I recently read and reviewed The Second Love of My Life, and reached out to its debut author, Victoria Walters, to see if she would like to be interviewed on my blog. The Second Love of My Life is currently on Amazon for £2.99 for the eBook, and the physical copy is on both Amazon and The Book Depository for just £3.85. So, what are you waiting for? Go grab a copy! 🙂

R: Hi Victoria, introduce yourself to Book Geek readers, and tell us a little about you – what do you do when you aren’t writing/blogging?

V: Hi everyone! My name is Victoria Walters and my debut novel The Second Love Of My Life was published in April this year. When I’m not writing, I work as a bookseller for Waterstones and always have my head stuck in a book!

R: I would love to work surrounded by books! So, what made you want to become a writer?

V: I have always written stories. Maybe because I’m an only child, I have always had an overactive imagination and was always a massive bookworm so I think it was inevitable that I’d end up writing one day really.

R: In The Second Love of My Life, many of the characters deal with loss and grief, what made you want to tackle these emotions, or was there a specific inspiration for your story? 

V: I lost my father when I was nine, so grief is a subject I’ve thought a lot about, and when my main character Rose came into my head, I knew instantly that she had lost someone close to her and was struggling to move on. I also had read a lot of stories where the love interest died at the end and I thought it would be interesting to mix it up and have him have met his demise at the start of the story instead.

R: It must be so difficult to lose a parent at such a young age. Are there any other aspects of the story that your real life has inspired? The novel also deals with the idea of “the one”. Do you believe in the one?

V: Ohh, what a question! I think it’s a subject I wanted to explore in the book for sure. I haven’t met ‘The One’ for me so we shall see 🙂 Let’s say I’m undecided…

R: I feel the same! We meet a variety of characters in your novel, are any of them inspired by people you know in real life? And which one is most like you?

V: There’s no one I can think of as explicitly inspiring one of the characters. The TV show The Gilmore Girls was definitely an inspiration for my quirky, small town of Talting in the book. I wanted a small, close-knit community that Rose would find very hard to leave. I think Rose is the most like me.

R: Talting definitely reminded me of Stars Hollow in The Gilmore Girls. I was watching the show around the same time I read your book. The location of the novel is beautifully written, and feels like a character in its own right. Was there a reason you chose a small town setting, and did you intend for it to be such a pivotal element of the novel?

V: Stars Hollow was an inspiration for sure! Yes, I really wanted the small town to be a character in the novel in its own right. Some parts were influenced by my small town too – we have an annual fair and a tree-lighting night at Christmas. I think the fact that Rose grew up in this small town, with the husband she lost, makes for some really poignant moments, and there’s a struggle in her whether she wants to keep on living there.

R: As a budding writer, I have to ask, what is your favourite, and least favourite part of the writing process?

V: I generally enjoy writing a first draft the most, I find editing difficult, but I’m learning!

R: Introduce The Second Love of My Life to Book Geek readers in one sentence.

V: It’s the story of a young widow who is struggling to move on from her husband’s death, and then one summer a mysterious newcomer arrives in town…

Quick-Fire Round

R: Weigh in on the eternal debate – eBook or hard-copy?

V: Hardcopy for me!

R: What is your favourite word?

V: Befuddled.

R: What is your favourite non-fiction book?

V: I loved Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert – every writer should read it.

R: Do you prefer the hero or the villain?

V: Hero.

R: What are you currently working on that we can look forward to?

V: I’m working on a new book, which I’m really enjoying and fingers crossed I get to tell you all about it soon!

Links for readers to find out more about Victoria Walters and her work:  

Twitter – Website – Goodreads

Massive thanks to Victoria for agreeing to be interviewed. Have you read The Second Love of My Life? Share your thoughts in the comments!