1. What's your Wattpad username?

EvelynHail.

2. If you had to describe yourself in one word, what words wouldn't you use?

Incurious, Humble 😛, Ordinary, Coward, Prudent. Oh, and Nice. Totes forgot Nice. 🙃😈

3. Think back to when you were in school. What was your favorite subject?

Oh me, oh my, now that's a tough one! 🤔 I'm awsully torn between Truancy an' Skiving off.

4. When you were a young 'un, what did you want to be when you grew up?

T would be... A young 'un. Petra Pan. Never wanted to grow up at all. That's jus' overrated. :P

5. What does Tevun-Krus mean to you?

Tis a smorgasbord orange platform place fer kindred souls readin' & creatin' future 500 million sci-fi allegories 'bout the perils of wasteful human behaviour.

6. Tell us about your reading/writing habits.

To me, reading and writing are two sides of the same coin 🪙. I started writing fairly late, in 2017 when I was already a 32 years old Grannylyn!

This is not so good 🥺 in comparison to most of me fellow scribes. Some of them tell me they'd started writing in their early teens, or even sooner.

These days I tend to write a book per year, two if I am REALLY lucky! 💜

9 books written so far 🤓.

I feel like my reading taste influenced my writing because my books are pluri-genred. I've written action, adventure, fantasy, middle grade, literary fiction, short stories, poetry, science fiction, erotica, mystery, young adult, romance, you name it xD

Now I just have to write a horror book and my ensemble will be complete.

Before completing the manuscript I plot a lot and envision the entire narrative arc, as well as main characters/side characters' arcs. An Architect, this writer lass is.

As to readin' buckle up, cuz I've got loads of 'em books to enumerate!

Ever since I was lil' Lyn 🦋, when there was no heating at me hUs I'd go to a nearby library before school, from 7 am till 13 pm.

And in that library, the miracle would happen.

This lassie became a bookophage!

Would sometimes devour two booklets per day xD

I think I mus' 'ave read somewhere between 3000 and 4000 books so far, not countin' the ones I read on Wattpad o.O

So my favorite series when I was lil' were Famous Five series, with kids detectives.

And I absolutely loved Alice in Wonderland; this is a book that I always return to.

Heck, one of me two PhDs was done on the motifs of madness in Alice in Wonderland.

I felt this strong proclivity for the books where kids were adventurous detectives or protagonists who could solve any mystery despite their age, (cue Agatha Christie and Sherlock Holmes).

I also loved Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson and Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe.

Jack London and his White Fang, Iron Heel, and Call of the Wild spoke to me as well, and I used to imagine I was a fierce she wolf prowling in the wilderness as I dashed through me hometown park wearing me battered red Converse.

One of my favorite writers was without a doubt, Jules Verne. He nudged me towards steampunkish mindset and I adored 20 000 miles under the sea, Around the World in 80 days and Journey to the Centre of the Earth.

Books that were a must-read for a teen me and that I would recommend to absolutely anyone have been written by my two favorite writers.

Roald Dahl (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Witches, James and the Giant Peach, George's Marvelous Medicine, Mathilda and others), and Neil Gaiman (Coraline, Stardust, Graveyard Book, Good Omens, Anansi Boys, American Gods, Neverwhere - this one served as an inspiration for one of my book titles, Anywhen, and others).

My first shy journeys into the fantasy world were marked by a melancholy book, Bridge to Terabithia, as well as Chronicles of Narnia and Eragon, by Paolini.

Some standalone books that I always come back to even today due to their magical aura and that are worth mentioning are definitely Mary Poppins, Anne of Green Gables and Heidi. I have a copy of Heidi that is all crumpled and dog eared because I was a careless lil reader and adored everything about the mountain girl, her adventures and the way she was with animals. She reminded me a lot of myself.

Talking about book series, there are, of course, the unavoidable Harry Potter series, Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicker and Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan, which inspired by latest book, Dana Ilic and the Shadow Door.

I loved being whisked away into fairy-tailish worlds so I also read Russian and Ukrainian fairy tails as well as Serbian ones, but also the fairy tail collections by Charles Perrault and La Fontaine.

When I was lil' I liked some horror books and comics, which for some reason changed and right now it's my least preferred genre, to be sure.

