Better Know An Author – Alanna Irving

Our weekly spotlight series on authors from around the world. This week we sat down with Alanna Irving!

Please give a brief introduction, including your name and where you are based

I’m Alanna, I’m from Nottingham in the UK but I live in sunny Barcelona. I have a Bachelors degree in Classics from Christ’s College, Cambridge, and a Masters in International Relations from the Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals. I work on EU projects of economic development in the Southern Mediterranean, and split my free time between my three great passions in life: writing, travelling, and dancing (salsa, lindy hop and collegiate shag). I’m a lifelong writer, first-time published, and currently navigating the bewildering world of indie publishing and self-promotion.

What book or books have you published or are working on at the moment?

I’ve just published my debut novel, Abolish the Rose. At the moment all my free time is going towards promoting it, but I am itching to get back to a book a started writing last year and left half-done. It’s a retelling of a particular saga of Greek myth, in a world with no gods and no magic. Women in Greek myth often do things because a god makes them – I thought it’d be fun to see what happened if they could make their own decisions.

What drives you to write?

I think I first started writing because I couldn’t get enough of stories as a very young kid – I read voraciously and it gave me a thirst for storytelling. As I got older I began to appreciate language as a material, and how it can be used and manipulated for effect. Nowadays I like to write to explore characters and themes that interest me – Abolish the Rose is really my musings on what we’re “supposed” to achieve in life, what counts as “worth it” and what counts as a waste. The characters and the events are 100% fictional and nothing to do with my real life, but I can definitely relate to the feeling of pressure to walk a certain path or achieve certain milestones in life.

What I find so magical about writing is that it’s a way to transmit emotions – the idea that someone can stir up emotions in another person, someone in another time and another place, just through words on the page – I think that’s something really special. And at the same time, each person can connect with a story in a different way – I think people find the message they need to find. So it’s a personal experience, but at the same time a powerful connection.

That is all a very long-winded, deep and philosophical way of saying I write because I like writing.

Where can folks find you online and on social media?

I’m on Instagram (@alannairving) and Twitter (@alanna_irving), plus Goodreads, and would love to connect!

What is one piece of advice you would give to another author out there who might be struggling?

I think any advice I could give will sound clichéd. Keep writing. Be hard enough on yourself to keep improving, and soft enough on yourself to keep enjoying it.

In general I don’t think there are many rules for writing (or at least, for every rule, there are times when you could or should do the opposite) but one thing someone told me that I’ve personally found helpful is: if a scene doesn’t achieve anything – advance the plot, develop a character, something – get rid of it.

What are some of your five-year goals with writing?

I have pretty laid-back goals when it comes to writing – the main thing I want to achieve is to keep writing. I’d like to finish the Greek myth book I’ve started, and probably have started another one.

Final Thoughts?

Thank you so much for getting to know me a bit better – if I’ve piqued your interest, I’d love for you to give Abolish the Rose a try!

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