Author Interview with Manfred on the Mercedes Fox Author Blog.
Halo, lovelies! Welcome to Interview FoxSeat with guest author Manfred
Manfred is the author name for a Melbourne born writer who now lives in Copenhagen Denmark. Manfred has been writing for many years and Magic Mirabelle and the Riddle of Night Opium is his first novel in the YA Fantasy and Paranormal Romance genre. Manfred also has a degree in English literature and Philosophy from Copenhagen University and his main interests besides writing and Gold-Making are watching films, travelling to exotic places like India, reading Fairytales and Romances, playing the guitar and the piano and taking his pet dog Shimba for walks with his son Tristan by the beach or in the forest. His favourite authors are the Scottish Father of Fairytales George Macdonald, the Romantic poet and Radical William Blake and a whole host of Fairytale and fantasy writers like Lewis Carrol, James Barrie, Jean Ingelow, J.K. Rowlings and Tolkien. His favourite foods are pizza, lasagne, vegetable pies and spicy Indian food. He also has an addiction to drinking hot chocolate and eating very rich and yummy cheese cakes!
1) Why do you write and when did you decide to become a writer?
I write for many reasons – on one level I write to escape the monotony and predictability of ordinary life. On another level I write to explore the otherworldly and magical side of myself – the one who lives in my imagination and dreams and helps me discover an enchanted world of magic, witches, fairies and fairy tales.
I don’t know when I decided to become a writer as such. I began to write in my late teens and kept on exploring the other side of myself in novels, short stories, plays and poems until I decided that I had some stuff that others might find interesting to read and was worth publishing. I guess it was then that I decided to become a writer.
2) Give us an insight into your main character. What makes him or her so special?
The main character in the book is the young Witch Mirabelle Sommerfield. The entire story is told through her eyes, beginning with her as a teenage Witch and ending with her development into a young woman who has attained Wisdom. I think the reason why she is so special is that her fabulous adventures in the otherworld are juxtaposed with her Rite of Passage in this world – where she grows from girlhood into maturity. I like working with that idea – that the inner world of magic and our imagination can mirror the important events which happen to us in our everyday life and play such a central part in our growth and psychological development.
Mirabelle of course isn’t alone in this process. And along with her magical helpers, she also has many friends and allies on the physical plane. Her Grandma for example gets her started by telling her heaps of stuff about being an apprentice Witch and introducing her to the Dungeons Of Lethe Game – in the book the DOL Game is a very old game played by young Witches and Sorcerers as part of their Initiation into Magick. Mirabelle starts to play it seriously a couple of months after her 13th Birthday.
Her Mother and little brother are also important. The Wish Mirabelle makes with them in the beginning of the book kind of opens up the door for her later adventures. Mirabelle’s best friend Lucy also plays a big part in Mirabelle’s life. Lucy is vivacious, charming, a little bit mad and she definitely provides much of the comic plot twists and humour in the story. She is also a Fairy Queen in disguise so that gives her the opportunity to do loads of Magic – and in the end her and Mirabelle discover that they both share a very special bond that makes them inseparable! But I can’t say too much about that here. You just have to read the story!
3) Do you work to an outline or plot or do you prefer just seeing where an idea takes you?
Definitely both. I think when I write I tread the fine line between creative inspiration and going with the flow and trying to consciously follow the red thread which gives the novel coherence and substance. It’s very curious because at various stages in the writing process, the characters and the plot often start to take on a life of their own and I am very surprised where the story ends up. And I think how on earth did that happen? This phenomenon is not unusual for writers, especially those who are writing stuff about fairies and magic and the otherworld. Your rational, conscious self is kind of put on hold and your imaginative personae takes over. It is really quite an exciting and inspiring process.
4) Do you ever feel self-conscious when writing love/sex scenes?
No. I totally love romantic and erotic scenes. Romance is woven through everything I write. And although I don’t write hard core erotica, there is usually two or three tasteful and steamy love scenes in my books, like with this book about Mirabelle – she has a teenage romance with the Sorcerer in the book called Night Opium. This romance is put on hold for a while but really blooms later on. She also has a bit of a thing for one of the three Fairy Queens which appear in the book. This Fairy is the youngest and most mischievous of the fairy Queens in the story and she is called Apricot Lantern. She is there from the very start of the novel and during Mirabelle’s 17th birthday a very humorous erotic episode occurs with her and her Fairy!
5)Where do you come up with your stories?
Sometimes I really wonder. But I think that they come from three main sources – the first and most obvious source being episodes from my own life experiences including my travels. This book is set in London for example. I have never lived in London but I have visited the city and other places in the UK several times, so a lot of what I have seen and experienced over there goes into the book. The second source of inspiration is the books I have read and which have made a deep impression on me – stuff from the fairytale and fantasy tradition like Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland and the Scottish Father of Fairytales George Macdonald, along with my favourite authors from the Hermetic Magical tradition like Dion Fortune. I have also been very interested in Jung’s writings on Alchemy and the collective unconscious. So I kind of put ideas and themes from these various sources and genres and came up with the idea of “A Fairytale in the Goldmaking Tradition.”
