The MOON shines on Armenian Princess and author


Princess Sophie Audouin-Mamikonian is not your typical princess. In fact, she’s a prolific author who works hard to perfect her writing. Our own Olivia asks Her Royal Highness what it is like to be a princess with a new YA novel on the shelves, SPRING MOON! Check it out!


Spring Moon coverAmid the expansive plains of Montana, the Lykos Ranch stretches for miles. The inhabitants who live in near isolation from the outside world are members of the most powerful clan of werewolves in North America. Among them lives just one human: Indiana Teller.

Grandson of the clan’s leader and offspring of a werewolf father and a mysterious yet human mother, Indiana is rejected by his peers and heads to the University of Montana to find a normal life. Despite warnings from his grandparents, he falls in love with a beautiful human, Katerina.

Before too long, he is the victim of an accident that would have killed him had he not miraculously vanished at the moment of impact. Are these strange occurrences just chance or the machinations of a hidden enemy out to destroy him? Facing his destiny, Indiana will have to choose who to believe, and who to love.

 

 


Author Sophie Audouin-MamikonianOlivia with YA-Mag: Your Royal Highness Princess Sophie, welcome to the Young Adult Magazine!


YA: In the past, you wrote a series from the perspective of a young girl.  But this time, it is a young man who takes center stage.  How did you first meet Indiana Teller?  What makes him the perfect character to tell this story?

HRH Princess Sophie Audouin-Mamakonian: I created Indiana because of the Jungle Book. Kipling inspired me with Mowgli.

Mowgli is raised by the wolves, but is weak because he doesn’t have claws and jaws. He is defenseless to the other jungle animals. And his dream would be to become one of them: a panther, a wolf, a bear, even an elephant! Anything, but himself.

Finally, like all coming-of-age stories, Mowgli learns how to use his own human nature instead of trying to copy what he is not.

This is what I tried to describe with Indiana. Indiana is the heir of the werewolf pack but cannot turn.  From the first person perspective, it was easier to transmit this incredible frustration to the readers. One way or another, he will have to embrace his humanity.

But be honest, it was a bit hard for me to become a 17-year-old.  I had to study all my daughter’s friends in order to write the book.

Okay, Olivia, now… can you imagine how horrible it was for Diane and Marine to bring boys home and have a mother that immediately began to ask them, “Okay, boys, what do you like in girls? Their bottom? Their lips? Their eyes? And why? How many showers are you taking every day? How do you choose your clothes?”

A real nightmare for them!


Spring Moon quoteYA: Haha!  Hopefully they had a good sense of humor about it!  So, what would you say sets Indiana’s story apart from other YA werewolf novels, like SHIVER by Maggie Stiefvater or BLOOD AND CHOCOLATE by Annette Curtis Klause?  What will readers find that isn’t anywhere else?

HRH PS: I realized that most werewolves stories were always about the poor guy who is bitten and has to fight his wolf nature. I really wanted to be more original, as Indiana is not a werewolf has to train his human body in order to fight against his pack’s enemies.  But Indiana has some of his family’s abilities: his senses of smell and sight are better; he is faster and more resistant.

Also, he is very, very clever.  Like Harry Potter, Indiana is always using his brain much more than his power, simply because he is not confident in himself.

This story is completely new, because Indiana is in a unique position to observe the werewolf pack’s habits, inside and outside.

The university part is very small, because I was more interested about the fact that Tyler, Katerina and Indiana are in a love triangle. As the younger wolves are not into big industries, the three of them are all studying to work in banks and finance.

Reviewers who already read the book and talked about it always write that it is refreshing and new. This is exactly what I wanted it to be: different.

I have to apologize because, for me, Indiana is a big book, 2,000 pages that I split into 4 volumes. That makes the beginning of Indiana’s saga a bit slow.  I had to describe all the pack laws, the story of the wolves and the semi wolves, what the wolves’ venom is, and so on. But as soon as the villain tries to kill Indiana, it is quicker and quicker.  The second volume is furor and fire!


YA:  You are a fan of many fantasy writers and even DC Comics and Marvel Comics, especially X-Men whose moral questions are paid homage to in your Tara Duncan series.  What influences (films, shows, music, plays, etc) inspired Indiana’s story?

