I’m super excited to share with you guys my most recent discovery 😀 Also at the end of my review, there will be a Q&A with the author and  you all know how rare those are on my blog 😉 Stay tuned because I love his answers !

Btw, it’s been 2 weeks that Montreal had -30 degrees celsius so this book was pretty much a reminder of the cold HAHA

What a chilling novel! I’m not talking about the winter atmosphere and setting of it but the sensation if leaves me when I finish reading it. It is haunting and eerie. 

Lynn, a 23 year old girl, living and surviving in the Yukon wild forest, is a fantastic character. She got skills, wits and she can outsmart anyone. She has one of the best  replies to be honest. Her I-don’t-give-a fck and sass attitude reminds me a lot of… me. I love it when I can relate to the main character (we also happen to live in Canada, have the same age and share the same nickname LOL my French name is Pauline and my nickname is pronounced Lynn, found that pretty funny). 

What starts as a group of people living in the wild turns out to be one of the most interesting post-apocalyptic premise. With similarities to The Girl with All The Gifts and The Handmaid’s Tale, it’s a story of loss, a pandemic and witty humour. The author’s prose was perfect for me. It is beautiful, elegant at times but it can also be raw, fun and light to read. The perfect blend! 

The pace starts out slowly but it picks up QUICKLY and even gives out a scifi vibe to the novel. I have to also warn people about the first pages, there’s a  sensitive scene, so be prepared. 

 

1. The Wolves of Winter is set in the Canadian wild, how did you get the inspiration to explore this side of the world? 

Well, I knew I wanted somewhere north that would naturally get a lot of snow. I also wanted the characters to not only experience the fall of mankind, I wanted them to be utterly displaced. To that end, I planted them where they wouldn’t be anywhere near civilization for miles and miles: the northern end of the Yukon.

2. It’s kind of hard to fit the book in one genre (a blend of mystery and science fiction), did you always plan for the plot to go into a cross-genre? What was the process behind it? 

I realized a while ago that books that blend genres tend to be my favorite (Trang: SAMEEE). I watched a conversation with Neil Gaiman and David Mitchell once where they talked about blending genres being like blending different colors of paint to create a work of art (Trang: OKAY DAMN That’s a nice image). I like to think of it like that. Fantasy, sci-fi, thriller, mystery—why not all of the above? So, yes, I knew I wanted to play with genre from the beginning, how that was accomplished specifically came out, to some extent, as I went.

3. What was the hardest scene to write? 

Any scene with romantic elements was difficult for me. So often these moments can be overdone or cliché. To me, subtlety is the best. My editors really had to push me to bolster a few of these scenes. Hopefully we found a middle ground that works well.

4. What’s the most difficult thing about writing the main character from the opposite sex?

I was lucky enough to have both a female and male editor working with me on the novel. They were invaluable in providing both perspectives on Lynn’s thoughts/tone of voice. As I mentioned before, probably the most difficult part of this was anything involving romance.

5. As a book blogger, I have to ask ahah : Do you read your book reviews? How do you deal with bad or good ones? 

Ha! I do, to some extent, though I’m trying to phase that out because it tends to be stressful. You can get twenty good reviews in a day and one bad review, and inevitably it’ll be that one bad review that sticks with you. I’ve had author friends tell me it’s best to have a trusted friend read your reviews and pass off the good ones. I really should start doing that.

6. A lot of our readers are aspiring writers themselves. What are the things you wish you knew before publishing your book? 

Before you obsess over getting published, be obsessed with getting better as a writer. It’s hard to see at first, but the two go hand in hand.

 

7. Now that 2017 is ending, what was your favourite book of 2017 and what is your most anticipated read for 2018? 

I’m going to cheat and pick two. Dark Matter by Blake Crouch (Trang: LOVE LOVE this book too!) and Beartown by Fredrik Backman. And as far as books I’m looking forward to, I’ve been so self-absorbed that I wasn’t aware any books other than Wolves was coming out in 2018. (Trang: LOL) 

Just kidding (mostly). Here’s a few books on my to-read pile:

How to Stop Time

The Immortalists

The Philosopher’s Flight

8. I also love sharing some bookish facts about the authors with the readers! Feel free to share some fun bookish facts about you 🙂 

I try to always be reading a novel, listening to a novel, and reading a book about writing (you can always get better at something you love to do!). Right now I’m reading Life After Life, because I keep hearing great things about Kate Atkinson; I’m also reading Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott, and listening to The Name of The Wind for the hundredth time (Trang: BEST BOOK EVER) .

A big thank you to the author for answering these questions, and honestly after reading them, I think I’d love to hangout with him haha 😀

Thank you to Simon & Schuster for inviting me to participate in this blog tour and feel free to visit the other blogger’s stops announced in the picture below ❤ \

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