I’ve made you wait long enough, so here she is…Alex Apostol!

AC: Tell us about Alex Apostol as a child (all the strange details!). Or maybe just some personality traits. Did you show signs of a future as a writer, even when you were young?

AA: On my twelfth birthday my mom gave me a small diary and ever since then I have always kept a journal. It was a great way to get all my feelings out. I think this is really what got me started on my love of writing. I’ve always been an avid reader, too. It wasn’t until I was twenty-one, when I switched my major for the sixth time and settled on English, that I thought I could actually be a writer for a living. As far as the somewhat eerie and scary subjects of my first two books, Earth Angel and Hunted Angel, a deep love of all things scary runs in my family. My dad and I enjoy watching horror movies together to this day and his mother was known to watch scary movies alone in the dark in her house with the doors unlocked, which is my plan for tonight…though maybe not the unlocked door part.

AC: That sounds legitimately terrifying. You are braver than I! So, what have been your best and worst experiences in writing so far, and how have you handled them?

AA: My best experience with writing so far has been working on my second book, Hunted Angel. I think I’ve really come along these past few years as a writer. I’m learning to let go of my self-consciousness and fear of judgement. It’s been a real great learning experience to dig deep inside myself in order to drive my characters and plots. Hunted Angel touches on subjects that have been very dark and hard times in my own life.

My worst experience with writing was probably when I was trying to go the traditional route of publishing. I’m very sensitive and took all the rejection letters personally, feeling defeated with each one. Then, when I finally landed a contract with a small publishing agency in Tennessee, I hated being stripped of my creative freedom. I had no say over the editing of my book, over the cover design of my book, the layout, nothing. This is what eventually and mutually ended my contract with that publisher, but made me realize that self-publishing was exactly the right route for me.

AC: What an appropriate segueway! I read on your blog about this very thing happening to you. Can you tell us some more about that?