One Question Interviews

Karen Brichoux, Author of The Girl She Left Behind

2005-07-15T04:05:23Z

Question:
It has been written that good art springs only from bad life, that what makes a great writer is an unhappy childhood, or that excessive drinking (and perhaps other addictions) is "the writer's vice." Having read your short bio online, I'm inclined to believe that you are a healthy, happy individual. What are your thoughts on the notion that writers should have led or continue to live tragic lives in order to create?

Answer:
I’d have to agree with you on the “healthy, happy individual” part. I don’t even have any interesting vices or eccentricities. On the whole, I’m a very dull individual who will never have a television miniseries or movie made about her life. Tortured artists are much more interesting at the box office, I’ll admit, but the question that always comes to my mind is: “How much more, how much better, would this artist have been if he (or she) wasn’t, say, drinking himself to distraction?” Imagine if Hemingway’s novels had continued to have the depth and beauty of his early work. Or the additional paintings Van Gogh might have made without the demons in his head.

I think in most cases depression or “vices” tend to detract from an artist’s potential. Is there a correlation between sensitivity, imagination, and emotional distress? It’s possible. But unless the artist is actively engaging in, as Matt Groening put it, “sitting in my cubbyhole, waiting, waiting” (i.e., deliberate cultivation of depression, bitterness, and “artistic temperament”), I can’t imagine that any tortured human being would want to continue the torture if he or she knew how to stop it or could find the will/way to overcome an addiction. (Well, unless the artist in question is a teenager. It’s required that teenagers revel in misery as part of the rite of passage. I have any number of stories about death, suicide, and general misery that I wrote in my high school days.)

Obviously, I’m prejudiced, but I think what makes great writers is not the torture within their soul, but their ability to see the people, places, and social tensions that surround them. Van Gogh’s paintings are his attempts to show on canvas how sunlight and starlight feel. A writer tries to put into words how life feels. And if the writer is too caught up in her own drama to appreciate and discover the drama in a character's life, she will never be able to adequately convey emotion, interaction, and the natural beauty of the surrounding world to her readers. I have read any number of what I call “pretentious” books that tell me more about the author than the characters in his or her story. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy these books, just that I don’t think they achieve their full potential.

One of the most profound pieces of advice I’ve received is: “Honesty is never cliche.” It’s an incredibly freeing piece of advice as it doesn’t ask you to follow the hottest trend or to write in a particular style or even to cultivate an unhappy life to aid your inspiration. Instead it asks you to look inside yourself and find what it is that you have to tell other people. Each one of us has a unique vision of the world and a large part of what makes art so wonderful is when your unique vision touches someone else’s and you truly understand each other. But if we are all trying to create art following a particular pattern--be it alcoholism or just writing to the market--we will only have a superficial understanding of the other humans beside us on the path of life.

I’d better stop before I wax philosophical!

The daughter of American missionaries, Karen Brichoux grew up in the Philippines, but now calls the Midwestern United States home. After receiving a Master’s degree in European history, she began writing fiction full time. Karen is the author of The Girl She Left Behind, and the previously released Coffee & Kung Fu and Separation Anxiety. She lives with her spouse, three cats, and a large, middle-aged dog who thinks he is a puppy.

Gayle Trent, Author and Founder of Grace Abraham Publishing

2005-04-14T02:03:20Z

Question:
What changes took place after you published your first novel, i.e. how different has writing been since you turned it into a career?

Answer:
After I received the e-mail from Neighborhood Press that they were publishing PHOTO FINISH, I felt elated, validated, and then sick. Honestly, I did! For some reason, I felt sick. I think I was overwhelmed but also afraid that readers wouldn’t like the book. After that, I had a children’s e-book published and then Sands Publishing published my romantic comedy, ANYTHING FOR A BUCK. By that time, I felt I was working around the clock and neglecting my family. I worked a full-time job, had a 45-minute commute one-way, tried to write on my lunch break and take notes into a voice recorder on my way to and from work…. It just really got to be too much. Plus, I realized that once my children started kindergarten (they were in preschool at that time), my time with them would be limited even more.

I talked with my husband and we decided that I would leave my job and write from home full time. If you’re a fiction writer, you know that you don’t make very much money from that; so I began freelance writing. I did a number of articles and that made me feel a little less guilty about leaving a full-time job and steady paycheck. I had more time with my children, and that made me feel a lot less guilty about the job and the paycheck.

