10 Things you may not know about Maggie Stiefvater

When I love an author, I want to know all about them. I tend to read all the back-matter in their novels, scour the internet for interviews and go back far too many years on their blogs. I’ve found some really interesting things out about some of my favourite authors and I thought I’d share them here.

First up is Maggie Stiefvater, author of the bestselling YA series The Wolves of Mercy Falls and The Raven Cycle (my current obsession). 

Here are a few things you may not know about her!

1. 1. Maggie Stiefvater was born Heidi Hummel. She legally changed her name from Heidi to Margaret at age 16.

       

   2. Stiefvater suffers from Addison’s disease, which is a rare condition that causes extreme fatigue, weakness, confusion and delirium if left untreated.
      
      Stiefvater wrote in a blog post that the years she went undiagnosed, while she was writing The Raven King, Crooked Saints and Call Down the Hawk, felt like she was under a fairytale curse. “This isn’t really how medicine should work, it’s how magic should work, and yet, this is what happened: They gave me replacement cortisol, and in thirty minutes, the world was in color.”
      
      Her dedication in her recent novel, Call Down the Hawk, is, “To the magicians who woke me from my thousand-year sleep.” which is a reference to this experience.

       

   3. Stiefvater once pirated her own book to prove a point to her publishers about how piracy was impacting her sales. With the help of her brother, she uploaded fake copies of The Raven King to all the pirate sites they could find. “The effects were instant. The forums and sites exploded with bewildered activity. Fans asked if anyone had managed to find a link to a legit pdf. Dozens of posts appeared saying that since they hadn’t been able to find a pdf, they’d been forced to hit up Amazon and buy the book. And we sold out of the first printing in two days,” she said.

       

   4. If you’ve listened to an audiobook of any of Stiefvater’s novels, you’ve likely heard her musical talent. She writes the intro and outro music for all of them. She plays multiple instruments and you can find her music on SoundCloud.

       

   5. In a Reddit AMA, Stiefvater revealed that as a navy brat she moved a lot as a kid. One of the places she lived was a haunted house. “In the way of many beautiful things, the house was lovely but demonic, and I spent a lot of time outside where the demon wasn’t.”

       

   6. Stiefvater spray painted her car with a giant knife to match one featured in her novel, The Dream Thieves.

      

      The custom number plate also matches the car in the novel.

   7. On the topic of that car, she said on Reddit that she went to see it because she was writing about a similar car. “The first time I sat in an Evo was because I was trying to get in the mindset of Kavinsky, and then I bought it, because the Evo and I were M.F.E.O. (made for each other).”

       

   8. Before becoming a full time author, Stiefvater was a car journalist and portrait artist.

       

   9. Stiefvater started writing The Raven Cycle by hand when she was nineteen. Among other changes, Ronan was named Sean and Gansey was an actual old man.
      
      

      

   10. Steifvater attended Catholic school until 6th grade when she switched to homeschool. “I was a good student apart from punching people,” she said. 

    Bonus inspirational quote: “One truly never learns how to write novels. Just the novel one is currently writing.” – Maggie Stiefvater.or