Dead Beautiful Blog Tour: Video and QnA

As some of you guys know who follow us on twitter, we have been filming some scenes from Dead Beautiful by Yvonne Woon and well here is the final product. If you haven't read the book yet maybe this will make you want to! ENJOY! please lead feedback! we hope to do another scene soon from another awesome book. Also check out the QnA we had with Yvonne at the bottom :)




 How did you come up with the (story, angle, idea)

I came up with the story in different parts. I thought of the lore behind it when I was reading a Descartes book for one of my graduate classes. It got my mind thinking, and Dante and Renée came from that. I went to a New England prep school for high school, and Gottfried Academy was inspired by those experiences. The Latin came to me in the university library. I was doing research for one of my classes, and looked up to see a huge Latin phrase engraved over the door. After that, everything sort of fit together.


What is your favourite scene/scenes in Dead Beautiful?


Hmm, that’s hard. I think the scene I had the most fun writing was the séance, and the Dante and Renée chalkboard scene that followed. I also really enjoyed writing the winter break chapter. It was nice to take a break from Gottfried and explore a different setting—kind of like taking a break to catch my breath.


 When naming your characters, do you give any thought to the actual meaning?


I did. I think a lot about etymologies, and because Dead Beautiful is in some ways a book about ancient languages, I knew that the names had to be specific. I came up with the names Renée and Dante before writing the book, though the rest of the names were made up on the way (or borrowed from my friends and former teachers!).


The ending of the book was amazing, not at all expected. Do you surprise yourself sometimes when you come up with twists and jaw dropping scenes like that?


Thanks! The ending surprised me, too. I actually wrote several endings, none of which really worked or did justice to the rest of the story. The current ending eventually came to me after weeks of brooding, and then I spent a few more weeks tweaking it, including a few elements from previous endings as twists.


Can you give us any clues as to what is going to happen in Life Eternal?


It picks up Renée and Dante’s story, though with a few complicating characters. All I can divulge for now is that it involves a lot of French. And trekking through snowy climes.