I could mention... Dylan Dog comics, and everything by Stephen King, especially IT (this is why I love Stranger Things so much xD)

At uni they had us read literature classics, so from the British authors, I devoured Shakespeare, Charles Dickens and Sisters Bronte. I especially love Jane Eyre 💜

The Frenchies captured me heart with Les Miserables and Hunchback of Notre Dame; then I also loved Conte of Monte Cristo and Three Musketeers (Alexandre Dumas), Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery), The Stranger (Camus).

I'm a iuge fan of Russian classics so lemme mention my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE Master and Margarita (Mikhail Bulgakov), and some others.

War and Peace/Anna Karennina (Leo Tolstoy), The Brothers Karamazov (Fyodor Dostoyevsky), Eugene Onegin (Alexander Pushkin), Childhood (Maksim Gorky).

And finally, here is the list of the selected German classics I adored: The Tin Drum (Gunter Grass), All Quiet on the Western Front (Erich Maria Remarque), Perfume (Patrick Suskind), Metamorphosis/The Trial (Franz Kafka), Buddenbrooks (Thomas Mann), Demian (Herman Hesse) and We Children from Bahnhof Zoo (Christiane F), which left such a bitter and melancholic taste in me mouth.

Some of my fave stand-alone booklets are Gone with The Wind, The Life of Pi, To Kill a Mockingbird and Uncle Tom's cabin 😻

And FINALLY lemme circle back to me two greatest loves: fantasy and sci-fi.

When it comes to fantasy, this is the list of my beloved reads, which you should definitely check out, in case you haven't yet.

Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, Shannara (Terry Brooks), Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Amber Chronicles, (Roger Zelazny), Gormenghast, The Wheel of Time (Robert Jordan), The Stormlight Archives (Brandon Sanderson), A Song of Ice and Fire (G.R.R. Martin), The Demon Cycle (Peter V. Brett), The Name of the Wind (Patrick Rothfuss), EarthSea Cycle (Ursula K Le Guin), First Law (Joe Abercrombie), Dresden Files (Jim Butcher), His Dark Materials, (Phillip Pullman), Malazan Book of the Fallen (Steven Erikson), Memory, Sorrow and Thorn (Tad Williams), Discworld series (Terry Pratchett)! (Especially this last one, it's so clever, quirky and whimsical in the best possible ways) ❣️

As to sci-fi, I swear by Douglas Addams and everything by him is a must read. Apart from the more modern booklets such as The Hunger Games, Divergent, Maze Runner, Ender's Game and Ready Player One, I am a big fan of the classics.

1984, Slaughterhouse 5, 2001 A Space Odyssey (A. Clarke), The City of Ember (Jeanne Du Prau), The Time Machine/The War of the Worlds (Wells), Dune (Frank Herbert), Brave New World (Aldous Huxley), Hyperion (Dan Simmons), Fahrenheit 51 (Ray Bradbury), Do Android Dream of Electric Sheep (Phillip K. Dick), Foundation (Isaac Asimov) and everything by this lad Asimov 💜

Whew. This will be the longes brick wall answer in the history of answers xD

7. As your crew casts your lifeless body into the heart of the nearest star, list three pieces of music likely to be rattling the bulkheads of your beloved vessel!

The three pieces of music likely to be rattling the bulkheads of me beloved vessel, ye say.

Hmmm... I am mostly a hard rock and heavy metal gal, having sung inna Metallica tribute band as a teen, so the first piece of music has to be "Nothing Else Matters," of course.

Pickin' the Symphonic Orchestra Version:

https://youtu.be/YpoHBTeyFxg

Next I wanna pick the Dark Soundtrack.

https://youtu.be/0VEczNVW6tY

This is my favorite TV show and the soundtrack for it is absolutely mesmerising, somewhere between indie, mild rock, and psychedelic atmospheric music.

It's so terrific and unique. So hauntingly beautisul.

Songs like, "Goodbye," by Apparat, "Me and the Devil," by Soap&Skin, "Irgendwie, Irgendwo, Irgendwann," by Nena, "Familiar", "It's Happening Again," and "Broken Sleep" by Agnes Obel, "Keep the Streets Empty for Me," by Fever Ray, "A Quiet Life" by Teho Teardo, "My Body is a Cage" by Peter Gabriel, and many, many more.