My next novel, SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION, was a quirky comedy in which the heroine had two jobs: IRS auditor and children’s TV superhero. As you can imagine, none of the traditional houses wanted to take a risk on it. It was published, however, by Fantasy Romances, an e-book publisher that does a terrific job.

Still, I was dissatisfied with my fiction career. I wasn’t making much money at all and the Catch-22 of finding an agent when you haven’t been published by a large publisher and vice-versa was tough. I began researching self-publishing and became more and more convinced that this is something I could do not only for myself but for other authors. I decided I wanted to create a publishing company where the publisher, editor, authors all had a good working relationship and cared about each other. I wanted to give to other authors what I felt was lacking in the publishing community. So, I began Grace Abraham Publishing.

Our first book was LAUGHING AND LEARNING: ADVENTURES IN PARENTING, an anthology of stories from parents around the world. Though the book was well-received by readers, I had a horrible time getting it reviewed. I had an even harder time getting distributors.

Later that year, I decided to launch a mystery fiction imprint called Dark-N-Stormies. This time, rather than going the more traditional publishing route (2000-book print run), I decided to utilize print-on-demand technology. Though many booksellers aren’t keen on stocking POD books, our authors and I have found they’re more than willing to work with us when we have signings or other events scheduled. In addition, my POD printer has a distribution system in place that facilitates our getting into the more traditional markets.

The one difference now is that I have so many administrative duties that it’s hard to find time to write. I still love to write, but now it’s sometimes put on the back burner while I attend to other authors’ books, editing, marketing, etc.

It has been slow going; but out of that first launch, one of our books MCLEARY’S MULLIGAN by Bridget Bell Webber, has been selected as a finalist in the ForeWord Magazine 2004 Book of the Year Awards. We’ve seen steady sales, received great reviews, and we’re excitedly looking ahead.

Gayle Trent is the author Photo Finish, Anything for a Buck, and Spontaneous Combustion. She is the founder and editor of Grace Abraham Publishing. You can visit Grace Abraham Publishing at http://www.graceabraham.com or e-mail Gayle at gd830@hotmail.com .

Ophelia Julien, Author of Saving Jake

2005-02-12T19:16:32Z

Question:
I read that you grew up in a haunted house. How has writing "what you know" or writing based on experience affected your creativity/ imagination?

Answer:

Growing up in a haunted house becomes a double-edged sword when writing about the paranormal. It's almost a chicken and egg question in that I honestly don't know if I am obsessed with the subject because of where I lived, or if I was more in tune to where I lived because I was obsessed with the subject and read everything I could find. Aha! some people are probably thinking. The disturbances in your house were really all in your head! Nice try, but too many guests and one-time visitors had experiences in that house for me to honestly believe that.

When I first started writing about this subject, I probably drew a lot on what happened in my house. That meant things like unexplained noises, cherished objects disappearing for weeks at a time and returning again to be found in the most obvious (and frequently searched places), lights and radios going on by themselves, voices, a baby crying, footsteps. My house was a veritable cliche for a haunted house, and therefore, to write about it without doctoring it somewhat would have made my stories very cliched and probably quite boring. So I was forced to take those experiences and change them just a bit. That was good for the creativity, I suppose. For example, I would sometimes hear a voice call me by name in my bedroom. Good. What could I change that to in my story? Suppose that voice cried out to the character, not only by name, but in obvious distress, or terror? Suppose that voice was the same as the voice of someone the character had just seen buried weeks before? I guess the hauntings I experienced are a good point of departure, but they can't, for the most part, be transferred from life to the page without some work.

Did it affect my imagination? I think that having that sort of thing in my life forced me to be more open minded about all sorts of things across the board. I am not comfortable nay-saying a story told to me as true just because it is outside my own experiences and I can't believe something like that could happen. I think having lived in that house gave my world view a particular spin that leads me to listen and then think, "Well, why couldn't that have happened? What law says that something like that does not exist?" So the more I read and write about this subject, the more leads there are to follow. Doing lots of reading led me not only to the wealth of hauntings existing in this world, but to a whole different slew of other-worldly ideas: thought photography, psychometry, the arts of divination, the world of creatures that exist in a gray area and yet seem to be universal. Why does everyone have vampires, ghosts, and shape shifters? Why are dragons and mermaids found all over the globe? And what about Sasquatch/the yetti/the abomidable snowman/the alma? Why is he in so many countries and on so many continents? Stories like these put my imagination to flight.

