My next interview is with Olga Gibbs, a fantasy author who also has a background in mental health for young people. Given the intensely stressful time for everyone with the Covid 19 cases increasing so dramatically, I figured she’d be a great person to interview next!

Tell us about yourself! What would you like readers to know about you?

Olga Gibbs: I am an author and a writing mentor, studying for Masters in Creative Writing, with a background in adolescent psychology and mental health, after years of working with young people in therapeutic and supportive settings.

Alexis: Awesome! I imagine that writing and psychology would compliment each other, especially when it comes to character development.

What book or books have most influenced you as a writer?

Olga Gibbs: I was born and spent my formative years in Russia (USSR back then), so the reading that have influenced my taste in literature and my subsequent writing is predominantly by Russian authors. For example, I love “Crime and Punishment” of Dostoyevsky and as result it had influenced my reading taste, and my writing. I’m always intrigued by morally grey characters and moral dilemmas, like the one which is a theme in the above book: “Is it okay to kill a bad person?” 

I want to be surprised when I’m reading a book. I want to like a baddie. I want to question my view of the world when fictional characters ask questions.

But I like adventure stories too. I like high-concept, plot-driven stories. In particular, I love adventure stories of Dumas. “Count de Monte Cristo”, “Three musketeers”, I think he is the first and true high-concept writer and would’ve made a killing should he lived in our times.

What are some tropes of fiction in your genre that you love/hate? Why?

Olga Gibbs: Hate: A female character portrayed as a weak one, in need of saving, usually by a male.

Love: A good plot-twist at which I can gasp in shock and surprise.

Who is your favorite character in your book? What do you like about them? 

Olga Gibbs: Ariel, the main character in the “Celestial Creatures” series. She was written because of the girls I worked with. She was written for them. 

The market of children’s fiction is sterile. It’s gate-guarded by parents, teachers, librarians and truly broken characters with uncomfortable topics rarely find their way into the market. The children like the ones I work with are not represented in books. Their stories are too uncomfortable, too cruel, and therefore often hidden.
So I wanted to give those girls a voice. One day I thought: “These girls have seen nothing good from humanity; nothing but abuse, cruelty and suffering”, and then I began to wonder what would these girls do to humanity, to everyone who hurt them, if they had the power? If they were, say gods, placed above the ones who hurt them, who didn’t care for them or broke them, what would they do then? What would power like that do to a person, but most importantly, what would it do to a girl like Ariel? Would she follow the mainstream religious preaching on forgiveness or would she take revenge?
I crafted Ariel honestly: with her PTSD manifestations, with her failed childhood attachments, with her teenage overreactions and maximalist views. I gave her schizophrenia, and according to a few readers’ reviews, I’ve tackled that difficult diagnosis honestly and realistically too.
You see, even here I chased a multi-layered story with grey and confusing characters. The “Celestial Creatures” is not just a fantasy, it’s so much more than that. It’s a commentary on the childhood abuse, on social class divide, on injustice, survival in cruel world and metamorphosis. I have written it in a fantasy genre because if I would’ve written it as a contemporary piece, it would’ve been too real, and the children, and adults, abuse survivors wouldn’t have wanted to re-live their past traumas. I gave some, special, readers the character they can relate to, but the story they can escape through.

Alexis: You’ve clearly thought very deeply about your characters. I do find children’s literature very sterile, and I worry that children facing real-life problems won’t see themselves in books. I love the idea of YA books tackling issues like mental illnesses and child abuse.

I noticed from your bio that you have a background in mental health. Has that informed your writing?

Olga Gibbs: Absolutely. Understanding human behaviours and responses to certain situations helped me realistically craft my characters, although sometimes I find myself battling with stereotypes that readers place on my characters, because of their initial manifestations or appearances in the story. But that was expected. As I said above, I love confusing characters with ambiguous goals, so I write my characters with many layers, many motives, with hidden desires. I love playing with characters and with readers. Life is not black and white. Only when we come closer and spend some time assessing new people we know who is a friend or foe, and I don’t feel that stories should be any different. As I said before, I love to be surprised and I’m writing for readers who want to be surprised too, gasping at unexpected twists and turns.

Are there any books or types of reading or writing you'd recommend to anyone struggling with their mental health during the pandemic?

Olga Gibbs: We are all different, and our responses to stress are different too. Some prefer escapism, whilst others seek to exercise total control over a situation. My main advice: know yourself and listen to yourself and your mind. Give yourself and your mind a break. If you feel overwhelmed, take a step back and unwind, treat yourself to something that makes you happy, and above all, shift your focus from negativity to positivity.
In terms of reading: I wouldn’t recommend anything challenging, that pushes your self-discovery and self-acceptance too far, as without help, or in the difficult environment that as we are in currently, it might push us into depression.

In time of pandemic, I suggest to take it slowly and softly. Positivity, positivity and again positivity! Look for it, create it. 

One thing I would suggest that anyone can do and that doesn’t take much time or psychological training is gratitude journaling. It’s a diary, but instead of writing everything that happened to you in a day, you write only positives, and if you can’t find any positives, you learn to give thanks: looking at the day, at your life, at small and everyday things in your life, you give thanks. This technique has a great benefit and it amends our mind and outlook on life. It challenges us to look for positives, making lists of good things in our life. It activates “good” neurons in our brain, rewiring them, establishing new, good, life-long connections.  A gratitude journal is an easy, yet very effective tool. 

And if it’s okay, I’ll mention the gratitude journal that I developed: “100 days of gratitude”. I developed it to create a culture of appreciation in one’s life. The “100 days of gratitude” is filled with daily prompts and the way the book is structured: it progresses gently from noticing little good things in our lives to promoting and encouraging our acceptance of self, as we step into therapeutic letter writing in the final days (the link to the journal below).

What do you like to do other than read or write? Do you have any interesting hobbies?

Olga Gibbs: I paint, mainly abstracts, as I had an art training. I love cooking and knitting.
Art allows me to express myself, whilst cooking and knitting help me unwind.

More about Olga Gibbs

Books: “Celestial Creatures” series, 100 days of Gratitude, and Anxiety Journal: Record, Analyze, Manage

Social Media: Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram