At 33 years old, Venezuelan Ariana Godoy (1990) is one of the five most widely read writers from the Wattpad platform in the world. The version of her books on paper accumulate a whopping million copies sold, but if we go to the figures that move on the internet, it is best to sit down: My love from Wattpad (Planet), was the story that launched her to digital stardom when she was a university student, but her most widely read book, Through My Window, currently has 373 million readings on the platform that launched her to fame. Netflix has also boosted the popularity of this former teacher, releasing a successful version of said book starring Clara Galle and Julio Peña, which will have a second part on June 23.
Settled in Raleigh, North Carolina (USA) since 2016, this is the first time that Ariana Godoy has visited Spain, and she does so in connection with her new saga, Lost Souls, where she makes vampires fashionable again , some beings for whom she feels fascinated. In fact, with her she closes a circle and reconnects with the 19-year-old girl who entered Wattpad for the first time under the name ColdLady19 to write her first novel, precisely with a vampire theme. "It was my first story and I'm very fond of it. It even won a Watty and everything, but I took it off the platform because it was written, ohh my god!" She exclaims, putting her hands on her head.
Back with the vampires, then.
Yes, because vampires are related to my start with Wattpad, when I was 19 years old. I had finished all of Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles, I read the entire Twilight saga... and I said to myself: now where do I get more? And then, looking for free vampire stories on the internet, I found Wattpad. I went in and started reading all these stories that were written by regular people, in the sense that they weren't established writers. And I said to myself: I can too. And I uploaded my first story. It was a boom (11 million readings), because vampires were trending at the time.
What was it called?
I don't even want to remember (she puts her hands on her face and smiles).
Well, let's talk about current vampires. The Lost Souls saga started with The Revelation, where we find Morgan, a supernatural and powerful being, who knows nothing of his mission on earth, and now continues with The New World. Also, he says it's his favorite saga.
I actually wrote this story in English in 2012. It was one of the first and I feel that right now I am closing the circle with the rewriting into Spanish and its publication on paper. It is also my husband's favorite: the species that appears there seems very original to him, the purifiers, that idea that the world needs purification from time to time.
Obviously there is a lot of blood in this series, but also a lot of violence.
I am very multifaceted, I work in different genres, I don't think anyone ever told me 'hey, in this genre you can't write; if you are romantic you have to stay romantic'. So I've gone for all genres, even for terror, I'm all over the place. With this new novel, readers are going to think: let's see what we come up with now. I have several genres that I really like, but somehow I'm fascinated by the darker ones.
Is there then a dark part in your personality?
Yes, I think we all have a dark side that sometimes we like to reflect in the things we do. I do it in books, a healthy way to do it, huh?
The Darks saga started with the presentation of Fleur Dupont in a psychiatric hospital and without memory. Now, in Lost Souls, the protagonist, Morgan, also remembers nothing of her past. Is it just coincidence?
The subject of memory seems very interesting to me and the brain seems to me to be a spectacular thing, with that capacity to block traumas, to not remember for pure survival. I feel fascinated by the study of the brain and I end up reflecting it in my characters. In addition, for the flow of the novel it helped me a lot.
In Darks, the father raped his daughter, and in this one the father abuses Morgan for the first 18 years. Another coincidence?
That has a lot to do with my experience in life, because one as a writer leaves bits of his own. My dad passed away ten years ago and I loved him very much. It was very painful and I went through a lot of things that I ended up reflecting on Follow my voice. That loss created in me an aversion to creating dads or making them bad so I wouldn't have to miss mine. A good father figure like my dad meant remembering him when writing and reliving all that pain of loss that took me a long time to overcome. So what did I do? The father, or he is absent, or he is bad. No similarity of the affection and love that mine gave me.
All his works revolve around a powerful romance, but in them he deals with important issues such as mental illness, sexual abuse of minors, filicide, even sects...
The things that I find very interesting are the ones that I investigate the most and end up being a reflection of my stories. For example, I really like Morgan as a character because despite all the bad things that happen to her, she's still a good person. That is what I sometimes try to reflect with the characters who go through such hard and strong things, with hard pasts that could justify their behavior, but it does not mean that other people deserve bad treatment because you have gone through things powerful.
In which book do you think she has left more of herself?
In Follow my voice, because it tells the story of Clara, a girl on her journey to recover her mental health. There I left everything I had inside. Because most of the things that Clara lived through, with the exception of cancer, I lived through. It is almost an autobiography, but without being. I also went through the same anxiety disorder, agoraphobia, panic attacks, medication... There are even many pages that are literal conversations that I had with my psychologist.
What remains of that girl who started writing on Wattpad?
There is still the fangirl. The one who likes to fangirl about everything. I still get very emotional. I walk around like a little girl and I still reread my books. I reread this saga a lot, especially the second one. I think I'm my number one fan.
My Wattpad love was your first big hit. Now, with his experience, would you change anything about him?
I would rewrite it from scratch.
And so?
Obviously, the writing style is very basic, because I was just starting out and I was like, "...and I went out and brushed my hair." I mean, it was very routine. He didn't describe the places where the characters were, they just arrived, that's it; he wouldn't say if they were in a house or something. And well, people also sometimes had attitudes that now I see and say: what are you doing? No. But hey, it's already written and I hope that with the second part I can take advantage of it and put a little more hand into editing.
Keep writing on Wattpad. How do you handle the feedback with the readers?
I try to see where the comment comes from: if it is with good intentions, to make you grow to point out something that is wrong, that you ate something or anything, obviously I receive it with an open door. Sometimes I write down some things from discussions that the readers have with each other, because I can see different perspectives than mine. Obviously I have the story, I know what is going to happen, but sometimes they help you improve some aspect that is not clear. I tell them: you have all the confidence in the world to tell me anything, any mistake, anything you notice that can help me improve. Now, he was the one who comes to say your book is crap, or insults, or hate comments, I try to ignore those. Although sometimes it is difficult not to affect you.
When did you really realize how successful you were on Wattpad?
I think it was when I returned to visit Venezuela, to Campolara, my town, in 2018. I went to work as a teacher in the United States in 2015 and I returned to a quinceañera party in 2018. I was eating and I saw a small group of girls he looked at me and laughed. I thought, what's wrong with them? will it be that I know them? Then one of the girls approached me to ask if I was Ariadna Godoy and that she loved my books. Then one girl after another began to come, to take pictures with me and I thought, could it be that there are really so many people following me? Because one sees the numbers and they are cold, isolated. But those girls who recognized me made me think that something was up.
