Interview with Aniesha Brahma, author of All Signs Lead Back to You I’m not going to be reviewing your newest novel, but from your other published novels, is there one that is your own personal favourite?
Hi, Rosemarie! J Thank you for interviewing me. When Our Worlds Collide is my personal favourite novel, because in many ways it set the ball rolling for me to finally be recognized as a young author!
Everyone has a ‘first novel’, even if many of them are a rough draft relegated to the bottom and back of your desk drawer (or your external harddrive!). Have you been able to reshape yours, or have you abandoned it for good?
The first novel that I ever wrote was about a girl called Sara Basu and her stepbrother called Iemon Mukherjee. I actually got it printed from a print-on-demand shop just to see what the book might look like. I think the story exists on a site I used to write on. I don’t do anything with it. I haven’t decided if I want to go back to it – ever.
Some authors are able to pump out a novel a year and still be filled with inspiration. Is this the case for you, or do you like to let an idea percolate for a couple of years in order to get a beautiful novel?
My mind is always bubbling over with new ideas. And in order to stay relevant authors do need to pump out a novel very year. I’m forever looking for that little spark that would set into motion a story that my readers would be able to relate to. The spark comes to me whenever it wants, without warning. It’s honestly a little annoying at times.
I have heard of writers that could only write in one place – then that cafe closed down and they could no longer write! Where do you find yourself writing most often, and on what medium (pen/paper or digital)?
I wrote an entire children’s book on my phone during my metro journeys to and from work! I don’t think it’s the place half as much as it is the state of mind one requires to be in while writing. I am most comfortable writing on my laptop. I don’t think I’ve written anything by hand since I was gifted my laptop during my second year in college.
Before going on to hire an editor, most authors use beta-readers. How do you recruit your beta-readers, and choose an editor? Are you lucky enough to have loving family members who can read and comment on your novel?
I have loving friends who are more than happy to suffer through my first drafts and give me very honest feedback. As for choosing an editor, I’ve just been very, very lucky that the editors and I have gotten along very well. So the nasty fights never happened between us.
I walk past bookshops and am drawn in by the smell of the books – ebooks simply don’t have the same attraction for me. Does this happen to you, and do you have a favourite bookshop? Or perhaps you are an e-reader fan… where do you source most of your material from?
I work in a publishing house as a social media manager and hence I’m surrounded by paperbacks and hardbound books all day long. I am the happiest when I’m around books. While I don’t have a favourite bookshop, I am more comfortable ordering books online. While I am not an e-reader fan, I understand that it’s okay to like reading e-books. I cannot possibly afford the paperbacks of all the books I’ve been reading…for me, the story has been more important.
I used to find myself buying books in only one genre (fantasy) before I started writing this blog. What is your favourite genre, and do you have a favourite author who sticks in your mind from:
1. childhood? Grimm brother’s Fairy Tales.
2. adolescence? I used to read a lot of Enid Blyton and Roald Dahl and Ruskin Bond during this phase of my life.
3. young adult? I started reading classics like Pride and Prejudice and Gone with the Wind and Rebecca during the time I was a young adult.
4. adult? And I started reading Young Adult fiction when I was an adult. Because YA is NOT a category, it’s a point of view!
Social media is a big thing, much to my disgust! I never have enough time myself to do what I feel is a good job. How do you manage its demands?
I manage my own platform. And I am most comfortable running my Facebook author page and my Instagram page. I am on twitter as well, but I don’t use it as much. I spend chunks of ten minutes a day to make the creatives which I would be sharing from my social media. J On a daily basis, at least fifteen minutes a day get spent in promoting my work. I just find it easier to reach a wider audience this way to be honest.
Answering interview questions can often take a long time! Tell me, are you ever tempted to recycle your answers from one to the next?
Sometimes. But I never recycle them. I take the time out and reply to each and every interview personally.
As the final bell for the day rang on their last day in school, Diya Rai, had a chill run down her spine. The chill of not knowing what the future holds for her and her high school sweetheart, Ashwin Chowdhury.
So she does a preemptive strike.
She dumps him before he can hurt her.
2015.
Two years later, Ashwin and Diya, cross paths. Each holds grudges, feelings and only one half of the story that completes them.
Told from alternating points of view, through a non-linear timeline, this is the story about first love, second chances and ALL the SIGNS THAT LEAD BACK TO YOU.
Diya Rai – is the protagonist of the story whose actions have always had terrible consequences for those around her. Diya is self-absorbed and never chooses anyone else over her own self. Diya’s troubled past keeps her from letting people into her life. Even though she’s hurt Ashwin she wants him back in her life years later.
Ashwin Chowdhury – is her best friend in school and later on, boyfriend. He is left heartbroken by Diya but when their paths cross later on, he realises he doesn’t want anything to do with her. He lives with his mother and elder brother and hails from a upper middle-class family background.
Nina Gonzales – is Diya’s best friend in college. She and Diya had met during their admissions and had become fast friends with one another. Nina and Ashwin end up competing with one another to see who is really Diya’s best friend!
Rishabh – is the quintessential hot, rich guy that Diya dates in college. He seems to be in love with her, but Diya doesn’t seem to return the same affection towards him. Nina hates his guts.
Trina – is the girl Ashwin is interested in. She goes to the same college as Diya and Nina, and while Diya dislikes her mostly because Ashwin seems to be interested in her, Nina is indifferent to her.
Aniesha Brahma is an author who realized her passion for writing at the tender age of six. She also happens to be the social media manager for BEE Books. Her debut novel, The Secret Proposal (2012) was published by General Press and was followed by When Our Worlds Collide (2015) by the same. She blogs at: www.anieshabrahma.com and runs an online magazine, BUZZ Magazine. She can be contacted at: aniesha.brahma@gmail.com. She lives in Kolkata with her family and her five super adorable cats!
This sequel to 
The short stories lapped in with each other, the world felt complete and despite the short stories being, well, short, I felt satisfied after reading each one. I’m not sure that I would be able to comfortably read a whole novel of this, nor what storyline could go with it. There is just so many disparate things happening that it seems impossible to get
Personally, I think the blurb on GoodReads gives far too much away. You start to get inklings of something being wrong with this generation of Queens as you are reading, and to have them all knocked away before you even start reading would be a serious detriment to your enjoyment of the novel.
In the tradition of ‘The Day My Bum Went Psycho’ and ‘The Adventures of Captain Underpants’, this novel contains bums, snot and disgusting boys! If you have a reader that is into that kind of thing, they are going to love this novel.
The novel’s characters didn’t fill out for me. I remember Sean’s name. That’s it. I had to recheck the blurb to remember the other characters, even the ‘main’ character, Cole.
Sabriel has always been an established Abhorson in my eyes, but here we see Lirael grow into what she should be. When she returns to the Glacier where she grew up, it is obvious that there has been some serious character growth coming on. We get to see more of that in this novel too, as well as Sameth (who I hold a personal soft spot for) and Nick.
This novel lets its main character develop the way I would want, but could have left a bit more time for other characters to put their own 2 cents in. I would have liked to have more of everything, the world as it was many years before the rest of the series, and the state of society.
Bad guys never give up do they? This novel offers a satisfying plot with twists that I certainly didn’t see coming. Bam! Nothing like having sociopaths on the loose. Even if some successful scientists are likely also sociopaths. The ultimate question is whether removing those genes will be sustainable and what might happen next.
It was a bit convenient how there just happened to be 4 brilliant ‘munies that could be used to help design the maze. Then again, the whole thing was amazingly orchestrated by WICKED. Not having read The Scorch Trials, I didn’t know that there had been two communities in the mazes (male-only and female-only).