HRH PS: The Jungle book, of course, but also ‘An American Werewolf in London’ (the ghost is just a ton of fun).

Strangely, ‘Star Wars’. Luke is like Indiana: lost and trying to understand who he is really. And like Indiana, Luke lost his father.  If Indiana’s mother is still alive, she is locked into a mental hospital for the abnormal…

Indiana Jones. I love this character so much it’s why I named my main character Indiana.  The name of a dog for a non-werewolf seems very funny to me! And Harrison Ford is my God.  I would love to make an Indiana Teller movie with him as the leader of the Pack!


YA: When you were a teen, what were your favorite books (YA or otherwise)?  Now that you are an author for teenagers, what are your favorite contemporary YA novels?

HRH PS: T.H. White’s ‘The Sword in the Stone’. I still have it in my 12,000 volume library. This book is amazing. The best YA ever. I am very sad that the Disney animated movie couldn’t include the Chimera and the Knight and Robin Hood and all the monsters from the book. This is the book that brought me to fantasy, no doubt. Such an imagination seemed unbelievable for me as 13-year-old girl, stuck in my bed for three weeks after a surgery.

I am totally fascinated with Stephanie Meyer’s ‘Twilight’. In volume 2, during Bella’s nervous breakdown, nothing special happens for 260 pages. And still, I was hooked! Meyer is the best, bringing out little pieces of the puzzle slowly, slowly. I love her style very much.

 

YA: What is the story behind the title SPRING MOON?

HRH PS: For some strange reason, my editors, publishers, and agents never discussed my titles. They always loved them. They said that I have a kind of gift at finding proper titles. I think this is a remnant of my long ago advertising life, when I was working for a big agency.

Also, it is like evidence. It comes to me in a flash, in a split second.  As I was telling the story, Teller for his last name was logical. Indiana Teller was born! For ‘Spring Moon’, he is born in springtime and the moon, of course, is a sign of wolves. 


YA: SPRING MOON is the first of four books.  What can you tell our audience about things to come in the next book?

HRH PS: Vampires. Incredible, terrifying, cruel vampires. Very different, though, from Bram Stoker’s vampires. These vampires are lazy.  They don’t need so much blood.  (Come on, 6 liters of blood ? Seriously ? I eat one plate of soup and I’m full!  Same for the vampires. They don’t have crazy stomachs; they still have human bodies!)  These vampires don’t care at all about human beings, as much as we don’t care about our steak.

The werewolves will have to face the worst of their enemies, because the Lord Vampire is able to manipulate them. And they even don’t feel it. They are defenseless to his power! Indiana will have to sacrificed a lot in this volume.  Not only because he has to keep Katerina safe, but also to find his mother, Jessica Teller.

And one vampire girl, that we briefly met in ‘Spring Moon’, has a major role in volume 2, ‘Summer Moon’. With the beginning of a very, very hot love story between her and another character from the first volume.

Also, at the end of volume 2, something absolutely horrible will happen to Katerina. Something that hurts so much, so painful that the Indiana fans wrote to me to say that I am a total sadist! The end cliffhanger is terribly painful for fans.

And the love between Indiana and Katerina is complicated by Tyler. Who will win? Now, that’s the question. 


YA: Now you are not only an author, mother, and activist, you are also the heir to the throne of Armenia.  How do you balance the responsibilities of royal life with writing, publishing, and book tours?

HRH PS: LOL! This is an excellent question. Well, I’m not in charge of the kingdom anymore, as my Christian ancestors were fired out from the country by our Muslim invaders in the 19th century. Armenia is the first country in the world that took the Christian religion as state religion. It is also where Job had his vineyard and where Noah arrived with the ark.   My responsibility is more to help Armenia as much as I can, and yes, cut a rug from time to time and open inaugurations.  But I don’t have any political or other royal activity.

I can then concentrate on my real job: to be a lovely, tender, sweet wife and mother; and give love and laughs to my family and my millions of fans all over the world. They treat me like a queen more than a princess, which make me feel from time to time like Madonna when I see how incredible they are!

