about uploading your old stories.

As for The Descendant of Evil, I love Star Wars. I wrote so many Star Wars fanfictions when I was younger, but this one is my best one. It has a very creative plot and contains things we have not seen in Star Wars: supernovas and wormholes. I also worked really hard to develop Rey more, since I believe she could have used a little more development in the Sequel Trilogy. A lot of work went into coming up with the plot for The Descendant of Evil, and I am very happy with what the novella turned out to be.

My condolences for the loss of your brother and I hope writing a book in his memory really helped you in coping with the loss. Writing The Green Guardian in honor of your brother must have been difficult because surely you would want your readers to connect to your story, was there any moment you lost hope in writing it?

There's a bit of a story behind The Green Guardian. I wrote it before my brother (Matthew was his name) died. He struggled so much those last six months leading up to his death. To help overcome the guilt he felt, I decided to write a story in his name and base the main character off him. The main character's name is Mateo, which is Matthew in Spanish and Italian. I was going to give Matt The Green Guardian as a birthday present in September, but sadly, that never happened. He died one week after I finished the book. I wanted him to have it,--to hopefully loosen the guilt on his shoulders--and I think it would have. The thing I was most looking forward to was seeing his face when he learned I wrote a book about him, but again, that didn't happen. However, I never gave up on him, and I knew he would want me to share his story. I did not write The Green Guardian for me. I wrote it for him. Everything I'm doing with it is in honor of him.

And I must say, what you did for your brother is really sweet and he must be honored to have a loving sister like you.

Memoir writers are one of the most underrated writers on Wattpad because most readers focus on Romance and other genres and honestly I'm also guilty of that.

What inspired you to go into memoir writing?

It's another coping method for me. This semester at my school, a well-known author came and shared a memoir with us. Hers was about her mom, who died tragically, just like my brother. It was such a beautiful piece that I decided to try a memoir myself. I already had my collection of old stories; I just took them to the next level. Wait! I Wrote That? has been such a fun, yet nostalgic piece for me to work with. I hope that one day, I can read it in front of an audience, just like that author.

That's great.

Among your works on Wattpad, which of your character do you relate with the most?

Mateo, for sure. He's the perfect example of how young adulthood can affect an individual. He has high anxiety, like me, and struggles so much to find his place in the world. He's made mistakes that he feels guilty about, but he has to learn that they're all in the past. He needs to live in the future. Mateo is one of my most flawed characters. Matthew was very flawed, and so am I. I believe Mateo is someone anybody can relate to: not just me, and not just young adults.

Well, I'll surely love to read about it, although I'm more of a ghost reader. Lol.

What's the story behind Green Guardian?

The Green Guardian is actually something I've been working on since 5th grade. The first series I wrote was called Maglin Arts High. It took place in the medieval-modern kingdom of Pinta Country. The Green Guardian, which was originally called The Enchanted Forest, was one of the stories in the series. As I grew older, I started to look back at Maglin Arts High, and I picked out the stories I thought were worth re-writing. This is the 4th draft of the story, so the inspiration has flip-flopped back and forth over the years. It wasn't until the 3rd draft, when I changed its name to Mystery of the Paperblank Forest, that I based it more off my older brother. He was a green guardian,--he loved nature--so that's the story behind its official name. I also really enjoy nature, and I've always wanted to write about the mysteries of it, but I decided to include lessons I've learned in life and what I've gone through as a young adult myself. The general inspiration is still there, which is how much I enjoy being in nature, but even more hit me as I grew older and started to learn about the world around me.

Wow. That's a long time.

How old were you in 4th grade and how old are you now? My apologies if this information is private, as I would like to know how long you've been writing.

I was ten when I first started writing, so it's been thirteen years.

Wow. That's a long time.

How did you hear about Wattpad? Did you first start as a reader?

