Thirty Grains of Love is an emotionally rich novel weaving romance, family secrets, and historical fiction as an artist’s investment in a Bulgarian seaside villa draws her into a complex family history that reshapes her present. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

The inspiration came in multiple layers. First, I wrote one page of an idyllic picture at the seaside. Then, the outline of four couples, eight friends, trying to recreate their youth, emerged. Only then, when I started thinking about their midlife challenges and the difficult route to authenticity, did I see how artistic—or sometimes any—ambition often clashes with financial uncertainty, family obligations, and the complicated realities of love. The beautiful Bulgarian seaside is where I spent my childhood summers, and the palace is real. I am fascinated by how different generations experience dramatic political change, but above all, I am interested in what it was like to be a woman throughout history. So, I wanted to tell a story with a dual timeline that asks: a hundred years after Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield, have all their dreams been fulfilled? Is finding true love and pursuing one’s calling getting any easier?

Then, since personal relationships are complex in the modern world, I wondered whether I could depict both the male and female points of view. The story is set against the backdrop of history and generational echoes of secrecy and social limitations, but also of today, when we have the freedom of choice—exploring the price of happiness across four marriage models: trad wife, double career, open relationship, and unequal income.

Did you find yourself identifying with Isabella’s creative ambitions or personal struggles?

As a working mom in the corporate world who buried my dreams of writing for a while to provide for my daughters, I related to Isabella’s struggle to protect her family’s legacy while reconsidering the life she has built and the choices that shape personal freedom. This is even more prominent in her best friend’s story, Nina, and her creative journey as a writer, showing what it is like to be with a husband who is not your soulmate, and what a difference it makes if you meet one. Then there is also Isabella’s inner struggle between pursuing her creative ideas and the temptation to copy her art for quick cash, which would help her in the short term. 

Were there particular challenges in connecting the historical and contemporary storylines?

The greatest challenge was how to compare the dilemmas of women in 1922, the 1950s, and the present day while also connecting them into a coherent storyline. In this context, the Art Nouveau villa became more than a setting; it was a meeting point for generations of secrets, personal histories, and decisions whose consequences reached far beyond the people who first made them. I also realized that multiple narrators were particularly suited to a story where love, guilt, and loyalty can look very different depending on whose experience we are following.

If readers take one central message from the novel, what would you hope it might be? 

Sometimes, the life that we fight to save is what prevents us from becoming free. And sometimes, if it’s worth saving, we may not see it. The best compass is what we need to embrace our true selves.

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