Featured Interview With Mara Malins
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
My life is typically but reassuringly boring. I live in Manchester, Uk–the same place that I grew up. In fact, I live about five streets away from my childhood house, and my siblings (three of them) all live within a five minute drive. Even my yoga class is a two minute walk away.
Maybe I should branch out?
I own a house with my long term partner (who also lived locally), three cats (who terrorise me daily) and two turtles (who, whilst looking exotic are actually quite boring and fit neatly into my life). I work a regular 9-5 with a long commute into the city center. In fact, the only irregular thing about me is my sense of humor (so twisted) and that I have double-jointed toes.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
I was one of the fortunate people that was brought up around books. My parents and siblings always had a book nearby–dogeared and overread by the time they made their way to me–so it was natural that I’d do the same. Our living room had one entire wall dedicated to books and, thankfully, nothing was off limits.
By age ten, I’d read all the Nancy Drew’s, Goosebumps, Point Horror’s, and Christopher Pike’s I could get my hands on, and was soon pinching the more adult themed books off the shelf, under my jumper, and squirreling them away to my bedroom to read with a flashlight after bedtime. I thought I was being sneaky. It turns out my parents knew and approved all along.
Luckily, my parents were big believers in the protection of imagination. They believed that it didn’t matter how scary or adult the book was; your mind will only imagine exactly what it can handle. Unlike films where you’re shown in graphic and often unforgettable detail. So, I started reading Pratchett, King, Feist, Herbert, and other adult authors pretty early on.
As it often does, reading led to writing. I knew by the age of fifteen that I wanted a career in writing so I took some work experience at the local newspaper. I wrote several articles–including the main front page story!–in that two week stint, but it wasn’t for me. It made me realise that the words I wanted to write were the fiction kind.
I took English Literature and English Language A levels in college, and went on to study Creative writing and English Literature in University.
Surprisingly, after all that writing training, I ended up working in fashion! By day I manage budgets and clothing ranges, and by night I still scribble down words where I can. I’ve had some small successes in short story anthologies and I’m currently writing a novel about my experience in the fashion industry.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
I don’t think there is anything that I wouldn’t read but I’m definitely a sci-fi and fantasy nerd at heart! My favourite novels of all time are the Dune Series by Herbert, although the Empire Series by Feist and the Song of Ice and Fire series come a very close second. I’ve also recently discovered Phillipa Gregory, who absolutely sings to my inner history nerd. Jane Fallon is also a new find. I love her take on women’s fiction; it has a mature, adult feel to the narration that really appeals to me.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
Strangely enough, I like to read fantasy but I LOVE writing romance. When I started dabbling in writing steamy romances, my first port of call was to get the true definition of “romance.” I knew what romance was, of course; everybody over the age of ten does. But maybe there was another aspect I was missing. Google proved me right. The Oxford dictionary defines romance as “a feeling of excitement and mystery associated with love.”
That definition doesn’t sit right with me. At all. Not only is it seriously lacking in…well, romance, but mystery? Really?
Now, I’m one of those lucky people who found true love at a young age. I was sixteen when I first met my long-term partner and almost sixteen years later we’re still together and still very much in love. After all this time, I think it’s safe to say that there’s very little mystery left surrounding the wonderful man I live with. I probably know more about him than his own mother does, but does that necessarily mean there can be no romance for me?
Absolutely not.
Let me tell you, we’re a romantic pair. It’s true that our romance is closer to running each other baths after a long day, or relinquishing a piece of treasured cheese on toast to the other instead of the more clichéd dozen long-stemmed red roses, but does that mean it’s any less romantic? Nuh-uh. Not in my eyes.
So, when I started to write INKarnate—and the series of short stories set in that world (coming out later this year!)—I knew it had to be my kind of romance and not the kind that dominates the bestsellers. My world wouldn’t have the controlling billionaire or the uber-interested (but sometimes stalker-ish) love interest to sweep my hero/heroine off his/her feet. That was the stuff of fantasies.
I wanted truth.
I wanted relatability.
I wanted real aspirational partnerships with everyday problems.
I wanted to explore romance at every stage of life and how it changes as we mature.
With that in mind, I started from the beginning and wrote INKarnate. The obstacle standing between my two protagonists, Matt and Emily, was the rather mundane issue around communication; neither communicates their feelings—or even admits them—in an honest way. I felt this was a good place to start in my exploration of “true” romance.
After that, I wanted to tackle the next stage of life; parenthood. INKapable came next. Joe and Nathan’s obstacle was a little weightier—how do you build a trusting relationship when you’ve been hurt badly before? How do you let your guard down when you have children relying on you?
Then I wanted to write about something that’s in the post for all of us; the deterioration of health. In INKurable, the third story of the INKomplete series, Phee has cancer. It was a toughie to write, but I feel the relationship between Phee and her surgeon, Pete, comes together naturally. They struggle as a team.
Finally, I rounded off the series exploring the theme of grief; Blakey is a widow and his story in INKonsolable deals with him overcoming his guilt in moving on and initiating a mature, late-blossoming romance.
Each of these stories, I feel, is relatable, truthful, and—perhaps most importantly—full of romance. Not the glamourous kind, or even the “mysterious” kind, but the kind of romance that leaves you feeling hopeful. Not everybody needs, or even wants, a billionaire or a man so overwhelmed with love that he stops being his own person. Sometimes, you just want to read about something real.
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