And no, I'm not talking about all of the wonderful free books they are offering over at the Book Giveaway Carnival.
Okay, no, there won't be any funnel cake, so before I go any further, I should probably warn you that this is a virtual carnival that I'm talking about.
When did you first begin writing?
I suppose the pat answer is, ever since I can remember. I've always been making up stories. But I began writing seriously when I was 27 which was when it occured to me that my dream of writing a novel would never come true if I didn't start doing some actual writing.
Where do you find inspiration for your work?
Wherever I have to. As Jack London so famously said, You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club. The inspiration I like best comes when I'm not looking for it. Those moments when my mind is occupied with other things; a great book, a movie, when I'm cooking or exercising. Alas panic seems to be a great inspirer for me. This makes me very sad as I would rather have the muse come down from on high and annoint me with sweet perfume and rose petals along with the answer to all my writing issues. But when I'm getting panicky about finishing and polishing something, I generally end up tuning out my editorial voice and inspiration kicks in. It's painful, but it works.
What are you working on right now?
Right now, I'm working on proposals for my next paranormal romances from Grand Central Publishing. Some people have classed them as Urban Fantasy, but they're marketed as paranormal romance. They're set in the present time and involve magic wielding humans who quite often aren't so nice and demons who are fighting for their survival. The first in the series was My Wicked Enemy, which came out in August of 2008. My Forbidden Desire will be out in June 2009.
How do you usually begin your stories—with a character or with a plot?
I am very much a character-driven writer. My stories develop from the characters and the plot depends on what they turn out to be like. Which means I throw away a lot of plot ideas as I write my characters. I have tried mightily and, I must say, in vain, to do more up front plotting.
It sounds so efficient! But it just doesn't work for me. All that happens when I do that is I waste time writing plots my characters refuse to fit in.
Do a quick character study on yourself: don't forget to add in the fun stuff, like favorite foods and things you love/hate!
I work as a Microsoft SQL Server database administrator, which means I am a geek with pretty much all that implies except for the pocket protector. My writing is the opposite of the kind of logical, technical knowledge required to support enterprise databases. I am detail oriented – to a fault, I'm afraid. I even drive myself crazy with that. I have an MA in English, which took me forever to get because I was working full time while I was in graduate school. The degree was one of the best things I ever did for myself and for my writing. The time management required for the combination of grad school, the day job, writing and parenting resulted in my learning to ignore things like neatness and to develop tunnel vision. I have to look at my monitor. Any glance to the side might result in the burning need to straighten up. Except in dire cases of writer's procrastination, I succeed in this.
I am organized, but you'd never know it from looking at my work space. My favorite food is chocolate (duh!). I used to be a coffee fiend and I often miss it but don't miss the cost. My now 13 year old son is two inches taller than I am and still growing. We love action movies and have been on a mission to see every move ever made by Jet Li and Jackie Chan. We have reached the point where there's not much we haven't seen by them. I know my martial arts movies. I am not-so-secretly in love with Jet Li. Swoon.
Thanks, Carolyn! Want to win a free copy of Carolyn's book? Just leave a comment below and you're entered! Want extra entries? That can be arranged.... Blog about it for another entry. Become of follower of this blog for another entry, too.
I'm so proud to tell you that this contest is part of the Book Giveaway Carnival which is being hosted by the fabulous Bookroom Reviews!
Special mention goes out to Angelina Jolie's emeralds. Did you see that ring? Those earrings?! Talk about jewelry that could've come to the party by itself! Words cannot describe....
Is it just me, or are you totally confused with what's happening on LOST? The producers keep saying that this season they'll be answering lots of our questions, but I feel like they just keep piling on new ones.
5. Do a quick character study on yourself: don't forget to add in the fun stuff, like favorite foods and things you love/hate!
How do you fight writer’s block?
We've heard grumblings of a Gossip Girl spin-off for a while now, but I refused to let myself believe, lest my heart break when the plans inevitably get canceled.
Ignoring her mother’s prophetic words, “Running off with a foreigner will bring you nothing but trouble,” a Japanese woman follows her fiance to the
When did you first begin writing?
From a young age I was always drawn to words and reading, but my real dream was to be a singer-songwriter, ideally fronting an all-girl rock band. After many adventures in the world of rock and roll, but without much to show for it, I found myself working as a technical writer at a database company in
What is your favorite part of writing? Least favorite?
My favorite part of writing is revision—I can spend hours tweaking a chapter. I read out loud to make sure I’ve gotten the right rhythm down, and look for places where I can improve the prose, dictionary and thesaurus at arm’s reach. On the other hand, I find it very difficult to write new material. I hold my nose and persevere, all the while my inner critic imploring, “This really stinks, you know.” But once I slog through it, then I can revise, and I’m happy again.
Give us a quick character study on yourself...
I’m a late bloomer and a Gemini who is always multitasking, dealing with multiple people and situations at the same time, whether in- person or via email, Facebook, MySpace, blogging, etc. My current favorite TV show is “30 Rock,” and my favorite hobby is eating out—I’m always researching new restaurants with Zagat, Chowhound, Yelp, etc. I like all kinds of music, but especially electronica, dance, and J-pop.
