Discover Your True Calling - In Pursuit of Your Passion

by Elvira Dimitrova
Mar 21, 2018
4 min read

She’s 24 years old. She runs her own media and communication agency, makes youtube videos and is part of the leadership of an online gaming community, called Bladesin Gaming. She currently has two cats (Stiles and Crowley) and as she puts it, “there’s a severe lack of dragons” in her life for the moment being.

She is Veronica Di Dato, and oh, did I forget to mention the most important thing? Amongst all of these endeavours she has taken up, she is a writer in the first place. Her first novel is in the process of being published and there are already some of her short stories that you can find on Goodreads. Veronica is a personal inspiration for me as she has taught me that if you chase after what really ignites you, you can achieve it all, regardless of how difficult it might seem at times. Explore some of her experience with writing and a brief peek into her novel in the interview below.

1. How did your passion for writing start?

- I read my first book the year I turned 5, Brother Lionheart by Selma Lagerlöf, and I guess it just took off from there. My interest for Fantasy solidified when I stumbled upon The Lord of the Rings books my mom had in her bookcase, and when Harry Potter came out I realised it was definitely my genre. It worked as a sort of theraphy for me to write, and fantasy just made it more interesting.

2. Where do you draw your inspiration from?

- Many, many places. Films, other books, people around me. I don’t have one place I go to when I hit a snag. Usually, I take a walk and listen to music and my imagination just does the rest on its own.

3. What would you say is the most crucial thing when it comes to writing?

- Persistence and self-awareness. You’ll never get anywhere if you don’t remind yourself to keep writing even if you’ve got no inspiration. You also need to be honest with yourself. Sometimes that idea that sounded really good in your head doesn’t look quite as good on paper.

4. What strategies and approaches do you use when you write your stories?

- I need to have some bullet points written down before I start. Usually that’s the beginning - some indication on where I want the story to go and a plot twist that I want to include. Some stories demand more planning than others, so sometimes I have to write out a chapter summary before I even begin the first one.

Time management is important as well! Don’t get stuck on the plotting stage, or areas where you don’t know where a scene is going. Leave it for the moment and keep writing, then go back to it when you have more inspiration. Not getting stuck is one of the most importat parts.

5. What do you find to be the most challenging and the most rewarding part about working on a novel?

- The most challenging is definitely to stop myself from writing too much backstory for the world. I can’t stop! So it’s a real struggle to make sure I put more time on the story than on the world. The most rewarding is probably when I have a complete story before me and when the random strings of ideas I had in the beginning actually make sense.

6. Could you give the readers some insight into your novel – about its characters, the world, and the story?

- The idea came to me when I was taking a creative writing course in university and had to write a short story. My teacher strongly discouraged writing fantasy, going as far as saying that it couldn’t be done, so naturally I had to do it. I was sitting in the library after several failed attempts of starting and was just daydreaming about what kind of libraries I wanted to visit. A while later, I had the idea and I spent the next few days ironing out the details. After the assignment was done the idea never left me, so I decided to make a book out of it.

So my novel is called the Sword of Dalkor and follows Alexa, the newly appointed apprentice of the legendary forest library as she sets out into the world to retrieve the dangerous sword she had accidently lost. Together with her companion fairy, Spy, she must navigate through a world in growing turmoil, meeting new people and making dangerous friends, all before her mistake throws the world back into the dark age.

The main character, Alexa, is a highly educated young woman, although she is a bit too curious for her own good. Her companion fairy, Spy, is a polite and proper young fairy who has wanted to become a librarian’s fairy, but is not at all ready to be Alexa’s companion fairy. Selma is the current Master Librarian and Alexa and Spy’s master. She’s a seasoned librarian who knows a lot about the artefacts hidden in the library and the magic that runs through the place. Other than that I can’t tell you, you’ll just have to read the book to meet the villain and the assassin, the prince and the guard, and everyone else!

7. Would you share some of your goals with the readers?

- My life goal is to be a full-time author. I can’t see myself doing anything else for the rest of my life, so I’m sure it’s my calling. If you want to have a career in writing, you have to treat it like a job. The romanticized view of struggling authors who wait for inspiration to hit them in order to get far is a myth and you have to accept it. If you don’t treat it like a job, you will never succeed. If you do, you’re already on the right way!

Already hooked on Veronica's novel? Well, below you can find the link to her website, facebook page and to her video channel: