This installment of the featured author we speak with Kashel Char about their writing habits and the latest book in their Children of Anzulla series.
Q) Your latest book, Draxton, came out in January. Could you tell us a little about it and what inspired you to write it?
A: Draxton, Part One of Children of Anzulla, starts in the Cradle of Mankind in South Africa. I was born and grew up in that area, and I wanted to give the rest of the world a taste of it. I specifically wanted to write about a character on the autism spectrum and about two men from different ethnicities.
Q) Do you revise your work extensively, or do you prefer to write a first draft and then go back to edit?
A: I write and revise constantly. Even after it was published, I sometimes have to go back and fine-tune and update because my books are all part of a massive, overarching alternate reality, with time travel elements spanning from the Ice Age to 2145 A.D. My stories and characters are complicated and extremely detailed, and by the seventh book, I have to ensure that everything aligns.
Q) How do you handle criticism of your work?
A: Extremely personal and very poorly. However, after a day or two of sulking, I usually go back and check if there’s truth in it, and use that to grow and improve my writing, so my readers and audiobook listeners can enjoy it more.
Q) What is the most challenging thing about being an author?
For me, it’s about trying to overcome my obsession with making everyone happy, including my readers and family. I work extremely hard and many long hours, night and day. I create all my promos, my covers, my website etc. I love what I do, but having my books and audiobooks pirated feels like I work not for myself, but for others, without compensation, in other words. I’m a slave to the machine, and no one cares.
Q) What is your favorite thing about being an author?
A: Losing myself in my stories as I write them and photoshopping. Both of which I’d taught myself starting in 2019
Q) What is your next project you are working on?
A: I have three projects waiting.
- Having Draxton and Kellan’s books ready for audio production by Jonathan Waters.
- Start my new book in the Children of Anzulla series, Lucifers’ Ferryman
- Write a pure contemporary MM romance, standalone.
Q) If people want more information about you or your projects, where should they go?
A: They can contact me via my website: https://KashelChar.com or check out my work at https://www.amazon.com/stores/Kashel-Char/author/B0BGNPD855.
I also rework my books for Young Adult audiences under the pen name Glacier Dune, see https://GlacierDune.ca
Final four questions –we ask everybody.
Q) When the zombies take over the world, where will you be?
A: Reinforcing my home and start planting vegetables in the basement.
Q) What is your favorite Fandom (could be sports, pop culture, favorite director or author)
A: I love dancing, and my favorite DJ is Armin van Buuren. Additionally, I enjoy watching sci-fi and fantasy movies.
Q) What piece of art, be it in the form of music, a book, a film, or a picture, do you think people must experience before they die?
A: Go to Tomorrowland.
Q) Give one fact that most people would not believe about you?
I really don’t know. We should ask them. The only thing they may find weird is that I only learned to type and use a computer in 2007, before I immigrated to Canada. I bought my first laptop to do my paperwork and online courses.
Paper Phoenix ink 