Author Interview: Danni Maxwell
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Danni’s Author PHoto.
Writing as a medium and a profession has changed drastically over the years. Long gone are the days of sitting at a typewriter and mailing your manuscript to brick-and-mortar publishers. Now, we read primarily online, and authors have a million options at their disposal for publishing and marketing their books.
Danni Maxwell is one of those new-age authors. Originally from Kingston, Ontario, Danni writes Queer New-Adult fiction and is currently celebrating the release of her new short story collection. She's active in the writer community on Tiktok, where she has 1500 followers.
I had the chance to sit down with Danni to discuss her writing recently. Here are some of the best moments of that conversation.
As cliché as it is, I'd love to know what made you initially start writing.
As cliche as it sounds, I really have been writing for as long as I can remember. Telling stories became my creative outlet from a young age, but I think my earliest memory of writing any of them down was when I was 7. It took off from there, and I wrote all through elementary school just for me. The stories were books I wanted to read that I couldn't find when I looked for new books. I also dabbled in fanfiction writing for almost 5 years before shifting back to original content. I never really took it seriously until my creative writing class in high school, though.
You've published three books in four years, which is quite an achievement! How do you start your book writing process?
Thank you! I think it definitely depends on each individual book I write. I can draw inspiration from anything. Usually, that's a good thing, but sometimes it can get really distracting. A single photo, a sound. A scenic view through a car window. One tiny thing could incite an idea for me, be it a character, a plot point that I write around, etc. It will get stuck in an infinite loop in my mind until I write it down. Characters will come to me, scenes will play out, and it becomes the bare bones of a plot that starts the entire process of writing the book. I am not really a plotter by nature; I plan little things and let the rest come to me as I go along. That is a whole other problem in itself!
LIfe In COlour’s Cover, retrieved from Ninestarpress.com
Your new anthology, Life In Colour, came out Oct.4th of this year; care to tell the readers a little more about it?
Sure! It's a short story collection with a diverse cast of characters and their journeys to happily ever after. In A World in Blue, you follow Oliver and Blue. Even though Oliver writes about happily ever afters, he doesn't believe in them. Blue is his #1 fan (but he doesn't know Oliver is his favourite author because he writes under a pen name). He knows Oliver's opinion on love and happily ever afters, but Blue is determined to show Oliver that they do exist. When Skies Are Grey is a companion sequel about Oliver's best friend Eli, who thinks he's notorious for ruining everything he touches, especially relationships. But then he meets Grey, the person his best friends swear will be the one to show him how to grow and learn how to love again. The Rainbow Connection is the perfect epilogue to everyone's story.
Finally, If you could go on a writer's retreat to anywhere in the world, where would you go?
I think I would go somewhere to Europe. Paris and Italy are known for writer's retreats, and I couldn't think of anything better than writing from a little Parisian patisserie or surrounded by gorgeous Italian architecture. How could that not foster my imagination?
Danni’s newest book, Life in Colour is out now and available on Amazon.ca or directly through the publisher at Ninestarpress.com.
Corrin Lewis
Corrin first picked up a book when she was three years old and hasn’t stopped reading since. She’s a 2nd-year student in Algonquin College’s Professional Writing program and hopes to publish a novel of her own one day. Her favourite way to waste time is by playing video games.
