Anna Mattaar developed her writing skills as a teenager on writers’ forums and organised writing competitions and other activities through her own forum ‘Het Leesbeest’. She studied ‘something to do with games and theatre’, but the written word was never far from her mind, so she took what she learned from the other types of storytelling back to her writing. Since 2021 she has been active under the name of Fictera Writers’ Coaching, helping other writers find their own unique writing process and make their stories on the page match the vision inside their heads. She does this by means of articles on writing, personal coaching and giving feedback on stories.
In 2015 a story by her appeared in the English-language collection In Memory: A Tribute to Sir Terry Pratchett, and in 2022 her story Rot(s)profetie was given an honourable mention in a Fantasize competition. However, she spends most of her energy as a writer on the stories and novels set in the country Mennistriam. The novella Winterwaker, which appeared in the collection Werelden ontwaken in late 2022, was the first of these to be published.
Anna’s stories are characterised by immersive world building and a focus on the personal struggles of characters who often don’t fit in the existing patterns. She loves to talk about such topics as how to structure a thrilling story, character development, and all kinds of writing techniques to take your readers on the best possible trip through your imagination.