Gabriel Woods asked Lissa Oliver:

Apologies Lissa, I just wanted to obtain a deeper understanding of what you write. Could I suggest from reading Sainte Bastien - and particularly Nero which I am reading now - that you have an interest in characters that are conflicted or contrasted? I am interested too if you would like to describe what theme you may have identified in my books.

Lissa Oliver No apology needed, it's good to get the brain exercised! And a spot-on observation, I do have an interest in characters who are conflicted, because that's the essence of drama. Without conflict, there is no drama - and without drama, there is no story. Taking a normal person and setting them down in an abnormal situation, or taking an unusual person and setting them within a normal situation, are probably the most common structures of story, particularly comedy. The big attraction to Nero, for me, was that he was forced into a situation that he couldn't safely escape and, worse, one that was at direct odds with his own political and social beliefs.
The theme I read into both your books was of the search. The characters of The Golden Age Dawns are searching for something, not always knowingly; and there was a strong sense of the author needing to answer his own questions within Easter Rising 1916: A Family Answers The Call, a personal search for justification of events, as well as the quest for freedom which is at the book's heart.

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