My husband surfs almost daily, but I am the most unathletic person I know. I have to force myself to get on the treadmill and I so do not do bicycles. The only exercise I don’t mind is yoga because my body actually feels good while I’m doing it, though not as good as when I get a massage, which is another favorite activity (and one I wish was less expensive!). I also enjoy clothes shopping and cannot pass up trips to Anthropologie or H&M. I love to travel and have been to Japan at least thirty times, but the ideal would be to have a trans-oceanic highway spanning from
What’s next for you?
My second novel comes out in Fall 2009. It’s called LOVE IN TRANSLATION and is about an American woman who finds herself unexpectedly in
Those of you who read my blog know that I absolutely LOVE to give away free books! I give away boxes upon boxes of books, and it really is such a pleasure for me to make other bibliophiles so happy (speaking of which, our next giveaway will be next week, when we give away two-- yes, two!-- copies of Wendy Nelson Tokunaga's MIDORI BY MOONLIGHT).There is nothing more inspiring than real life. That’s why I tell my students (in the Writers Program at UCLA) that the most important thing a writer can do is read, but you also need to put down your books and experience life so that you have something to write about. No need to go bullfighting like Hemingway, but just being aware of the world and the people around you can offer great inspiration. Novel writing is a lot different than nonfiction, when you are essentially researching and reporting on something with a particular point of view – even history books get rewritten when new information comes up or the prevailing point of view has changed. But with fiction, you are responsible for creating an entire world, so every single detail, every word, must work together to create the story and the emotional truth that you want to explore. While life is surely stranger than fiction, I think that’s because it’s more arbitrary, whereas fiction can’t be. Even a short story is intensely precise. And essays are an organized expression of thought – so it’s often the first way I write about a subject makes me angry or confused or thrilled. I have to feel passionate enough to plop my tush in the chair and do this thing that no one may appreciate as much as I do. So when I take on an entire novel, it’s because something has been on my mind so much that I know I can sustain the passion necessary to explore the “what-ifs” of the situation. There a question I want to answer. I feel so lucky to get to do that - to say what I think is important and to have a voice in this world - that I am inspired to work really hard and do the very best I can.
A year or so later during a toddler playdate, my former boss’s wife, a pretty model, pointed out my first gray hair. We were standing there on the driveway in my front yard - and I wanted to slap her. The anger stayed with me and I wondered what would happen if I was the kind of person who actually would do that. At the same time, a young, single production assistant kept calling my husband for work or for help with her car, etc. He was gone all hours working on location, so I wondered what that same person would do if she didn’t trust her husband. That inspired my first novel, 66 Laps, which won the Pirates Alley Faulkner Prize.
On the heels of Club Mom, my mother kept wanting to tell her side, so I worked up a proposal and sold Club Grandma, which has had many incarnations and is now excerpted on FisherPrice.com. But it was mostly inspired by money – nonfiction is easier to sell, but it feels a lot like homework. And I did Nesting, a coffee table book about a nursery designer, for the same reason, then the designer on Oprah, so the publicity helped my other projects. By then I had given up on the long hours and travel of the film business completely and committed to redecorating an extra bedroom into an office and was officially a writer. I was teaching and starting to meet other writers, not many of them moms, and it was very frustrating not having housekeeping help like many of the working moms and time to watch Oprah like many of the stay-at-home moms. So, I was invited to vent my frustration for the book Mommy Wars. Katie Couric laughed about it on the Today show, because of the title: “I Hate Everybody.” The real mommy war is in our heads of course; it certainly was in mine. Which brings us back to all the choices we make in life, how each little one impacts the next one, which is what keeps me writing.
In fact, I was working on a literary novel about a Mom who worked in Hollywood trying to protect her daughter in this crazy culture, when I had a long overdue but excruciating divorce and was asked to write about the difficult decision for anthology called The Honeymoon's Over. By the time I turned it in, I had emerged from the darkness into such blinding happiness, that I was inspired to write this novel, Wife Goes On. I found such camaraderie with other single women or women who had been there, that I created the four characters in Wife Goes On and sold it from the outline. I put my other novel aside and wrote as fast as I could and published it in paperback so more women who needed it could afford it. (Plus paperbacks are an easy gift to give to friends who would enjoy it and it’s lighter to carry in your purse.) These characters are all made up, but many of their experiences and all of their emotions are very real. Plus, the sex is good. And the jokes are fun.
Now of course, I’m returning to the literary novel and since my life is different, so is the book. I’ve changed the structure to be less dark, and more of an a detective type mystery where the mom has already lost her daughter and has to find her. Obviously, having two daughters still inspires the question that I want to answer, but the events are not real and the themes are universal to motherhood. I am always very careful to protect everyone who has no choice in the matter. And now that this Wife had gone on, so to speak, I’ve been in a happy relationship for a few years, so I’m inspired to add a stronger romantic subplot. I try not to question inspiration, just to keep my eyes and ears and heart open for the next book. Meanwhile, I enjoy, every little detail that inspires me, from the way the sun shimmers on the ocean, to the blessing of having readers and writers like you, Brenda, who are so committed to the written word. That’s truly inspiring.
