Braidee Otto

Yeah, so I think like I've always from that moment back to that moment when I first started reading and really fell in love with it.

I always had the dream of being an author.

Like I have kind of always written since then.

I think I really started to get into writing when I was around 12 years old.

and English became my favorite subject at school.

I went on to study literature at university, and it's always been the thing that I've wanted to do, but I feel like I've always kind of, I haven't pursued it because I felt like I wanted to have more life experience so that I could write with emotion.

And maybe I was just procrastinating and trying to put it off because I like I still doubted that I could do it.

And then I kind of just hit a point in my life.

And this is a similar thing that is explored in the book when you kind of like you look back on all of the things that you've done and where you are and you kind of realize that.

this isn't the life you kind of expected for yourself and you haven't done the things that you've wanted to do or pursued the dreams that you've always had.

So I really kind of hit that moment where I was like, I'm finally going to do it.

And I set myself a deadline of like my 30th birthday to have my first book written.

And I think, yeah, kind of just putting aside everything else and drowning out all of the other noise and sitting down and

was the hardest thing for me, but I'm so glad that I finally did it.

Well, like the one I just spoke about, I think it's really interesting how in a lot of young adult fantasy we have that feeling

kind of self-actualising, self-identity journey and exploring things like belonging.

And I think that at that point in time, I was like, this is actually really still relevant as an adult because there's all of these instances and scenarios that we kind of come across and we realise that

Maybe we don't know exactly who we are, even though we probably should by now.

So that was really a theme that I wanted to explore.

There is, of course, like oppression and power and kind of the weaponization of people and their bodies that I kind of delve into a bit more through here.