A minute with Erato Ioannou Writer, author of short story collection Not In The Ornamental Teapot

Where do you live?
I live in Nicosia in a ‘Bermuda triangle’ kind of home with my husband, our twelve-year-old son, our ten-year-old daughter, and four cats who appear to tolerate us most of the time.

Best childhood memory?
Sneaking into dad’s car to go to work with him. By the way… Dad was working in a confectionery!

What did you have for breakfast?
Coffee and then another coffee.

Describe your perfect day
Blazing sun, clear blue seawater, family and good friends, nibbles, and a lemon margarita with crushed ice please!

Best book ever read?
Since you have me cornered I would have to say The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison for everything in it and especially this line by Claudia: “So when I think of autumn, I think of somebody with hands who does not want me to die.” I’m so sorry Other Books. This doesn’t mean I love you any less.

What music are you listening to in the car at the moment?
I don’t get to choose anymore. I have a twelve-year-old in the passenger seat.

What is always in your fridge?
Milk

What are you most proud of?
My family

What movie scene has really stayed with you?
The scene with Lisa (Angelina Jolie) ‘playing the villain’ in Girl Interrupted. “I’m free! I’m free. You don’t know what freedom is!”

If you could pick anyone at all (alive or dead) to go out with for the evening, who would it be?
Would I be cheating if I picked Gertrude Stein? Because at her place you’re wining and dining with Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henri Matisse, and the rest of the gang.

If you could time travel where would you go?
Paris in the 1920s

What would you say to your 18-year-old self?
Don’t rush

What is your greatest fear?
What I fear the most I can’t put in words. That’s how much I fear it.

What’s your spirit animal?
A cat. Definitely a cat. You ask why? Cats have it all. (Cats Have it All is the title of Erato’s first short story collection (Armida, 2004))

Name the one thing that would stop you dating someone
Ego

If the world were ending in 24 hours what would you do?
I wouldn’t worry. There’s always a parallel one.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.