I write YA because I like to think that I help readers keep their doors open to possibilities. Kids are wide-eyed and accepting. They don't question things like the playmate no one else can see or the fact that Grandma came to visit (even though Grandma passed on some time ago). They don't learn that things like this aren't supposed to be part of the real world until they get much older. I hope that books written from the sort of world view I have will help these kids reach adulthood without completely closing off to the idea that there are many, many things in this world that have no sane, rational, three-dimensional explanation.

Ophelia Julien grew up in Chicago and graduated with a BS in Liberal Arts and Sciences from University of Illinois-Chicago Circle. She spent six years writing for newspapers, and another year or two free-lancing for local magazines. Along with a lifelong love of both reading and writing, she has also picked up a fascination for ghost stories and the paranormal, music, knitting, martial arts (both Eastern and Western), sign language, history, travel, and the lives and thought processes of kids. After raising two children herself and winding up as neighborhood den mother, part-time sitter, adopted mom, and sometimes tutor, she feels fairly qualified to write books for young adults. Besides, according to common knowledge, she is still in the process of growing up herself. She lives in Illinois with her husband and many, many crowded bookshelves.

Tasha Alexander, Author of "And Only To Deceive"

2004-11-15T20:11:26Z

Question:
Based on your own experience, what advice can you give writers who are or will be working with editors for the very first time?

Answer:
I have never been the sort of writer who considers her words to be sacred works of art, and firmly believe that every manuscript can benefit from a good editor. Yet, to suggest that the editorial process is pain-free would not be entirely honest. It's not easy to take the first look at your edited manuscript. All those Xs through passages and marks questioning the plot can make you wonder why your editor bought the book in the first place. Rant and rave if you must, but remember that there is nothing better than having a careful reader point these things out to you before the book is printed. Then take a deep breath and plunge into the revision.

You shouldn't expect to agree with every suggested change. Explain your reasons when you decline to follow the editor's advice. You will expect her to be able to justify her positions and must be able to do the same. But dismiss nothing lightly. Sometimes things that you resist will turn out to have been good ideas. The goal is develop a productive dialogue between you and the editor, not a tug of war. Remember that you both want the same thing: to produce the best possible book.

Tasha Alexander's debut novel, And Only to Deceive, will be published by William Morrow in October, 2005. (Photo by Jerry Bauer)

Howard Junker, Editor ZYZZYVA

2004-08-22T17:35:32Z

Question:
In a letter to the NY Times in 2001, you stated that you read everything sent to you, which I assume is a great task. Do you have days when you just can't face another submission?

Answer:
I like to go to work every day, since it's so much like play. And I'm lucky that I don't get so many submissions each day that it becomes an unbearable chore. The hope that I'll find something wonderful spurs me on. I'm only sorry I have to tell so many writers I haven't found their work "wonderful" enough for me. That's pretty harsh, and has more to do with me and what I think ZYZZYVA needs than the work itself. I admire the tenacity of writers.

Howard Junker is the editor of ZYZZYVA , a journal of West Coast Writers and Artists.

Johanna Edwards, Producer of Book Talk and Author of The Next Big Thing

2004-08-22T17:13:01Z

Question:
You have extensive experience in media, as a journalist and as the producer of "Book Talk." Can you tell us some Do's and Dont's of pitching to the national media?

Answer:

DO Cut to the chase
Producers have short attention spans. I don't want to wade through a 10-minute voicemail message; keep it to 2 minutes or less. Keep your e-mail pitches to 1 page. Postcards with book covers (and a short description on the back) always catch my eye.

DO Work any angle you can think of
This is especially important if you're a mid-list author trying to break into the big leagues. Remember, you're selling yourself (and your book). I get dozens of pitches every day, so do something to "wow" me. Make sure you have a terrific press kit and bio. Don't be modest -- brag about awards, advance praise, accomplishments. Can you tie your book to a current news issue? Do you have an unusual publication story or life history? Before becoming a writer, were you a bee keeper, an opera singer, a prison warden? Tell me! Do anything you can to make yourself stand out from the pack.

DO Be courteous and enthusiastic
Radio producers look for guests who are lively, energetic and personable. If you come across as boring and unfriendly during a phone call, why would I want to book you for an on-air interview?

DO Know your market
So many authors waste time pitching shows that are completely wrong for them. Or they waste money sending 3 or 4 copies of their book to different producers at our station when, really, they only need to send a copy to me. Do as much research as you can before contacting a producer. If you can't find anything online, it never hurts to call or e-mail the station and ask for a description of the program: What's the format? Who does the booking? What's the lead time? Do they only tape in-studio, or do they do phoners (phone interviews)? Do they prefer to work with established authors, or are they open to up-and-coming writers?

