The Big 4 Interviews – Garth Nix

Garth Nix was born in 1963 in Melbourne, Australia. A full-time writer since 2001, he has worked as a literary agent, marketing consultant, book editor, book publicist, book sales representative, bookseller, and as a part-time soldier in the Australian Army Reserve. Garth’s books include the award-winning fantasy novels Sabriel, Lirael and Abhorsen; and the cult favourite YA SF novel Shade’s Children. His fantasy novels for children include The Ragwitch; the six books of The Seventh Tower sequence, and The Keys to the Kingdom series. More than five million copies of his books have been sold around the world, his books have appeared on the bestseller lists of The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, The Guardian and The Australian, and his work has been translated into 37 languages. He lives in a Sydney beach suburb with his wife and two children.

1. You have a new children’s fantasy series, Troubletwisters, coming out in 2011. Can you tell us a bit about it?

I’m co-writing TROUBLETWISTERS with my friend and fellow bestselling author Sean Williams, my first foray into co-writing prose (I have written some screenplays with other people). We’re having a lot of fun writing it, though as is always the case, lounging about and talking through the story while drinking Guinness is probably the best part.

The basic blurb we wrote says: “The books tell the story of twins Jaide and Jack Shield, who have to move from the city to a small coastal town to live with their eccentric grandmother, where they are drawn into an age-old struggle against an ancient entity called The Evil, in the process discovering their own magical gifts and heritage.” Interestingly, in writing the first book TROUBLETWISTERS: THE BEGINNING, the story veered a bit from fantasy adventure to include more supernatural scary stuff, albeit suitable for the entry reading level of 9+. Like all my own children’s books, I don’t believe in upper age limits and I think that TROUBLETWISTERS will be an exciting and enjoyable read for older children and adults too.

2. Lord Sunday wraps up your incredibly popular Keys To The Kingdom series. Does finishing the last instalment give you a sense of completion or will you miss Arthur Penhaligon?

I think my major emotion on finishing the series was relief! The books ended up being both longer and more complicated than I planned in the beginning and the whole series took about twice as long to write as I originally planned. But that said, I do always have a strong sense of satisfaction when I finish a book and even more so when a series is finished. I don’t miss Arthur, because his story is done. It’s kind of like making a drystone wall that must edge a field — it needs to be a certain length and height, and when it’s done, it’s done, and hopefully will stand and serve its purpose for decades or even centuries. That’s how I feel about stories, they have their size and shape, I make them to the best of my ability, and then I move on.

3. Which of the 7 Trustees of the Architect do you most identify with and why? (If not, which was the most fun to write?)

Sadly I suspect that I am personally most like Mister Monday, the embodiment of sloth. I love doing nothing much and would sleep far more than I do if I had the chance. But I also identify with aspects of the other Trustees, and of course, like all my characters, they all do contain some particles of my own personality, mixed in with material drawn from many other sources.

4. Which of your many characters Burns Brightest in your mind and why?

This is a constantly moving tableau — the character I am writing at any particular moment has to burn the brightest so I can capture them and put them down in writing. I suppose that characters I have written a lot about remain etched in memory, and I can easily summon them up if I need to write about them again, but they don’t linger about if I don’t need them for the current work (or works) in progress.

You can check Garth’s website out here.