⁠˶⁠ ⁠❛⁠ Ladies and gentlemen, it is an absolute pleasure to welcome you to our very first interview of the show! And today, we have a special guest - the ever-talented writer, AziaElga . She has generously agreed to give us some fresh perspectives on the world of writing, equality, and some all-around fun stuff too. So, sit back, relax, and get ready for an exciting conversation with our amazing guest! ⁠❛⁠ ⁠˶⁠ 

Hi, it's great to meet you! I am Dinara (Jeon_Dinara) and today I will be interviewing you on behalf of Lynx Club. I'm thrilled to take your interview.

Can you introduce yourself a little bit?

Hello. Thank you so much! I go by Azia Elga (AziaElga) on Wattpad. I primarily write sapphic stories over a range of genres (fantasy, romance, historical fiction, sci-fi, etc.) I’m originally from Singapore, and so I love to include tons of Asian voices in my books too.

That's great! Moving to our next question. The next few question aren't about writing but it's associated with our cause; feminism and equality. And we'd love to learn about your views on it.

What does feminism mean to you? Why do you think the world needs gender equality?

Hmm, the term is indeed very broad and encompasses a lot of ideas, but personally, my view is that feminism aims to improve everybody's lives (regardless of gender) by encouraging the breaking of certain societal norms. A lot of individual and societal problems are the result of patriarchy, and we should strive to break out of that and think beyond what we've been conditioned to think.

One example I can think of is toxic masculinity. It affects both everyone—men are forced to hide their emotions while everyone else is forced to deal with the consequence of that. If we can encourage more gender norms to be broken, more equality over treatment of all genders, we can hopefully move to a world where this won't be such a huge issue anymore.

That's a great answer!

In Emma Watson's UN speech, she mentions that women themselves are not supporting feminism. Taking that into consideration, do you think "Women are their own enemy"?

I don't particularly like to use terms that generalize groups of people like that, but I can speak for myself. So personally, I admit I used to have a lot of internalized misogyny I had to unlearn over the years. For example, there were a lot of "girly" stuff I refused to try when I was young—or refused to admit that I liked—because I felt ashamed being associated with being "girly". Somehow, the environment I grew up in made me feel like being into "girly" stuff was shameful. Now, I embrace every "girly" or "non-girly" things I enjoy, because, well, why are they even labeled this way? Just like what you like.

I've grown out of this mindset (and many other problematic ones as well that is equally self-loathing) but it definitely took some years. Was I my own enemy? Possibly. But my beliefs did not spring out of the vacuum. This is part of a larger societal issue that needs to be tackled for sure.

Alright

Do you think gender pronouns are necessary? Why do you think they matter?

I think they are necessary to people who wants them. If there's a pronoun someone identifies with, it's just basic politeness to abide by it, just like how you'll learn their preferred name/nickname and abide by that too.

Why is LGBTQ+ equity important, especially in the light of the history shared in today's resources?

As someone who is not out to anyone in real life, who knows people who does not want to be out, I know first-hand how far we are from fully accepting people of the LGBTQ+ community. As long as there are people who are still afraid of admitting a huge part of themselves, who are still afraid of openly being in a consenting adult relationships they want to be in, who are still unsure if there is a future of marriage with the person they love, there is so much more to do.

I agree. Thanks for sharing your opinions on these matters. We really appreciate it.
We'll be starting our next section then. In this part we'll talk about book, reading and writing. Starting with our first question.

What developed your interest in writing? When did you write your first book/story?

I’ve always loved writing. I have vivid memories of laying in my living room floor and writing silly stories when I was really young. Actually writing a book never crossed my mind, however, because I’ve always thought my writing skills were terrible. But when I was about fourteen, I wrote my first fanfiction and published it. It wasn’t very popular but it garnered a few loyal readers who left very sweet comments. That gave me the confidence to keep writing.

That's amazing.

Where do you draw inspiration from for writing your books?

From all the media I consume! I listen to audiobooks a lot (I used to read a lot but I don’t have the time to sit down and read these days), I watch a lot of anime and Netflix shows, and I watch a lot of movies too. All of them give me inspiration of some kind, and I combine my favorite parts for my own books!

Cool.

Do you experience writer's block? If so, how do you work around it?

A lot of my block is not a creative block but rather a motivation/exhaustion block. I write at night after I come home from work so honestly the exhaustion block comes very frequently XD

I try to work around it by setting baby goals. People have lofty word count goals, and I just have a time goal—spend at least 30min on the story. I don’t even have to end up writing anything, as long as I spend that time. I think the flexibility makes me go easier on myself and helps me not get even more exhausted.

Nice

Can you tell us a little about your writing style and process? Do you outline, plot and plan, or is your writing more organic?

I am 100% a plotter! Before I even write anything, I’ll have documents of the world building and character sheets all written up, as well as a very detailed outline (my most recent one is 7k words for a book that ended up to be 50k!) I need to know exactly where the story is going to go before I start writing.

Awesome, I personally love that style!

What do you do when a new idea jumps out at you while you're still working on a book? Do you start a new story or do you finish your current project first?

So many new ideas jump at me, but I cannot afford to stop writing my current work-in-progress (I am a completionist and I need to finish one story at a time). What I do is to take some time write a very short outline for the idea (maybe ~100 words) and then put it aside. After I’m done with my current writing project, I can then expand that outline and start writing.

And I currently have about 20+ of these mini outlines in my document right now 😂

I see!

Do you identify with your main character or any other character from your stories or do you create characters that are different from you?

I tend to split my personality up into pieces and exaggerate them, so all my characters are mini exaggerations of one part of me. So I guess my answer would be that I identify with all my main characters from my stories! They make writing the story so much easier.

Amazing~

What type of books do you read? What is your favorite book?

Romance! Any type of romance in any setting, and the gayer the better! My favorite book currently is 'Delilah Green Doesn’t Care', a contemporary sapphic book about a woman who tries very hard not to care but… you guessed it… meets another woman who she can’t help but care. It’s beautifully written, I absolutely love it.

Sounds  wonderful!

What do you enjoy most about writing?

Taking the daydreams that have been haunting me and putting them into an actual story that other people can appreciate. Nothing makes me happier than rereading what I wrote and then seeing how other people react to what I wrote.

What a great motive!

What genres do you usually write? Is there any particular reason for selecting those specific genres?

I write a range of genres. I started out writing a ton of fantasy, and then I branched out to contemporary romance, and then to historical. Now, I’m back to the speculative fiction by writing a sci-fi. Since I do enjoy reading and consuming media of all genres, I think that’s why I love writing all genres and trying out all of them. My little goal in life is to write a book of every single genre under the sun (minus horror XD)!

That's a lot of genres!! Finally,

What advice would you give to the aspiring writers on this platform?

My advice to all writers is to: write! Don’t be afraid that it won’t be perfect. In fact, embrace the fact that it won’t be perfect, because you will be improving every day. Your second work will be better than your first, your third work will be better than your second, and so on!

Great!
  Your interview now comes to an end! Thank you for taking an interview with us, I was much delighted in taking it. Hope to see you around!

Thank you.

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