DON'T Forget vital information
When leaving voicemail messages, always give your name, contact info, a brief summary of your book and a few reasons why you'd make a great guest. This sounds obvious, but you'd be surprised how many people make careless mistakes, like forgetting to leave a callback number. Sometimes they even forget to tell me what they're pitching. Just last week an independent publicist left me a 4-minute voicemail, raving about a "wonderful new author that you've got to have on your show." But he never once mentioned the author's name or the title of the book!

DON'T Wing it
Unless you're a seasoned PR professional, don't just pick up the phone and start pitching producers without practicing first. Write out a list of "bullet points" for why you'd make a great guest and keep them handy. Have a brief speech prepared in case you get voicemail.

DON'T Behave unprofessionally
I get lots of e-mail pitches that start off, "What's up, Jo?" or "i wanna be on your show, r u interested?" Keep your correspondence business-like. Also, don't take it personally if a producer doesn't offer you a slot on their program. There are many factors that lead me to say "no" to authors. Sometimes their work isn't a good fit for our audience or sometimes it's simply a matter of scheduling. It really irks me if authors become rude or accusatory when, as a result of circumstances that are often beyond my control, I'm not able to feature them on "Book Talk." It's a small world, and you don't want to get a reputation for being difficult.

Johanna Edwards produces WYPL's nationally-syndicated radio program "Book Talk." Her first novel, THE NEXT BIG THING, sold for six-figures on the basis of a partial manuscript and synopsis. It will be published in March 2005 by Berkley. Visit her online at www.johannaedwards.com .

Amy Bloom, Author of Come To Me

2004-08-05T12:15:58Z

Question: Did you get published by major lit journals (The New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, etc.) after you've created a name for yourself, or was it the other way around (i.e. your works on these journals helped push your career to where it is now)?

Lauren Baratz-Logsted, Author of The Thin Pink Line

2004-08-04T12:55:13Z

Question:
I personally find it more difficult to make people laugh than to make them cry. Can you share with Likha readers how you inject humor into your stories?

Answer:
It is very difficult to make readers laugh, in particular to make a wide range of readers laugh, since humor is such a subjective thing. I'm afraid, though, that I don't see one specific "how" in how I do it, so much as it boils down to a philosophy of life. I'll try to give you some background and a few examples.

I've had a fair amount of tragedy in my life, nothing so awful as to put me on a par with someone starving in Africa, but enough of it at a young age that I needed to develop coping mechanisms. For me, the most effective coping mechanism I've ever found is humor. It's a particularly good thing that I'm able to laugh at myself, since I've been known to do and say foolish things that warrant laughing at. I also found, when I was younger, that being 4'11, it was always better if I made the short jokes on myself before anyone else did; being Jewish, I made the Jewish jokes first too. I think I figured that being the source of the laughter was better than being the source of the ridicule.

As far as the writing goes, it all comes down to voice. When I sat down to take my first stab at writing a novel nearly 10 years ago, I was sure that the voice that would come out of me would be serious. After all, I wanted to write the Great American Novel. Doesn't everyone (if they're American, that is)? And the Great American Novel is not traditionally seen as being a comedy. But the voice that started to come out of me was a voice that likes to tell jokes, to look at the absurdities of life, and I've never been able to shake that. There're always some moving moments in the things I write, at least readers tell me that and I choose to believe them. But even six years ago, when I wrote a book about a septuagenarian who learns that her only child will predecease her, the letters my then agent got from publishers often said, "This book is so funny!" And I'd be sitting here thinking, "But it's a book about someone who's dying! She dies in the end!" And they'd say, "Oh, of course we cried when she died, but it's still a very funny book."

Then, too, the subject matter I choose, often being absurd in some degree, naturally lends itself to humor. My first novel, "The Thin Pink Line", was about a woman who fakes an entire pregnancy. With a premise like that, there's tons of fertile ground for humor. My third book, due out in July 2005, is called "A Little Change of Face", and it's about a very attractive, never married, 39-year-old librarian from CT who, for one reason and another, decides to sabotage her own looks so she can see what life is like once she's no longer one of the world's swans. Again, because I have a character doing something that is contrary to what most people do - most of us try to make ourselves look better, not worse - there's a lot of humor that can be mined.

