{"id":76830,"date":"2017-10-16T12:39:06","date_gmt":"2017-10-16T01:39:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.booktopia.com.au\/?p=76830"},"modified":"2017-10-19T16:33:51","modified_gmt":"2017-10-19T05:33:51","slug":"ellie-marney-author-no-limits-answers-booktopia-book-gurus-ten-terrifying-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/2017\/10\/16\/ellie-marney-author-no-limits-answers-booktopia-book-gurus-ten-terrifying-questions\/","title":{"rendered":"Ellie Marney, author of No Limits, answers the Booktopia Book Guru’s Ten Terrifying Questions"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"No<\/a>The Booktopia Book Guru asks<\/h1>\n

Ellie Marney
\n<\/strong><\/h1>\n

author of\u00a0No Limits
\n<\/em><\/strong><\/h1>\n

Ten Terrifying Questions
\n____________<\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

To begin with why don\u2019t you tell us a little bit about yourself – where were you born? Raised? Schooled?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was born in Brisbane and grew up in country Queensland, in a tiny little dairy town called Dayboro. My dad was the local milkman, and we were \u2018the new family up on the hill\u2019 for the eleven years we lived there. I went to country schools and local pools, and fossicked around in creeks with my sister. We ended up moving into the outer Brisbane suburbs when I was in my early teens \u2013 think, state high school and 80s hair. I used to ride my bike to school, and harass the librarians to finish sorting all the new books so I could read them now<\/em>.<\/p>\n

What did you want to be when you were twelve, eighteen and thirty? And why?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"At twelve, I wanted to be a jockey \u2013 my grandfather was a racehorse trainer and my dad worked part-time as a bookie, so I spent a lot of time at the track. Being a jockey seemed more achievable, somehow, than being a writer. That just meant being poor, which no one in my family wanted to encourage me into! And I liked the idea of working with animals \u2013 they seemed easier than people.<\/p>\n

By the time I was eighteen, I wanted\u2026well, probably just to leave home. Which I did a year later, while I was studying Arts at University of Queensland. And all the time, I was scribbling down stories and writing in journals, so the writing thing obviously wasn\u2019t going away\u2026<\/p>\n

By the time I was thirty, I was pregnant with my first child, I\u2019d lived in Indonesia and India and Singapore, so I\u2019d lived<\/em> a little. I was writing fanfiction, not yet confident in my own voice, but I was on my way.<\/p>\n

What strongly held belief did you have at eighteen that you do not have now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

That the city was better than the country. Now I think you\u2019re drawn to the city when you\u2019re young, but the country is the place you go home to.<\/p>\n

What were three works of art \u2013 book or painting or piece of music, etc \u2013 you can now say, had a great effect on you and influenced your own development as a writer?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think \u2018genre\u2019 would be the easiest answer, as far as influences go. My early writing influences were from sci-fi and fantasy and crime and horror \u2013 Isaac Asimov\u2019s Foundation series, David Eddings\u2019 Belgariad series, Arthur Conan Doyle\u2019s Sherlock, all Stephen King\u2019s books. I still own my father\u2019s early copies of Foundation<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I read a lot of Star Trek<\/em> fanworks, too \u2013 d\u2019you remember them, in the days before the internet? Ah, me. In my twenties, I was reading feminist texts like The Handmaid\u2019s Tale<\/em>, then The Silence of the Lambs<\/em> by Thomas Harris kind of grabbed me by the throat and has never really let go.<\/p>\n\n\t\t