2015 Debut Authors Bash : Elaine Dimopoulos

 

Material Girls By Elaine Dimopoulous is reviewed here @ http://thephantomparagrapher.blogspot.co.nz/2015/03/review-material-girls-elaine-dimopoulos.html and Rated 4P's .



Guest Post Topic for MATERIAL GIRLS by Elaine Dimopoulos:


What prompted you to write a Fashion focused Dystopian ? What was your favourite part during the writing process ?



First off, thank you for hosting me! I’m thrilled to be stopping by The Phantom Paragrapher. Material Girls indeed explores the darker side of fashion and pop culture. It is set in an alternate present, where companies hire young teenagers to set trends and then effectively fire the kids once they get too old. It is intended to be a world that resembles our own in uncomfortable ways.



First off, Material Girls is a personal story. I tried hard to be in style in my 20’s and kept reading fashion magazines, only to find that a pair of shoes or a jacket I enjoyed wearing was “out” that season! I began asking questions about how much clothing is manufactured to meet the demands of such rapidly changing trends and what happens to the clothes after we discard them. The research these questions prompted shaped the novel.



Material Girls also explores our world’s obsession with youth and fame. I came of age at the same time as the Brittany Spears/Justin Timberlake/Christina Aguilera generation of pop stars, who all vaulted to stardom after their success on The New Mickey Mouse Club. I wondered what it would be like to be revered at sixteen and have the media then turn on you and laugh every time you stumbled in your personal life, gained weight, etc. I wanted to create a character who is on the cusp of losing it all, who clings desperately to her glory. Hence, the novel alternates perspectives between Marla Klein, a fashionista working for a design house, and Ivy Wilde, a child star turned pop star, who is on the verge of being ousted by a younger version of herself.



My favorite part of the writing process? Well, there was my trip to the Grammy Awards to do some important “research” for the novel! That was fun. I also liked ripping pages out of fashion magazines and tacking them up in my office for inspiration. With the exception of the “torture trend” in Material Girls, where I took some liberties, every other trend is inspired by actual high fashion.



Thanks again for hosting me! Hope you enjoy the novel!







Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Punk 57 - Penelope Douglas

Review: Steel Princess - Rina Kent

Review: Dr. Strange Beard - Penny Reid