They are so worth it.

It reminds me of the soundtrack of my second favorite TV show, Twin Peaks.

And the third place is SO friggin tough to choose so I will give the spot to two soundtracks, in equal parts 💜

Phillip Glass, "Glassworks," and "Cloud Atlas" movie soundtrack. ☺️❣️

https://youtu.be/KSw5kwZ7Xxs

Phillip Glass just immediately invites the listener into his complexity of compositional styling, providing somnolent, powerful imagery. His work is so hypnotising. No wonder his compositions are featured in Season Four of Stranger Things.

https://youtu.be/C2U-lL_qdTI

Cloud Atlas is a score that I love because every time I return to it it feels different and new.

It's as if each listening is a piece of a puzzle I have yet to complete, and as I hear its tones I envision the lives of the characters of the movie/book. I never fail to tear up when I hear The Atlas March, its main theme. It is an exquisite piano melody.

8. Who is your all-time favourite author? How much, if at all, has their work influenced your writing style?

That's a really difficult question.

Like there's no way I can just name one favorite author! Tis a trick!

*grrs, hisses*

Les see...

I can mention two or three trad published authors that truly influenced the themes, motifs, style, narrative arcs, worldbuilding and character building in my books, instead of talking about jus' one.

To begin with and talking about the style, dialogues and the overall reigning whimsical atmosphere, I just have to mention...

Sir Terry Pratchett.

His Discworld novels are truly otherworldly. Hilarious fun, filled with wit, satire, goofiness, and wise insights into the society which often mirrors our own. He inspires me so much, with his lunacy, use of language, social observations and tenderness and compassion towards all beings.

I feel like I am attracted to his works due to this mixture of levity and seriousness he exhibits, or better yet, he approaches deep themes with an unexpected and refreshing lightheartedness and it is the same thing I strive for when I write.

At times I believe that it's precisely thanks to Terry Pratchett that my dialogues tend to be one of the best parts of my writing, no matter the genre I am creating in. 💜

Another lad that inspired my worldbuilding in "The Prophecy of Water" is Brandon Sanderson.

Specifically, with his The Stormlight Archives series. He is an absolute guru of worldbuilding. In his works, everything is so detailed, thorough and simply falls into correct place that it's a joy to read. I recall one of his interviews where he talks about how he spends months working on the world before actually starting to write. All aspects of his world are so well developed, starting with the (logically explained!) magic system through linguistics (he literally invented whole languages for the species in his books) to society and culture.

Reading his work made me feel at times, as if his artificially created worlds live and breathe in a fashion much alike our own, if not even more lifelike.

His precision mechanisms, systems, tables are so amazingly put together and don't even get me started on the plotting control and worldbuilding mastery he has overall.

It was his books that made me think that all sufficiently advanced magic can be indistinguishable from science, just like in that saying by Arthur C. Clarke: "Magic is just science that we don't understand yet."

And finally I am very thorn between Roald Dahl and Neil Gaiman, they are kind of a duo-deal for me xD😹

I guess I shall just have to mention them both o.o and underline what I took from each of them in one of the books dearest to me heart, "GG."

From Roald Dahl, I took this chaos and humor of constructed language, bold metaphors and wordplays. The man is just incredibly creative, and he has this wicked imagination, and the uncanny ability to stretch it just a tad beyond the borders of the normal, as he pictures the ordinary details in a most vivid and elaborate manners. In this way he very much reminds me of Lewis Carroll.

It's as if he pushes the perception of the reader beyond the comfort we are used to and beyond the familiar. I just love that feeling when he can twist the everyday occurrence into something completely different and make me see mundane from an utterly new perspective.

Neil Gaiman is one of the few I hold close to my heart. He is like a literary chameleon, and in some books he manages to sound childlike and nostalgic, while in others, he feels magical and whimsical.

Each scene sets a different atmosphere, tone and the mood, as if he is all of a sudden stroking a completely different piano key.

I guess this reminds me of me in a way because it feels like his writing is a unique incorporations of all possible genres in literature.

Much like Roald Dahl, he is too, witty, wise, thoughtful, and quite refreshing. That raw imagination of his is uncanny and almost each thought he writes down is there to be a moral, a message or simply to makes us feel something, to make us laugh.