I think it just finally boils down to a way of seeing. I don't think a writer can make themselves be funny and I obviously can't make myself be serious, not completely.

Lauren Baratz Logsted is the author of The Thin Pink Line, which is out in seven countries other than North America and has been optioned for a Hollywood film, and the sequel, Crossing the Line. Her third novel, A Little Change of Face, is due out in July 2005. A former independent bookseller, reviewer, freelance editor and writer, and window washer, she now writes full time.

John Searles, Author of Strange but True

2004-08-03T15:09:15Z

Question:
Your first booK, BOY STILL MISSING, was a success. Did you feel pressure, either self-imposed or external, to duplicate that success for your second book?

Answer:
Below is a round-about answer that I hope fits the question.

Before Boy Still Missing was published, another novelist told me that he always found it best to begin writing a new book before the current one came out. I took that advice and began writing something right away. For two years, I worked on that story, and as it was nearing the end, I realized that it just wasn't coming together as I had hoped. Then one night on the subway last spring, an idea for Strange but True popped into my head seemingly out of the blue.

The idea was this: five years after the death of a high school boy, his girlfriend shows up on his family's doorstep and claims that she is pregnant with his child. I went home and wrote a rough draft of the entire story longhand in three weeks on twenty-three pads of paper. After that, I spent eight months revising it and telling almost no one what I was up to. The reason I kept it so quiet? Because that previous book--the one that didn't come together--had become so much about what other people thought instead of what I wanted it to be. I realized that I had been writing out of a place of obligation, not inspiration. This was such a valuable lesson to me as a writer--that no matter what happens, I always have to make sure that my writing is something I enjoy for myself first. The same way I had written stories back in the second grade--more like a hobby than a chore. Anyway, when I showed up at my editor's office with the completed manuscript that fall, I confessed to her that I had scrapped the book I had been working on, then presented her with the manuscript for Strange but True. She looked a little surprised and nervous, then told me it would take her two weeks to read and get back to me. Well, she called the next day to say she stayed up all night and loved it, which made me very very happy.

John Searles is the Deputy Editor of Cosmopolitan where he oversees all book excerpts and reviews. His essays and articles have been published in the Washington Post, the New York Times and other national magazines and newspapers.

He has appeared frequently on such shows as Today Show Weekend Edition, Live with Regis and Kelly, CBS's The Early Show and CNN to discuss his favorite book selections. He lives in New York City.

Katharine Weber, Author of The Little Women

2004-08-03T15:05:30Z

Question:
In your opinion, how important is it for a writer to have a writing degree?

Answer:
For me, this is a hilarious question because I have published three novels and teach fiction writing at Yale -- and have no degree of any kind. I don't have a college degree, though I attended The New School for Social Research and Yale University, because I never finished. And I don't have a high school diploma, because I skipped twelfth grade to go to college at sixteen.The only diploma of any kind in my writing office is one from a Dog Obedience Diploma from Ken Picciuto's School for Dogs and I have to admit that Lester the Scottie isn't especially obedient. So I have absolutely no credentials, no official training, no certifications, and yet I have minted my own credentials as a novelist and writing teacher simply by DOING IT.

The irony that my Yale students turn to me not only for advice about MFA programs but also for letters of support is quite rich. I always quiz my students about their hopes and dreams and I always point out to them that whether or not they are admitted to this or that MFA program, they do not require a license in order to write a novel. It's not like going to medical school to become a doctor, or getting a law degree to practice law.

I do think that for certain writers, certain writing programs can nurture and sustain the writing. I am not AGAINST writing programs by any means -- some are outstanding, others are not -- and I do think that wonderful writers have come out of them. But I also think wonderful writers can come from anywhere. And I am quite cynical about the sense that an MFA confers some sort of "publishable" networky kind of credential and status. I am also dismayed at the number of people who complete MFA degrees in order to be employable as writing instructors. The MFA rarely begins to address issues of teaching per se, so there is something wrong with the system of the assumption is that the holder of an MFA in creative writing has some sort of instant qualification as a teacher. The ability to teach well and the ability to write well are two different things. Often they occur together in the same individual, but often they don't. I am sure we can each think of examples of great writer/poor teacher or, conversely, mediocre writer/great teacher.

So I always urge students to be clear about their expectations of an MFA program, and their expectations of an MFA degree.

Katharine Weber, author of THE LITTLE WOMEN, THE MUSIC LESSON, and OBJECTS IN THE MIRROR ARE CLOSER THAN THEY APPEAR.