I don't read many thrillers... I love to write psychological thrillers, but tend to read other genres- I want to carve out my own voice and niche in the psychological thrillers genre, and try to avoid becoming too influenced by what others in the same genre are doing.
Alex Dahl by Nina Rangoy
I never, ever write a word without loud music... When I wrote The Boy at the Door, I mostly listened to Sia, London Grammar, Laura Pausini and Lana del Rey. With the novel I am currently working on, it is (strangely, perhaps) really aggressive French hip hop. I love Moha la Squale!
I love to travel and believe that my travels are really influential in my writing. One of my favorite parts of the creative process is setting the scene and choosing the places for the action.
I like to write very closely to my characters, preferably in the first person, present tense. I like this immediacy in writing, like the action unfolds as you read.
My favorite authors are David Mitchell, Maggie O'Farrell, Marilynne Robinson, and Jonathan Safran Foer. I generally like to read sad stuff and nobody breaks my heart better than Marilynne Robinson! Gilead is a masterpiece.
If I wasn't a writer, I could imagine myself as a ski instructor or a pilot. I'm a real plane geek & I like action! My ideal job besides writing would have to involve nature and no two days the same ideally...Or I'd run a b&b in a French chateau!
I speak French, Russian, German, Norwegian, Spanish and some Dutch- I love languages and studied linguistics as an undergrad. It is a long-term goal to get my French and Russian to fluent-level.
I grew up in Oslo, but really struggled with the climate. I found the cold and dark winters so hard to deal with, and now people laugh when I say I like the London climate.
I'm a real foodie and like to cook to unwind. I especially like making Indian and Mexican food- it's got to be super hot!
I'm never short of inspiration when it comes to writing- I have at least another five novels 'ready' in my head. I can find it hard to get 'in the zone', though- to produce new material I need to be in an almost trance-like state and being interrupted is...painful! Not always an easy job to combine with small children, but the flexibility more than makes up for it!
