An Interview With Christa Mandler

BL’s own Christa Mandler has written and published a book, Zada: Earth’s Twin. It’s about a far-distant planet known as Zada, where the animals of Earth have found a safe haven, free to continue their evolution without interference. That is, until an invading race of conquerors set their sights on Zada’s abundant resources. It’s up to young fox Renard, alongside his friends to take on this Herculean task: unite the Zadans and save their world!

We loved reading Christa’s book, so we asked her to sit down with us and share a little about the story, her writing process, and more!

1.     Why did you decide to write a book? And why this story in particular?

I always wanted to be an author! I loved creative writing assignments in school so much, teachers usually had to reel me in during them. I also used to tell myself stories as a kid; I’d make them up in my head. This book was one of the stories I made up. I thought, “there’s a lot of story here, let’s write it down!”

2.     Where do you get your ideas from? What inspires you?

It comes from a lot of childhood imagination plus a mix of inspiration from games (like Star Fox), movies (like Independence Day, The Matrix, and The Land Before Time) and other books I read (like Watership Down, and Enchanted). I was definitely inspired by the Redwall book series as well, but it always bothered me that certain species of animals were evil by default. Why can’t a fox be good?

3.     Let’s talk about your writing process – how much planning did you do ahead of time in terms of characters, world-building, and plot? How much was improvised?

I did a little of both. Some dialogue and world-building comes from planning and the initial stories I told myself as a kid, but other things were improvised as I wrote. My husband (and editor) is an engineer and big into details. He asked a lot of questions, especially about physics and climate, that helped me refine the initial worldbuilding.

4.     How much research into animals/animal behavior did you do to prepare for the story?

I’ve always been a big reader, and when I was younger, I’d love to go to the library and get books on specific animals. I’d be like, “Today I want to get books birds and foxes”, and then come away with a lot of new information. I knew quite a lot about different animal species and used that to develop how each animal’s society would function based on their particular species.

5.     Do you think your environmental background impacts your storytelling or your writing? If so, how?

Absolutely. I’ve been interested in and concerned with the environment since I was a tiny child. There’s definitely a strong environmental message throughout. I was inspired by how sad it was that some animals had been driven to extinction by humans, so I wanted to imagine a world where that hadn’t happened.

6.     Can you tell me a little about the self-publishing process? How easy/hard is it?

Amazon makes it very easy. One of my author friends recommended Kindle Direct Publishing, which is Amazon’s self-publishing platform. They have really clear instructions and tips, and there’s the Kindle Create program which formats your manuscript for you so it’s ready for e-book publishing. A little bit more goes into preparing your manuscript for printing, as you need to have a cover / spine / back cover prepared in addition to formatting the manuscript. Amazon sends you a proof of the hard copy so you can adjust things if needed. While Amazon takes a cut of sales, they make things pretty easy.

7.     What advice would you give to aspiring authors?

If you want to write – read a lot. It will help you immensely, even if it’s just to find some ideas or inspiration.

8.     Where can people find your book, and do you have plans to write any more?

It’s available on Amazon Kindle or paperback here. As for future books, I have a lot of ideas and definitely want to explore some adjacent stories in this world. I just need to pick which one to do first!