 

YA: What is the best part of being a real life princess?  What is the best part of being a best-selling author? 

HRH PS: Curiosity. It helps me to talk with a lot of people, because they are curious about me.  It’s great.  But it didn’t help me to be published.  I had to wait 17 years to be published, first with the Tara Duncan books and then Indiana Teller!

Traveling. I was in Korea for a week of conferences and signings. Then in America. I will travel to Mexico and then to Russia, then to China. I’ve traveled to 26 countries. It allows me to learn from so many cultures. It’s a great part of my job.

Love. When you are loved by millions, it is like a nonstop battery. It fuels you with energy and power. 

 

YA: It has been such a pleasure, Princess.  I have one last question for you!  If you could spend one holiday with Indiana and his love, Katerina, which would it be and what traditions would you keep?  What would you tell Indiana about his past and his future while you visited?

HRH PS: Thanksgiving, of course! Sharing with family and friends, preparing pies, sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes. Okay, I can imagine that, for werewolves, it would be more “rare and bleeding steaks and live turkeys”.  Anyway, it’s always truly about love and sharing. Isn’t it?

I would tell Indiana, about his past and his future, that as the famous Chinese general Sun Tzu said, “Know yourself and be confident. You are your best allies”!


YA: Thank you very much, Princess Sophie!  And again, from YA Mag, congratulations on SPRING MOON!  We look forward to hearing a lot more from you in years to come!

HRH PS:  Thank you very much for having me, Olivia.  You have many great and incredible authors in the USA.  I would be proud to be considered a favorite author there one day, hopefully 😉 Have a great and wonderful day!

~*~

Readers, be sure to check out HRH Princess Sophie Audouin-Mamikonian at Facebook.com/PrincessSophieHRH . Or follow her on Twitter @HRHPrincess_SAM.

SPRING MOON, published by Entangled Teen, is available to purchase online for your favorite ereader!

 

Olivia Hennis is a transplanted New England girl dropped by a tornado into the magical Land of Jersey.  For more info, follow her on Twitter.


the-moon-shines-on-armenian-princess-and-author

Princess Sophie Audouin-Mamikonian is not your typical princess. In fact, she’s a prolific author who works hard to perfect her writing. Our own Olivia asks Her Royal Highness what it is like to be a princess with a new YA novel on the shelves, SPRING MOON! Check it out!


Spring Moon coverAmid the expansive plains of Montana, the Lykos Ranch stretches for miles. The inhabitants who live in near isolation from the outside world are members of the most powerful clan of werewolves in North America. Among them lives just one human: Indiana Teller.

Grandson of the clan’s leader and offspring of a werewolf father and a mysterious yet human mother, Indiana is rejected by his peers and heads to the University of Montana to find a normal life. Despite warnings from his grandparents, he falls in love with a beautiful human, Katerina.

Before too long, he is the victim of an accident that would have killed him had he not miraculously vanished at the moment of impact. Are these strange occurrences just chance or the machinations of a hidden enemy out to destroy him? Facing his destiny, Indiana will have to choose who to believe, and who to love.

 

 


Author Sophie Audouin-MamikonianOlivia with YA-Mag: Your Royal Highness Princess Sophie, welcome to the Young Adult Magazine!


YA: In the past, you wrote a series from the perspective of a young girl.  But this time, it is a young man who takes center stage.  How did you first meet Indiana Teller?  What makes him the perfect character to tell this story?

HRH Princess Sophie Audouin-Mamakonian: I created Indiana because of the Jungle Book. Kipling inspired me with Mowgli.

Mowgli is raised by the wolves, but is weak because he doesn’t have claws and jaws. He is defenseless to the other jungle animals. And his dream would be to become one of them: a panther, a wolf, a bear, even an elephant! Anything, but himself.

Finally, like all coming-of-age stories, Mowgli learns how to use his own human nature instead of trying to copy what he is not.

This is what I tried to describe with Indiana. Indiana is the heir of the werewolf pack but cannot turn.  From the first person perspective, it was easier to transmit this incredible frustration to the readers. One way or another, he will have to embrace his humanity.

