on 21/05/2015
To celebrate her fantastic fiction novels and the latest edition to her collection, THE SUNRISE, we asked Victoria Hislop a series of quick-fire questions to find out more about the bestselling novelist herself. Discover more about the amazing woman behind the books below:
Q. When I was a child I wanted to be…
A. ‘A tennis player at Wimbledon. I spent hours and hours hitting a ball against the wooden garage doors. As I saw on a nostalgia visit, those doors have been replaced with something more modern. That made me sad.’
Q. The moment that changed me for ever…
A. ‘Was having my first child. This is where my life divides into the ‘before’ and ‘after’.’
Q. My greatest inspiration…
A. ‘Comes from visiting unfamiliar foreign cities, sitting in cafés and wondering what goes on in the lives of the people there – and eavesdropping.’
Q. At night I dream of…
A. ‘Very little. When my head touches the pillow I am gone in seconds, and awake eight hours later from a seemingly dreamless sleep. When I do remember, it’s usually been a nightmare.’
Q. My style icon…
A. ‘The simple elegance of Jackie Kennedy. I love the way she dressed – and in The Sunrise I have made her the icon of the character of Aphroditi. Most days, when I get up I put on jeans – but when I go out, JK is the person I would most like to emulate (though never with a hat).’
Q. The shop I can’t walk past…
A. ‘Any stationers. Perfect for anyone who works at home and needs something to cheer up a desk.’
Q. The best invention ever…
A. ‘The printing press. Civilisation would stand still without it.’
Q. A book that changed me…
A. ‘Wuthering Heights. It’s full of literary depth – but intensely exciting too. It woke me up to reading and was the first proper adult book I enjoyed.’
Q. My favourite work of art…
A. ‘Picasso’s Guernica. It captures, on a single canvas, the cruelty and violence that characterised the Spanish civil war. Standing in front of it is like watching a film, complete with a soundtrack – you can hear the squeals of dying animals.’
Q. All my money goes on…
A. ‘Greek lessons. I have one-to-one tuition every week and I am addicted. It’s like a code that I am cracking, slowly but surely. And it’s wonderful to express myself in a completely new language.’
The wonderful author Victoria Hislop
Q. If I have time to myself…
A. ‘I read.’
Q. My house is…
A. ‘Full of bookshelves – but somehow there is never enough space!’
Q. My most valuable possession is…
A. ‘A line-drawing of our children. It captures their essence in a way that photographs never do.’
Q. My favourite building…
A. ‘An old café in Nicosia – where the back wall is in the dead zone – it is the most atmospheric place I know.’
Q. Favourite children’s book…
A. ‘I am David – Anne Holm’
Q. My favourite film is…
A. ‘Melancholia’
Q. My guilty pleasure is…
A. ‘chewing gum’
Q. Pen or paper?
A. ‘Pen’
Q. Town or country?
A. ‘Town’
Victoria Hislop’s latest novel ‘The Sunrise’
Now you have learnt a little bit about Victoria Hislop, why not discover her passion of writing and read her recent novel THE SUNRISE? It is out now in hardback and ebook.
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