Author Jacinta Maree stops by TeamNerd to chat about her debut novel, My Demonic Ghost. She also opens up about where her love for writing came from, what her favorite aspect of writing is, and what her favorite place to go to is in Japan along with some other fun tidbits. Enjoy!
Annabell: Tell us a little about yourself.
Jacinta Maree: I’m born in Melbourne Australia and I’ve lived there my entire life so far. I enjoy basketball and watching movies/ playing games (both board games and video games) with my friends. I love anything oriental and seemed to have gotten a bad habit of collecting tea sets. Favourite animal is most definitely a cat and favourite destination to travel to is Japan.
Annabell: Where did your love for writing and storytelling come from?
Jacinta Maree: Honestly I have no idea. None of my family members were writers, though my mother was a big fan of reading books. I’ve been writing for so long, I can’t even remember how it all started. Grade two I had to write a story for class and I ended up writing about a haunted house infested with bats, and from there I was writing every spare moment I had. Whenever my parents tried to punish me when I did something wrong, instead of sending me to my room I was sent to the laundry as they knew I would have a blast writing in my bedroom.
Annabell: My Demonic Ghost centers around ghosts who have done not so great things in their lives attaching themselves to humans to keep from crossing over. Where did the inspiration come from? Why did you decide to debut your novel in the supernatural and paranormal genres?
Jacinta Maree: The idea actually came to me as I was sitting in my philosophy class at Ivanhoe Girls Grammar listening about the teachings of Descartes. He was talking about the theory of consciousness and it just started to make me question all the things we as a human race just accepted, especially about the stories of the afterlife. One question Descartes brought up was the possibility of a demon god, which then turned me towards the question of ‘how do we know that we aren’t controlled by something corrupted by power?
From there, the story mutated its self to what it is today. I had wanted to write something where good and bad are flipped around, and instead of ‘Angels’ being white coated heroes I wanted to draw attention towards the demons and the so called ‘bad spirits’. Suppose I was interested in writing a story from a different perspective where the stereotypical case of angel equals good and demon equals bad doesn’t apply here, and showing that not everything is as black and white as we had first assumed.
As to why did I write in the genre of supernatural and paranormal, well I guess that comes from my interests in the unknown. Why write in a world with limitations?
Annabell: Rachel is the heroine of My Demonic Ghost and she’s fifteen. Why did you choose to narrate the book through the eyes of someone younger rather than older?
Jacinta Maree: I could have easily written it in a grown up version of Rachael, but I felt the message behind her struggle with Lock and spirits wouldn’t have been so powerful if they were older.
I wanted to write from innocence and take everyone back to the heart pounding, stomach twisting, nervous sweating anxiety that comes with first time love. I also believe that having Lock and Rachael so young helps the impact of Lock’s damnation feel much more enhanced.
Annabell: Tell us a little about yourself.
Jacinta Maree: I’m born in Melbourne Australia and I’ve lived there my entire life so far. I enjoy basketball and watching movies/ playing games (both board games and video games) with my friends. I love anything oriental and seemed to have gotten a bad habit of collecting tea sets. Favourite animal is most definitely a cat and favourite destination to travel to is Japan.
Annabell: Where did your love for writing and storytelling come from?
Jacinta Maree: Honestly I have no idea. None of my family members were writers, though my mother was a big fan of reading books. I’ve been writing for so long, I can’t even remember how it all started. Grade two I had to write a story for class and I ended up writing about a haunted house infested with bats, and from there I was writing every spare moment I had. Whenever my parents tried to punish me when I did something wrong, instead of sending me to my room I was sent to the laundry as they knew I would have a blast writing in my bedroom.
Annabell: My Demonic Ghost centers around ghosts who have done not so great things in their lives attaching themselves to humans to keep from crossing over. Where did the inspiration come from? Why did you decide to debut your novel in the supernatural and paranormal genres?
Jacinta Maree: The idea actually came to me as I was sitting in my philosophy class at Ivanhoe Girls Grammar listening about the teachings of Descartes. He was talking about the theory of consciousness and it just started to make me question all the things we as a human race just accepted, especially about the stories of the afterlife. One question Descartes brought up was the possibility of a demon god, which then turned me towards the question of ‘how do we know that we aren’t controlled by something corrupted by power?
From there, the story mutated its self to what it is today. I had wanted to write something where good and bad are flipped around, and instead of ‘Angels’ being white coated heroes I wanted to draw attention towards the demons and the so called ‘bad spirits’. Suppose I was interested in writing a story from a different perspective where the stereotypical case of angel equals good and demon equals bad doesn’t apply here, and showing that not everything is as black and white as we had first assumed.
As to why did I write in the genre of supernatural and paranormal, well I guess that comes from my interests in the unknown. Why write in a world with limitations?
Annabell: Rachel is the heroine of My Demonic Ghost and she’s fifteen. Why did you choose to narrate the book through the eyes of someone younger rather than older?
Jacinta Maree: I could have easily written it in a grown up version of Rachael, but I felt the message behind her struggle with Lock and spirits wouldn’t have been so powerful if they were older.
I wanted to write from innocence and take everyone back to the heart pounding, stomach twisting, nervous sweating anxiety that comes with first time love. I also believe that having Lock and Rachael so young helps the impact of Lock’s damnation feel much more enhanced.
Read the rest of the interview at: http://www.nerdalien.com/2012/07/inte...