But be honest, it was a bit hard for me to become a 17-year-old.  I had to study all my daughter’s friends in order to write the book.

Okay, Olivia, now… can you imagine how horrible it was for Diane and Marine to bring boys home and have a mother that immediately began to ask them, “Okay, boys, what do you like in girls? Their bottom? Their lips? Their eyes? And why? How many showers are you taking every day? How do you choose your clothes?”

A real nightmare for them!


Spring Moon quoteYA: Haha!  Hopefully they had a good sense of humor about it!  So, what would you say sets Indiana’s story apart from other YA werewolf novels, like SHIVER by Maggie Stiefvater or BLOOD AND CHOCOLATE by Annette Curtis Klause?  What will readers find that isn’t anywhere else?

HRH PS: I realized that most werewolves stories were always about the poor guy who is bitten and has to fight his wolf nature. I really wanted to be more original, as Indiana is not a werewolf has to train his human body in order to fight against his pack’s enemies.  But Indiana has some of his family’s abilities: his senses of smell and sight are better; he is faster and more resistant.

Also, he is very, very clever.  Like Harry Potter, Indiana is always using his brain much more than his power, simply because he is not confident in himself.

This story is completely new, because Indiana is in a unique position to observe the werewolf pack’s habits, inside and outside.

The university part is very small, because I was more interested about the fact that Tyler, Katerina and Indiana are in a love triangle. As the younger wolves are not into big industries, the three of them are all studying to work in banks and finance.

Reviewers who already read the book and talked about it always write that it is refreshing and new. This is exactly what I wanted it to be: different.

I have to apologize because, for me, Indiana is a big book, 2,000 pages that I split into 4 volumes. That makes the beginning of Indiana’s saga a bit slow.  I had to describe all the pack laws, the story of the wolves and the semi wolves, what the wolves’ venom is, and so on. But as soon as the villain tries to kill Indiana, it is quicker and quicker.  The second volume is furor and fire!


YA:  You are a fan of many fantasy writers and even DC Comics and Marvel Comics, especially X-Men whose moral questions are paid homage to in your Tara Duncan series.  What influences (films, shows, music, plays, etc) inspired Indiana’s story?

HRH PS: The Jungle book, of course, but also ‘An American Werewolf in London’ (the ghost is just a ton of fun).

Strangely, ‘Star Wars’. Luke is like Indiana: lost and trying to understand who he is really. And like Indiana, Luke lost his father.  If Indiana’s mother is still alive, she is locked into a mental hospital for the abnormal…

Indiana Jones. I love this character so much it’s why I named my main character Indiana.  The name of a dog for a non-werewolf seems very funny to me! And Harrison Ford is my God.  I would love to make an Indiana Teller movie with him as the leader of the Pack!


YA: When you were a teen, what were your favorite books (YA or otherwise)?  Now that you are an author for teenagers, what are your favorite contemporary YA novels?

HRH PS: T.H. White’s ‘The Sword in the Stone’. I still have it in my 12,000 volume library. This book is amazing. The best YA ever. I am very sad that the Disney animated movie couldn’t include the Chimera and the Knight and Robin Hood and all the monsters from the book. This is the book that brought me to fantasy, no doubt. Such an imagination seemed unbelievable for me as 13-year-old girl, stuck in my bed for three weeks after a surgery.

I am totally fascinated with Stephanie Meyer’s ‘Twilight’. In volume 2, during Bella’s nervous breakdown, nothing special happens for 260 pages. And still, I was hooked! Meyer is the best, bringing out little pieces of the puzzle slowly, slowly. I love her style very much.

 

YA: What is the story behind the title SPRING MOON?

HRH PS: For some strange reason, my editors, publishers, and agents never discussed my titles. They always loved them. They said that I have a kind of gift at finding proper titles. I think this is a remnant of my long ago advertising life, when I was working for a big agency.

Also, it is like evidence. It comes to me in a flash, in a split second.  As I was telling the story, Teller for his last name was logical. Indiana Teller was born! For ‘Spring Moon’, he is born in springtime and the moon, of course, is a sign of wolves. 


