Hi friends! I’m posting another personal blog to help you get to know me a bit better.
I’m Trudie AKA Tru. I live in the North East of England but spent the first nineteen years of my life in Nottingham, the home of Robin Hood. After growing up on his tales and reading Tamora Pierce’s The Song of the Lioness quartet, I became obsessed with knights and castles. Nottingham has its own impressive castle, but the UK has many more. One of my favourites as a kid was Warwick Castle! Now that I live in the North East I’m surrounded by many beautiful castles such as Alnwick Castle and Bamburgh Castle.
I loved video games as a kid and went on to study computer games design at University which I have a degree in. The first console I ever played was the SEGA Master System. I begged my parents for a SEGA Mega Drive (Genesis in the US) and never looked back. I grew up on the SEGA side of the great console wars, but my love of video games meant that I owned 99% of most home consoles at one point or another, including a SEGA Mega CD and 32X and even an N-Gage mobile phone! My favourite console flips between the SEGA Saturn and Dreamcast, but of modern times I was quite fond of my Xbox 360 and I now love my Nintendo Switch. I mostly play PC gaming now because it means I can mod some of my favourite Bethesda RPG’s. I’m currently playing Fire Emblem: Three Houses on my Switch!
My two biggest addictions are Skyrim and Stardew Valley. I can’t wait for the Final Fantasy VII Remake though.
Obviously, I love reading and writing YA fantasy! Some of my favourite books include anything by Tamora Pierce, the Rebel of the Sands trilogy, the Throne of Glass series, the Eon duology, the An Ember in the Ashes series, and more recently We Hunt the Flame.
It was Tamora Pierce who inspired my writing, and I suspect she’s responsible for many author’s careers! I do spent most of my time these days writing Sand Dancer and its sequels, but I have many more ideas for fantasy stories that I hope start in the near future.
I’m not much of a TV or film buff, but my favourite Disney film is Aladdin! I enjoyed the live action film. Outside of Disney, I like fantasy, sci-fi, and adventure films, such as The Prince of Persia, Jupiter Ascending, Stardust, The Lord of the Rings, any Studio Ghibli, Guardians of the Galaxy, Blade Runner, etc. I like imaginative films set either in the future or in fantasy worlds. My favourite film is probably Mad Max: Fury Road.
In terms of music, I’m a massive Depeche Mode fan! I just can’t get enough – pun intended. I mostly listen to 80’s pop and synthpop. I love synthwave/retrowave-type electronic music, and I blame video games for my music tastes. I often listen to video game music when writing, and I’m a big fan of gaming music. I’ve been to quite a few game music concerts, including Final Fantasy’s Distant Worlds, the Zelda Symphony, and Video Games Live. I’ll actually be going to another one later this year for music from the Sonic Adventure games.
A few random facts about me:
- I’m short sighted and wear glasses all the time. I can’t see far without them.
- My favourite colour is either blue, green, or both together.
- I love nature and trees and clouds.
- My favourite food is a good Sunday Roast complete with gravy.
- I prefer Pepsi Max.
- Dark chocolate all the way!
- My favourite cake is Red Velvet.
- I’ve only visited a handful of countries in my lifetime: Cyprus, France, Italy, Switzerland, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
- Countries I’d love to visit: America, Canada, Australia, Germany, Norway, Morocco, Jordan, Lapland.
- I currently own three pets: a cat, a Jack Russell, and a Border Jack – a cross between a Jack Russell and a Border Collie.
- I’ve owned many other pets in my lifetime: goldfish, hamsters, guinea pigs, and degus. I’d love to own a bearded dragon next.
- Despite writing about deserts and fire magic, I’m not good with hot climates or weather! Give me the rain and snow!
- I work in IT admin now, but I have previously worked as a cleaner, a leaflet distributor, and a call centre agent.
- I write on a Windows Surface Book laptop with two extra monitors. I need those monitors, okay.
- I overuse emojis a lot. I can’t help it 😛
- I collect cute looking socks.
- I once shaved my head completely bald so I could cosplay as Dr Eggman at a Sonic the Hedgehog convention. If you want pics as proof, you need to buy my book first!
Here’s an older pic of me with some cake.
As you can probably tell, I’m a bit of a nerd. I’m always happy to talk about writing, YA fantasy, video games or random chatter with anyone! Feel free to drop me an email or a Tweet if you want to strike up a conversation.
