Featured Interview With Nadine C. Keels
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
I’m Nadine, a native of Seattle, Washington (US) and a lifelong bookworm-turned-author with a particular passion for fiction. I’m becoming as much of a film lover as I am a book lover—it all stems from my love of storytelling.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
My love of writing stemmed from the many books I read as a child, from authors like Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume. Hence, I’ve been writing stories since I was seven or eight years old. Then, during the few days of a horrific experience I had when I was thirteen, a novel saved my life: John Nielson Had a Daughter by Ruth Livingston Hill. That whole experience is a long story, but my purpose for writing books (beyond writing for my own pleasure) was first awakened there. I now write to help people: to bring hope, to change minds, to expand imagination, to provide entertainment, and to save lives, all of which other authors’ books have done for me.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
I’m partial to Henry James for his command of language, Janette Oke for her sweet simplicity, L.M. Montgomery for her beautiful descriptions and timeless characters, and J.E. Keels for his haunting style of storytelling. These days, I most enjoy reading classic literature and Christian Fiction, and my favorite books tend to include some measure of romance. Henry James and L.M. Montgomery may be the two writers who influence me the most outside of myself; the writer I will be someday ultimately inspires me the most, pushing me to keep on writing. I don’t wish to be the next James or the next Montgomery, but I do wish to be the best me.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
The Movement of Crowns is a novella series of royalty, romance, war, and hope, set in the fictional kingdoms of Diachona and Munda. The three books center on an indomitable princess, a beautiful prankster, and a young, untried ruler of a powerful Realm: three people whose destinies are entwined. An epic journey awaits each of them, after which they’ll never be the same.
So far, readers seem to really appreciate the lead character, Constance, a young woman readers have described as strong, mature, passionate, educated, and kind.
I began drafting scenes for the first book, The Movement of Crowns (which I thought for years would be the only book) back when I was a high school senior, inspired by the thought that although my generation was young, we weren’t precluded from aiming toward greatness. It took over ten years of growth, both as a person and as a writer, for me to be able to convey the story as I see it, and I wrote and published Crowns in 2012 in Love & Eminence: A Suite of Stories. It wasn’t until the spring of 2013 that I got the idea for a sequel. The “other side” of the Crowns story came to me, pretty much all at once, one afternoon. Out came The Movement of Rings, which demonstrated to me how the other side of a story isn’t the “other” side to the people who are actually there, living life on that side. After that, I thought one more book would round out and top off the Crowns message nicely, so I wrote The Movement of Kings.
Some call the series historical fiction, and while I didn’t set out to become a fantasy author, others call the series epic fantasy. The Crowns series doesn’t have the facts to technically be historical or alternative history, and it doesn’t have the element of magic to fit well into the fantasy genre, so I started calling this fiction series epic— heroic, majestic, with its elements of peace and war, cultural and international issues, family dynamics, personal dreams, and romance.
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