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It was supposed to be River’s eleventh birthday. It turns out to be nothing but a nightmare.
When River finds herself imprisoned in a strange house, belonging to a mysterious man called Uncle, she only knows one thing: She must escape. But every power in the house, it seems, is bent on keeping her within its twisted walls. The creatures that patrol the halls may be deadly, and River may have nothing but her wit and her will, but, with the help of several unlikely allies, she just might be able to make her way out of the house before she becomes nothing more than a mindless prisoner.
Today I am very excited to be hosting the last stop of Aria’s The Tangle blog tour!
If you haven’t seen Kyle Robert Shultz’s author interview, S.M. Metzler’s book review, or Hannah Heath’s review, check them out now! Trust me, it’s worth your time.
After the interview, continue reading for awesome some music goodies!
I write mostly fantasy, so I really wanted to try writing a different genre, and you can’t get much different that paranormal suspense! I also wanted to try my hand at scaring people with my writing, so this story gave me an awesome opportunity to do that. At one point, I was really into watching playthroughs of creepy games (I have since stopped this, because nightmares) and those have probably got something to do with the book’s creepy aesthetic.
The Tangle was originally written as a serial novel for the serialized fiction site Channillo.com. I’m greatly indebted to the founder of Channillo, because without her invitation to write a serial for them I would never have written this book!
I’m guessing that by this question you mean, “what keeps you from getting any writing done?” and I’m glad you asked, because I have a whole laundry list of procrastination tactics that I apply to my writing life each and every day!
All joking aside, social media is a huge time suck for me. I will refresh Twitter hundreds of times just to keep from putting down another sentence.
Write a lot, even if it sucks. Everyone has to start somewhere and with every bad sentence or first draft you write you are learning what doesn’t work, and working your way towards figuring out what does. I would also like to remind all writers that first drafts usually really suck, and that that’s fine. Always remember: you can’t edit a blank page. Even if you have a bad first draft, you at least have something to work from and refine, and you have all your thoughts and ideas down on paper, just waiting to be made into something beautiful.
I’m certainly sure that I’ve cried over a book at least once, but I probably couldn’t tell you exactly what book or when! Books do tend to make me emotional, especially if they’re sad, but usually I don’t physically cry about them.
Ahh, this question is so hard! I’m not entirely 100 percent certain about my choice, but I think I’d have to go with Emily Starr from the Emily of New Moon trilogy by L. M. Montgomery. She reminds me so much of myself, and I can totally identify with her struggles as a young writer.
I usually write in my room, sitting on my bed with my laptop, but I love writing downstairs in the big comfy armchair in my living room.
I always have to have an ending and a specific beginning scene in mind before I start writing a new project. If I don’t know exactly where the story begins, and how it ends, then there’s no way I can start writing it. I don’t usually outline much more than that, though. I like to leave plenty of room for the story to change as I write.
I’m going to be super brutal and say social media, because I honestly would get a lot more done in a day if I wasn’t able to check Twitter every five minutes. But, obviously I’m not actually going to give up my social media, because… social media.
As a writer, what would you choose as your mascot/avatar/spirit animal?
I would probably have to pick a cat. I love cats, and I couldn’t think of a better spirit animal!
Criteria for answers:
One fictional character from your book
One fictional character from any other book
One famous person that is not a family member or friend.
Oh, shoot, a desert island question! I’m so bad at these. Hm… let me think… I would probably be trying to escape the desert island (because as far as I know most desert islands don’t have WiFi) so I’d probably need some smart or magical characters to help me…
From my book, I think I’d take the character Flint. He’s snarky, very smart, and also a shapeshifter, so he’s probably come in handy for escaping the deserted island.
The other fictional character I’d take would be Glory from The Outlaws of Time series by N. D. Wilson. She can travel through time and space, so that would be really helpful for escaping the island.
A famous person? I don’t know! I guess I’ll say N. D. Wilson, because he’s my favorite author and if we did end up stuck on this hypothetical desert island, we could at least have lots of conversations about writing…
As you may or may not know, I love music and am so glad that Aria included a playlist for The Tangle on her blog. Here are a couple of my favorite songs from her list.
Don’t forget to check out The Tangle on Amazon and keep up with Aria on her social media accounts!
Website: https://ariaemaher.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ariaemaher/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ariaemaher
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ariaemaher/
Aria’s first book, Behind Her Mask was Death: http://amzn.to/2ypPFps
The Tangle: http://amzn.to/2ieckzs
Aria E. Maher has been writing for almost her entire life. Her first real, honest-to-goodness book, a mystery/fantasy entitled Behind Her Mask was Death, was published in October, 2016.
Aria lives and works full time in her room, doing horrendously difficult math, learning a dead language, and voraciously reading everything from The Selection to The Count of Monte Cristo. She also works part time keeping small children from killing themselves on gym equipment. The Tangle is her second book, her first full length novel, and the first time she has ever been made slightly scared by something she wrote herself.
Brianna Merritt 
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