Last of all my writing is inspired by my inner dream life and my links to what I call the otherworld. There I meet the most amazing characters and have the most extraordinary dialogues and imaginative experiences. I have to write all of these internal dialogues and experiences down. Or else I would just explode thinking about them!
6) What is the one great lesson you have learned as a writer?
The greatest lesson I have learnt as a writer is that we are not limited to our conscious rationale personae. As Jung once said, there is another inside us who communicates to us in our dreams and fantasies and appears to know much more about us than we know about ourselves. The ancient seers called this other our Genius, our Daimon, our Guardian Fairy, our Higher self and so on.
7)Do you have any fur babies to brag about?
My fur baby is our little Bichon Havanaise Shimba. He is so sweet and cute that I have even included him as a minor character in the story – Mirabelle meets him through the Father of Wishes, when she celebrates her 16th birthday in the Land of Wishes. Along with Mirabelle’s little brother, the Baby, Shimba is definitely the cutest character in the book!
8) If there was one thing you could do to change the world, what would it be?
I would make sure that there was a LOT more love and magic in it than there is now. Everyone thinks that the problems of the world can be solved through economic development, politics and technology. And of course all this helps. But I believe that the only thing that can really help the world is if people get in touch with the magical other inside them – that they tune into their higher Genius or Damion or whatever you want to call it and start to imagine and commune with all the magic, dreams and visions inside them. And then when they have discovered that, they will find something else – the ability to open up to the universe and learn how to love all the amazing creatures in it – people, animals, trees, rocks, and so on. Love is the most important thing in the universe – but the key to awakening love in ourselves I believe is through our fantasy and imagination……
9) How important are your readers to you?
My readers are very important to me. I have this idea that through my books I can share my visions and ideas with likeminded souls who will understand where I am coming from and what I am trying to say and they will link up with it. Of course there will be many people who will like what I write because they find some of the characters and stuff strange, witty and entertaining. There will also be readers who will hate my stuff because it is too weird or esoteric – that is fine as well.
But what I am really looking for are readers who will just totally connect with what I have done and will want to solve all the various riddles and enigmas hidden in the pages of the book. This requires a lot of perseverance and patience and I haven’t really found many of these readers yet. But if you are one of these, please don’t be shy about sharing your thoughts. I would love to hear from you!
There ya have it folks! For more about Manfred, his work, and to get your copy, follow the links below:
Facebook /https://www.facebook.com/magicmirabel...
Amazon/ amazon.com/author/riddleofnightopium
INTERVIEW LINK TO MERCEDES FOX.
https://mercedesfoxbooks.com/meet-aut...
Manfred is the author name for a Melbourne born writer who now lives in Copenhagen Denmark. Manfred has been writing for many years and Magic Mirabelle and the Riddle of Night Opium is his first novel in the YA Fantasy and Paranormal Romance genre. Manfred also has a degree in English literature and Philosophy from Copenhagen University and his main interests besides writing and Gold-Making are watching films, travelling to exotic places like India, reading Fairytales and Romances, playing the guitar and the piano and taking his pet dog Shimba for walks with his son Tristan by the beach or in the forest. His favourite authors are the Scottish Father of Fairytales George Macdonald, the Romantic poet and Radical William Blake and a whole host of Fairytale and fantasy writers like Lewis Carrol, James Barrie, Jean Ingelow, J.K. Rowlings and Tolkien. His favourite foods are pizza, lasagne, vegetable pies and spicy Indian food. He also has an addiction to drinking hot chocolate and eating very rich and yummy cheese cakes!
1) Why do you write and when did you decide to become a writer?
I write for many reasons – on one level I write to escape the monotony and predictability of ordinary life. On another level I write to explore the otherworldly and magical side of myself – the one who lives in my imagination and dreams and helps me discover an enchanted world of magic, witches, fairies and fairy tales.
I don’t know when I decided to become a writer as such. I began to write in my late teens and kept on exploring the other side of myself in novels, short stories, plays and poems until I decided that I had some stuff that others might find interesting to read and was worth publishing. I guess it was then that I decided to become a writer.
2) Give us an insight into your main character. What makes him or her so special?
The main character in the book is the young Witch Mirabelle Sommerfield. The entire story is told through her eyes, beginning with her as a teenage Witch and ending with her development into a young woman who has attained Wisdom. I think the reason why she is so special is that her fabulous adventures in the otherworld are juxtaposed with her Rite of Passage in this world – where she grows from girlhood into maturity. I like working with that idea – that the inner world of magic and our imagination can mirror the important events which happen to us in our everyday life and play such a central part in our growth and psychological development.
Mirabelle of course isn’t alone in this process. And along with her magical helpers, she also has many friends and allies on the physical plane. Her Grandma for example gets her started by telling her heaps of stuff about being an apprentice Witch and introducing her to the Dungeons Of Lethe Game – in the book the DOL Game is a very old game played by young Witches and Sorcerers as part of their Initiation into Magick. Mirabelle starts to play it seriously a couple of months after her 13th Birthday.