YA: SPRING MOON is the first of four books.  What can you tell our audience about things to come in the next book?

HRH PS: Vampires. Incredible, terrifying, cruel vampires. Very different, though, from Bram Stoker’s vampires. These vampires are lazy.  They don’t need so much blood.  (Come on, 6 liters of blood ? Seriously ? I eat one plate of soup and I’m full!  Same for the vampires. They don’t have crazy stomachs; they still have human bodies!)  These vampires don’t care at all about human beings, as much as we don’t care about our steak.

The werewolves will have to face the worst of their enemies, because the Lord Vampire is able to manipulate them. And they even don’t feel it. They are defenseless to his power! Indiana will have to sacrificed a lot in this volume.  Not only because he has to keep Katerina safe, but also to find his mother, Jessica Teller.

And one vampire girl, that we briefly met in ‘Spring Moon’, has a major role in volume 2, ‘Summer Moon’. With the beginning of a very, very hot love story between her and another character from the first volume.

Also, at the end of volume 2, something absolutely horrible will happen to Katerina. Something that hurts so much, so painful that the Indiana fans wrote to me to say that I am a total sadist! The end cliffhanger is terribly painful for fans.

And the love between Indiana and Katerina is complicated by Tyler. Who will win? Now, that’s the question. 


YA: Now you are not only an author, mother, and activist, you are also the heir to the throne of Armenia.  How do you balance the responsibilities of royal life with writing, publishing, and book tours?

HRH PS: LOL! This is an excellent question. Well, I’m not in charge of the kingdom anymore, as my Christian ancestors were fired out from the country by our Muslim invaders in the 19th century. Armenia is the first country in the world that took the Christian religion as state religion. It is also where Job had his vineyard and where Noah arrived with the ark.   My responsibility is more to help Armenia as much as I can, and yes, cut a rug from time to time and open inaugurations.  But I don’t have any political or other royal activity.

I can then concentrate on my real job: to be a lovely, tender, sweet wife and mother; and give love and laughs to my family and my millions of fans all over the world. They treat me like a queen more than a princess, which make me feel from time to time like Madonna when I see how incredible they are!

 

YA: What is the best part of being a real life princess?  What is the best part of being a best-selling author? 

HRH PS: Curiosity. It helps me to talk with a lot of people, because they are curious about me.  It’s great.  But it didn’t help me to be published.  I had to wait 17 years to be published, first with the Tara Duncan books and then Indiana Teller!

Traveling. I was in Korea for a week of conferences and signings. Then in America. I will travel to Mexico and then to Russia, then to China. I’ve traveled to 26 countries. It allows me to learn from so many cultures. It’s a great part of my job.

Love. When you are loved by millions, it is like a nonstop battery. It fuels you with energy and power. 

 

YA: It has been such a pleasure, Princess.  I have one last question for you!  If you could spend one holiday with Indiana and his love, Katerina, which would it be and what traditions would you keep?  What would you tell Indiana about his past and his future while you visited?

HRH PS: Thanksgiving, of course! Sharing with family and friends, preparing pies, sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes. Okay, I can imagine that, for werewolves, it would be more “rare and bleeding steaks and live turkeys”.  Anyway, it’s always truly about love and sharing. Isn’t it?

I would tell Indiana, about his past and his future, that as the famous Chinese general Sun Tzu said, “Know yourself and be confident. You are your best allies”!


YA: Thank you very much, Princess Sophie!  And again, from YA Mag, congratulations on SPRING MOON!  We look forward to hearing a lot more from you in years to come!

HRH PS:  Thank you very much for having me, Olivia.  You have many great and incredible authors in the USA.  I would be proud to be considered a favorite author there one day, hopefully 😉 Have a great and wonderful day!

~*~

Readers, be sure to check out HRH Princess Sophie Audouin-Mamikonian at Facebook.com/PrincessSophieHRH . Or follow her on Twitter @HRHPrincess_SAM.

SPRING MOON, published by Entangled Teen, is available to purchase online for your favorite ereader!

 

Olivia Hennis is a transplanted New England girl dropped by a tornado into the magical Land of Jersey.  For more info, follow her on Twitter.