An Interview with Author Beatriz Gea Marín

I’m an eighties’ female who was born in Elche, Spain.

During my studying years, I remember being good at English, Maths and Language/Literature. History was one of the subjects I was not attracted to.

In 2008 I moved to the UK.

Through the lockdown of 2020, I challenged myself writing DE TAPEO POR LA HISTORIA, a fiction-history book that took me around a year to complete. In that same year, I published EL PAVO ENAMORADO, a book that compiles all the poems I wrote in my late teens and early twenties.

Two years later, after my family’s dog had passed away, and not being able to forget him easily, I decided to write his biography. He tells his own life from Heaven. This is called COCO’S STORIES.

In one of my visits to my family home, I thought: “I don’t think I finish reading that book I bought 20 years ago”. Therefore, I looked for it and brought it with me. After I finished it, a new story came to mind. One that I got very motivated for, thanks to a writing bootcamp. This story is now a series: A DISCOVERY UNDERGROUND & A DISCOVERY UNDERGROUND 2.

As for the last book, I reflected all my weirdest and most interesting experiences as a hairdresser, on an e-book called BEYOND STYLING.

Amazon author site – https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0C2LD2Y77/about

  • Describe yourself in five words

Creative, passionate, honest, dynamic, forward

  • What fact about yourself would really surprise people?

My naturality

  • How do you work through self-doubts and fear? 

I try to relax watching something on Netflix, read a book or share my thoughts with friends.

  • What scares you the most?

Death and spiders. Spiders terrify me.

  • What makes you happiest?

I’m happy making people happy and get a smile from them with my chitchats.

  • Why do you write?

I write because I need to put my thoughts and ideas into a story to be able to get smiles beyond my world’s circle.

  • Have you always enjoyed writing? 

I haven’t enjoyed always writing. This is something that first began when one of my old pub’s colleagues back in 2011 when she advised me to start writing a book because she couldn’t catch up with my love stories. But when I became serious about it, with the thought I wanted to become a known author, was in 2020, and I haven’t stopped writing ever since.

  • What motivates you to write?

Life itself with its conventional and outrageous ways to present in front of my eyes is what motivates me to add my creativity into it.

  • What writing are you most proud of?

I would not know which one to choose. As my writing is quite versatile.

  • What are you most proud of in your personal life?

I think the most proud I feel is by adding one more page each time until the point when I run out of ideas.

  • What books did you love growing up?

The books I loved when growing up, that I can remember now, were those like The Witches, Konrad, The Little Vampire, Sopaboba or El misterio de la isla de Tokland.

  • What do you hope your obituary will say about you?

I hope good and humble things.

  • Location and life experiences can really influence writing, tell us where you grew up and where you now live?

I grew up in Elche (Spain) and I moved to Basingstoke (UK) in 2008.

  • How did you develop your writing?

I guess I develop it by working on it, revising it later, sending to a friend for proofreading and providing critical points of view so I can check once more before I believe it’s fully completed.

  • What is hardest – getting published, writing or marketing?

Marketing is the hardest of all because it requires patience, money, time and high expectations put in all those three together to produce any sale.

  • What marketing works for you?

At the moment I’m marketing my books on Instagram and Facebook most of the time. I believe they are very strong and well-known apps that can help in reaching lots of people.

  • Do you find it hard to share your work?

I don’t find hard to share my work at all, as I like to have opinions that I can grow with as an author and become better on my next novel.

  • Is your family supportive? Do your friends support you?

From my family, the only person who is supporting me in sharing my books, by adding them in his WhatsApp story, is my father. In regards to friends, I get a very small number who either likes every single one of my posts, comment about the books that were read or helps me sharing my books on their Instagram stories.

  • What else do you do, other than write?

Apart from writing books, I write blogs, I read books, I work and I catch up with friends for coffee as often as we both can.

  • What other jobs have you had in your life?

Since I first had my first job, I’ve worked as a shoe-maker, bakery assistant, hairdresser, travel and medical assistant and more catering in general.

  • If you could study any subject at university what would you pick?

If I could study a subject at university, maybe I would pick journalism, or interpreting.

  • If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be?

If I could live anywhere in the world I would choose Japan, I loved it when I went there in 2018 and I’d love to be there and explore more of their culture.

  • Tell us about your family?

My family consists in two sisters, both younger than me, and my parents. Everyone still going strong and well, which I’m thankful for.

  • How do you write – lap top, pen, paper, in bed, at a desk?

I prefer to start my writing with pen and paper, as I can go through lots of drafting that way, and then I will transfer it all to my laptop.

  • How much sleep do you need to be your best?

The sleep I can take to be a person is 8 hours. I don’t tend to sleep more than that, only very rare occasions.

  • Is there anyone you’d like to acknowledge and thank for their support?

I think the best one to acknowledge right now is my husband, as he is the first person liking all what I post, and gives me the time and space to keep writing.

  • Every writer has their own idea of what a successful career in writing is, what does success in writing look like to you?

To me success in writing would be just to accomplish this dream and manage to be a retired old woman through this success, so I can read my stories to my descendants and support them in reaching a dream the same way I did or even better.

  • It is vital to get exposure and target the right readers for your writing, tell us about your marketing campaign?

I’ve never done a campaign before. I’m basically using Canva app nowadays to do pretty posts about my books so I can upload them into Instagram, Facebook and Wechat. I’ve also followed other authors out there and updating my bio with tags that refer to books and authors, so I can reach more viewers.

  • Tell us about your new book? Why did you write it? 

This book, Coco’s stories was written in 2022 and published in March 2023. The idea of writing this book was when I was living at a friend’s house and a housemate told me about her complicated background. At that time, there was also some nostalgia about my family’s dog, as he died when Covid started and also some transition from my father becoming retired. I decided to bring the dog back to life. One of my sisters wasn’t happy in me sharing all of our real lives into the novel. Instead, I captured a mix of personalities between that housemate and my family, so the story can be 90-95% real.