Featured Interview With MV Ellis
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
I know what it’s like to fall head over heels in love with a badass musician, having followed my heart and my HEA halfway around the world to be with one. I moved from my hometown of London to Sydney after a steamy holiday romance with a sexy bass player in sultry Brazil. I have toured with said badass and several bands, in Australia and overseas, and draw from the things I saw and heard during those crazy times in my novels. Twelve years, two children and a dog later, and I’m still in Sydney, and still smitten.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
My love affair with romance started when at eleven I discovered a stash of my aunt’s books. After a summer holiday spent devouring them from cover to cover, I was hooked on bad boy heroes and smart heroines. An avid reader for as long as I can remember, I always knew I’d write a book of my own someday. Finally, after a career spanning advertising, marketing, and social media, I wrote my debut novel, Catching London in 2017.
Although it is my first book, amazingly, once I sat down to commit this story to paper (it lived in my head for a long time before that), it pretty much wrote itself. I’m lucky that I had plenty of personal experiences to inspire my writing – which no doubt, made the job easier.
When I’m not writing (which isn’t often), working or spending time with my kids, I like to go to the movies, watch gigs (a lot of my friends are musicians), bake the occasional loaf of homemade banana bread, or go out eating drinking gin with my best girlfriends. If I’m feeling diligent and healthy (and to try to counteract the effects of the gin!), I’ll also try to fit in a few visits to the gym every week. If there’s any spare time after all of that (which there mostly isn’t), I like to indulge my continuing love of Brazil by heading to a samba class or Brazilian event.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
I’m a romance reader through and through.
The first romance novel I ever read was a now somewhat controversial YA classic by Liz Berry, called Easy Connection. In many ways, that book is where my road to becoming an author began. I read and reread it countless times, marvelling in the writing, the themes and the emotions it evoked in me. It’s out of print now, unfortunately, and somewhat of a collectors item, as copies are few and far between. However, somewhat serendipitously, as I submitted my final edit of Catching London to my publisher, I randomly stumbled across a copy on eBay here in Australia. It wasn’t cheap, but I had to have it – it seemed like to much of a good omen, and a fitting reward for my hard work!
The first adult romance novels were those I unearthed at my aunt’s house – they were by Virginia Andrews, Jilly Cooper, Jackie Collins and Danielle Steele – stalwarts of romance. I guess they were influential in introducing me to some of the main tropes and themes of the genre. These days my tastes are for contemporary romance with a bit of angst and ‘grit.’ I’m not into super-sweet happy ever afters. As such, some of favourite authors are LJ Shen, Jay Crownover, Carmen Jenner and Haley Jenner.
Other than that, all of the books I have read have left something with me, and influenced me in some way, especially my favourites.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
Pushing Arlo is the third book in the Heartless Few series, which began in February 2018 with the launch of my debut novel, Catching London. In that book we are introduced to Arlo and London, a sexy tumultuous couple who ride an epic emotional rollercoaster of emotions on their path to their happy ever after. That story was told from London’s point of view, and it whet readers’ appetites not just for more of their story, but also for more of Arlo’s voice.
Following on from Catching London comes novella Cold, Hard & Heartless which retells some of the story we saw in Catching London, this time from Arlo’s point of view. Pushing Arlo is also written from Arlo’s point of view, but it picks up from where Catching London left of, taking the story further, and as we follow the feisty couple as they chase their happy ever after.
This book was a natural follow on from Catching London, and was really beginning to be written the moment I type ‘the end.’
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