This author truly resonates in the reader and it's the kind of author I strive to be, too.

9. Of everything you've written, which piece is your favourite?

It has got to be Mind the Gap.

Tis also me most popular piece, diving full speed ahead straight towards 400 000 reads! 💜

It took me and my amazing 😻 co-writer RainerSalt ☔️ a mere week to research and develop the concept, based on one of the Open Novella Contest 2020 prompts.

We speed-drafted the characters at the same time.

Before we knew it, between February 11 and March 1, the 22 chappies of the 20 000 words novella were already done and uploaded on Wattpad.

It's gotta be the speediest-written quality piece of literature EVAH! ☺️❣️

10. Pitch the above story to us. Make us really want to read it!

Here goes nothin'! 😛

*rubs grubby hands*

Mind the Gap is a quirky literary fiction piece, which is, in a nutshell, sci-fi meets romance.

Two strangers on separate spaceships, divided by uncaring tempered alumino-silicate glass pane.

An unlikely yet unbreakable bond forms between them.

But will it be sustainable in a four-dimensional manifold when their interstellar vessels are bound for different destinations?

A random encounter occurs in space, every five earth years, as Evan and Iris see each other for a brief time through the smudgy windows of their spacecrafts.

The two are assigned to different distant colony planets and it seems their paths shall never cross.

Nerdy Evan, the sailor of the universe is tied to an Elasian, who might 'ave a something of a Borg in 'er, too.

All the while quirky Iris, the pioneer of NASA art programme regularly bangs an Edo lad.

Read "Mind the Gap" if ye're a fan of quantum physics, time travel and the movie "Passengers."

Of course, in the (happy!) end there is an obligatory Warp Core Reactor Jesus ex machina, which, through its gravimetric field displacement manifold-ism brings the lad and a lassie juntos.

*Madame Spoiler bows*

*drops mic* 🎤

11. To what extent does the mythical 'real life' influence your writing?

The mythical real life influences me writing quite a lot, and in varied ways, dependin' onna booklet.

I feel that a book is a chicken soup ye cooked.

And so when the reader takes a sip, they need to be able to immerse themselves in that taste.

Savour the noodle, the chicken, the carrot *makes a yucky face*, taters, the soupy wate.

So noodle is like a worldbuilding, chicken is like a protagonis', carrot is... a plot *makes a yucky face times two*, taters are a theme, the soupy water is the setting and the atmosphere they are all swimmin' in.

So this soupy water accuracy must be taken quite seriously, or the reader will not be able to believe all them ingredients are swimming in there.

Where I mostly felt this need for accuracy in my case was, while writing contemporary setting books, urban fantasy books and science fiction.

For example, in "Dana Ilic and the Shadow Door," since there are quite a lot Slavic deities to be mentioned, they were all neatly documented one after another in me Glossary. Had to read six books on Slavic myths to get this one right!

"Anywhen'' was totally mental because in that book a character from the 23rd century meets a character from the 18th century so I had to dig deep fer both scientific AND historical accuracy.

Do not try zis at home. I wouldn't wish it upon me worst enemy, I wouldn't.

Furthermore, "Lily Lamar and the Dimwitted Druids" was set in Chester, UK, so I needed to investigate the map of the town, the locations, and the way people spoke to make everything more immersive, and the same goes for Gappy which was set in Boston Mass. 💜

We have haunted the Boston metro map, specifically the Red Line, in order to decide upon the train stations where Evan and Iris will cross their paths, where their flats will be, and their workplaces. The best part of it all was when we actually got some legit Bostonite readers who praised the way we captured the city atmosphere. This kind of thing really makes ye all gooey around yer ticker if ye know what I mean.

Protagonists are always either meself, me friends, people I'd known, loved, hated, stalked and people watched. Real life models to boot.

And taters aka the themes (alliterative choice there :P)... Where to begin. The real life influences are innumerable. Mostly, they are related to finding one's place within the vast world, and battlin' yer childhood demons and traumas. At times, even battling yer current version of self.

In some ways I have also integrated themes or doing good, and being good to others no matter what, and trying to be yerself, "no matter what they say." *hums to Englishman in New York*

12. If you could have any superpower, what would that be and why?

Pfft, wat an easy question. Hit me with something harder, will ya xD

Friggin Tempus control! I'd be Doctora Strange! Doctora Extraña. Or Kronosa.

