Alisa asked Marissa Meyer:

My daughter is in school right now, but she asked me to send this on her behalf: I'm reading Cress right now and I loved Cinder and Scarlet! Your writing is amazing! I love writing sci-fi and I want to be an author. I was wondering...how do you tie up your stories and talk about the past and have so many secrets, with it still being so interesting?

Marissa Meyer This is a great question! I spend A TON of time rearranging my plots, moving scenes and subplots around, and trying to maintain a balance of characters throughout each book. I try to balance action with reaction scenes, too, so that if you have one "dull" scene where you're giving the reader lots of new information, then I want the next scene to be more exciting and suspenseful. Or if you have to convey a lot of backstory or resolve some mysteries, try to do it in an interesting way.

SCARLET SPOILERS: For example, I could have had Cinder learn a lot more about her history and cyborg surgeries from Dr. Erland, but instead I decided to have her discover that information on her own when she stumbles across the underground lair where she was kept by Scarlet's grandmother. It was a much more interesting and visual way to uncover that information - for Cinder, and for the reader. (at least, I hope so, ha!)

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