This is explained in my memoir. My younger brother was the one who inspired me to start posting my stories online. I looked up "Writing Websites" on Google, and Wattpad popped up. However, I refused it at first, because I saw all the published books. I did not think I was publishing material. I did not want to share my stories with anybody else, but my brother's words haunted me, and I started on Fanfiction.net. I went to Quotev after it. Quotev is the writing workshop place for all my stories, where I edit them. Just as an experiment, I posted the edited portions on Wattpad, but I still had high doubts for myself. This was at the start of COVID, so 2019. It wasn't until I won my first contest in early 2020 that I started to use Wattpad more frequently. All in all, to answer your question, Wattpad was just part of an experiment. I did not start as a reader; just a writer. Now I'm both a reader and a writer.

With The Green Guardian having over 24k reads, Through The Wormhole having over 7k reads, and many more, how do you feel when readers appreciate your writing?

The reads are an accomplishment, for sure. I feel extremely blessed when I hit the next set of tens. It takes me a while to get there, but it's always a really good feeling when I do. However, I also know I still have a lot to do if I'm going to reach an even bigger audience, like the books on Wattpad that have millions of reads. The most important thing is to never give up and appreciate what I have. I always take longer to accomplish something. I'm not ashamed to admit that.

Although I'm not a writer, I know the struggles involved in getting your work out there and getting people to view and appreciate your work and I must say you're doing great work so far. If I'm not mistaken, you're studying a course related to writing, right?

I'm studying a lot of courses; I'm a Creative Writing Major. I took a Capstone Fiction Writing class last semester. I've been taking writing classes and attending writing camps and workshops ever since I was ten, basically. Honestly, I've lost track of how many classes I've taken. I've taken two, advanced Fiction Writing classes at my college, a couple of poetry classes, and a lot of Creative Writing classes and camps during high school. I also teach writing myself that's helped me improve. I'm a reviewer and judge for several communities on Wattpad, and I've applied to become a Wattpad Outreach Ambassador. They're the ones who help undiscovered books and teach new writers.

Wow. These are a lot. Who are your favorite writers both on Wattpad and on other sites or in real life?

I don't have a favorite writer on Wattpad, since I love them all, but I do have a few favorite real-world ones. I really enjoy Shannon Messenger, C.S. Lewis, Robert Jordan, and Sarah J. Maas. They've inspired me to challenge myself when it comes to Fantasy and writing in general.

Truth is I don't know any of them but they must be great authors. When writing your books do you picture how you want it to go (like the beginning to the end) or do you just go with the flow?

I mainly just go with the flow. I usually have a general sense of the story, but I don't know it like the back of my hand. Therefore, I just write, write, and write and see what happens. There are a few of my books where I already know the story well, but it's not many of them. To me, it's a bit more fun to be surprised than know exactly what's going to happen.

That's nice. Apart from writing, what are your other hobbies?

I have lots of hobbies. I enjoy reading, hiking, surfing, horseback riding, helping people, camping, watching movies, roller skating, and so much more.

Those are great. Apart from your Starwars Fanfic, do you have any other fanfic?

Yes, I've written a lot of fanfics. I have a How to Train Your Dragon fanfic, as well as a Merlin one and a Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir one. I wrote a lot of Pokémon fanfics, too, when I was little before I started original stories.

Those are cute. I'm an extremely big fan of How to train your dragon and Miraculous. I'm guessing you've watched Stranger Things also.

No, I haven't watched Stranger Things, unfortunately.

Ah! I would recommend watching it though. What are your goals as a reader?

My ultimate goal is to help undiscovered authors by giving them constructive criticism and teaching them what makes a story a story. I'll accomplish this by providing the authors with examples I've learned in my classes and camps. I also want to read the genres on Wattpad that don't get as much love and teach the community there is much more to writing than Romance.

That would be a very hard task but I hope you do achieve that. What message would you give to underrated writers on Wattpad?

We need to be patient. Nobody becomes a famous author overnight. If they don't have patience, then writing may not be the best thing for them. Underrated authors do not need to be shy about their works. Share them with as many people as they can, by entering awards, book clubs, communities, etc. That will help boost their confidence and eagerness to make revisions. Writing is all about revision. It takes many years for somebody to get noticed. Don't write for others; write for yourself. Don't let people push you around. Write how you write, and I can guarantee that will get underrated authors to places they never imagined.