Imagine the possibilities.

Pause time when there's like a tsunami or somethin' and jus get everyone outta there.

But also pause time to make kewl pranks. Just do all kinds of silly stuff.

Take a dive under the sea to see the unmovin fish.

Pause time so I could sleep hours inna second.

Accelerate time when I ave to wait in line or fly onna feckin plane :P

Relive the happiest moments, the butterfly moments over and over again, and the same goes for the best days of me life, the golden days.

I would even slow motion these to savour them as much as I can❣️

13. What would you do if you woke up one day and suddenly realized you were an alien from another world?

Oh shite.

Ye're onto me!

Signed

Evalien Hail

👩🏻‍🦰👾

14. The Technological Singularity presents a rather daunting, some say inevitable, future. Does the prospect of that level of artificial intelligence excite you, or leave you quaking in your space boots?

*spits inna dust*

There is no such bloody occurrence that would leave me quaking in me space boots.

Artificial intelligence is no match fer natural stupidity.

I am quaking in me space boots at the decrease of real intelligence, IYKWM.

15. Who was your first Sci-Fi crush? Who is your current one?

Deffo, David Tennant in his role of Tenth Doctor!

This lad is actually both me first Sci-Fi crush and I think, a current Sci-Fi crush as well. *giggles*

Some things nevah change, dontcha know.

Why, ye ask?

His beautiful mind, his wit, hickory brown eyes, his smile, his hair porn, his tongue ticks, that Scottish accent and the way he enunciates certain words such as "well" or "brilliant".

What else...

His teeth!
Heck his teeth play a major role. How I envy em. All straight, not gappy, crooked or vampiric at all.

16. If you could experience the world of any Sci-Fi story on Wattpad, which would that be and why?

At the risk of not bein able to resurface, or *gulps* even survive a day in this mad religion ruled post apocalyptic world, I am still goin' to pick Bunker Bird.

I love the mysterious, eerie bunker setting, the atmosphere, the lil' cavern garden with all dem pretty shiny lights.

Down there, I could both grow meself, and grow as many taters as I can until I am ready to go onna adventure of (ad) venturing outside.

I'd intrepidly brave the bat shite, and then I'd fly high into the sky and merge with the sun itself.

17. And finally, any words of wisdom to new and aspiring Sci-Fi writers?

Holy heck!

I sure hope someone responds this question fer me because I AM a new and an aspiring Sci-Fi writer *squeals*.

I never dared to write a full on science fiction book but I do ave this blazing trail of a decent number of short sci fi stories behind me.

Maybe in the future, I already have a draft of this post-apocalyptic steampunk booklet outlined, so I will try my luck with that.

For now I am jus a lazy contemporary or fantasy writer because I do not have to do research with me magic systems, I just abracadabra everything into obedience 🤣😹😂🙈

What scares me the most and I feel like it is super important in Sci-Fi is the world, and the detail accuracy.

You can have amazeballs protagonists and heart-stopping plot, and smorgasbordic dialogues but you cannot really force yer readers to don disbelief suspenders *puppy eyes*

You can imagine and speculate but dem facts and scientific possibilities must ground you.

I feel that even if you have created an interesting world, and told a good story, you have to make sure that the rules of this world are consistent, with believable structures.

Oh and one more thing: be careful of expo dumps. They are jus as dangerous as info dumps.

But ye will recognize them as those long heavy, sci fi facts laden paragraphs that move as slowly as space whales and create a ballast of burden in the readers' minds.

Get yer worldbuilding fed onna spoon or incorporated lil by lil in dialogues.

And I feel like you should never let the technical aspects overwhelm and choke out the social aspects of your universe, or the emotional ones.

The intricacies of the latter two will definitely have a greater impact on the reading experience.

Show off those live vibrant characters, show the readers what it means to be human being centuries after our time, and make your story relatable.

Regardless of the genre, a sci-fi novel is a story like any other.

For it to be a good story, it needs to have a palpitating human heart core in its center, driving it with both its virtues and its flaws alike.

Thanks for the interview!

What can I say except.... Ye're welcome *insert Polynesian demigod Maui gif here*