Her Mother and little brother are also important. The Wish Mirabelle makes with them in the beginning of the book kind of opens up the door for her later adventures. Mirabelle’s best friend Lucy also plays a big part in Mirabelle’s life. Lucy is vivacious, charming, a little bit mad and she definitely provides much of the comic plot twists and humour in the story. She is also a Fairy Queen in disguise so that gives her the opportunity to do loads of Magic – and in the end her and Mirabelle discover that they both share a very special bond that makes them inseparable! But I can’t say too much about that here. You just have to read the story!
3) Do you work to an outline or plot or do you prefer just seeing where an idea takes you?
Definitely both. I think when I write I tread the fine line between creative inspiration and going with the flow and trying to consciously follow the red thread which gives the novel coherence and substance. It’s very curious because at various stages in the writing process, the characters and the plot often start to take on a life of their own and I am very surprised where the story ends up. And I think how on earth did that happen? This phenomenon is not unusual for writers, especially those who are writing stuff about fairies and magic and the otherworld. Your rational, conscious self is kind of put on hold and your imaginative personae takes over. It is really quite an exciting and inspiring process.
4) Do you ever feel self-conscious when writing love/sex scenes?
No. I totally love romantic and erotic scenes. Romance is woven through everything I write. And although I don’t write hard core erotica, there is usually two or three tasteful and steamy love scenes in my books, like with this book about Mirabelle – she has a teenage romance with the Sorcerer in the book called Night Opium. This romance is put on hold for a while but really blooms later on. She also has a bit of a thing for one of the three Fairy Queens which appear in the book. This Fairy is the youngest and most mischievous of the fairy Queens in the story and she is called Apricot Lantern. She is there from the very start of the novel and during Mirabelle’s 17th birthday a very humorous erotic episode occurs with her and her Fairy!
5)Where do you come up with your stories?
Sometimes I really wonder. But I think that they come from three main sources – the first and most obvious source being episodes from my own life experiences including my travels. This book is set in London for example. I have never lived in London but I have visited the city and other places in the UK several times, so a lot of what I have seen and experienced over there goes into the book. The second source of inspiration is the books I have read and which have made a deep impression on me – stuff from the fairytale and fantasy tradition like Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland and the Scottish Father of Fairytales George Macdonald, along with my favourite authors from the Hermetic Magical tradition like Dion Fortune. I have also been very interested in Jung’s writings on Alchemy and the collective unconscious. So I kind of put ideas and themes from these various sources and genres and came up with the idea of “A Fairytale in the Goldmaking Tradition.”
Last of all my writing is inspired by my inner dream life and my links to what I call the otherworld. There I meet the most amazing characters and have the most extraordinary dialogues and imaginative experiences. I have to write all of these internal dialogues and experiences down. Or else I would just explode thinking about them!
6) What is the one great lesson you have learned as a writer?
The greatest lesson I have learnt as a writer is that we are not limited to our conscious rationale personae. As Jung once said, there is another inside us who communicates to us in our dreams and fantasies and appears to know much more about us than we know about ourselves. The ancient seers called this other our Genius, our Daimon, our Guardian Fairy, our Higher self and so on.
7)Do you have any fur babies to brag about?
My fur baby is our little Bichon Havanaise Shimba. He is so sweet and cute that I have even included him as a minor character in the story – Mirabelle meets him through the Father of Wishes, when she celebrates her 16th birthday in the Land of Wishes. Along with Mirabelle’s little brother, the Baby, Shimba is definitely the cutest character in the book!
8) If there was one thing you could do to change the world, what would it be?
I would make sure that there was a LOT more love and magic in it than there is now. Everyone thinks that the problems of the world can be solved through economic development, politics and technology. And of course all this helps. But I believe that the only thing that can really help the world is if people get in touch with the magical other inside them – that they tune into their higher Genius or Damion or whatever you want to call it and start to imagine and commune with all the magic, dreams and visions inside them. And then when they have discovered that, they will find something else – the ability to open up to the universe and learn how to love all the amazing creatures in it – people, animals, trees, rocks, and so on. Love is the most important thing in the universe – but the key to awakening love in ourselves I believe is through our fantasy and imagination……
9) How important are your readers to you?
My readers are very important to me. I have this idea that through my books I can share my visions and ideas with likeminded souls who will understand where I am coming from and what I am trying to say and they will link up with it. Of course there will be many people who will like what I write because they find some of the characters and stuff strange, witty and entertaining. There will also be readers who will hate my stuff because it is too weird or esoteric – that is fine as well.
But what I am really looking for are readers who will just totally connect with what I have done and will want to solve all the various riddles and enigmas hidden in the pages of the book. This requires a lot of perseverance and patience and I haven’t really found many of these readers yet. But if you are one of these, please don’t be shy about sharing your thoughts. I would love to hear from you!
There ya have it folks! For more about Manfred, his work, and to get your copy, follow the links below:
Facebook /https://www.facebook.com/magicmirabel...
Amazon/ amazon.com/author/riddleofnightopium
INTERVIEW LINK TO MERCEDES FOX.
https://mercedesfoxbooks.com/meet-aut...
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