Do you have any writing rituals? If so, what are they?
I have to have something to drink, a pen and my Bible, along with a clean desk. What are the most important attributes to remaining sane as a writer? Take a break, relax and what TV. There’s something about watching someone else’s creativity that helps get mine going. Are there any occupational hazards to being a writer? Yes. A sore neck and back with tired eyes that can cause brain farts leaving you staring at a blinking curser and a blank page. |
Describe your Muse. How does she/he/it influence your writing process?
God is my influencer. He gives me dreams, downloads and all my ideas, as well as my imagination.
How do you begin a new project? Are you a plotter (outliner) or a pantser (free-writer)?
I buy a five subject notebook and write out my thoughts and ideas. So I guess that makes me a pantser.
Do you write long-hand with pen/pencil and paper or do you write on a computer?
I do both.
Do you write every day? What is your writing routine? How do you discipline yourself to keep at it?
I don’t write every day. I write when I feel inspired or when ideas start to flow after I meditate on the story I’m working on. I enjoy writing so I don’t have trouble with not keeping disciplined.
Have you ever tried writing outside of your “comfort zone”? If so, what were the results?
Yes. I did a correspondence writing school through the mail and had to write an article. I don’t do articles. There not fun for me. However, my teacher did like how I wrote the article and that’s because I wrote it in a story form. Of course, that’s because I’m a story teller!
What are your favorite writing and research tools?
Google and the thesaurus bar on my computer. And of course my good ole’ dictionary along with my book on baby names.
How many drafts does it usually take to bring your manuscript to “The End” and ready to submit to your editor?
Too many to count. Let’s just say I’ve run out of ink on the printer way too many times and even broke it from over using it.
Are the names of the characters in your writing important? What about the titles? How do you choose them?
One of my favorite things to do is name my characters and the titles. To me, it’s like the cherry on top of a sundae. I like to pick names that have meaning that matches up with the characters personality and the meaning of the story. That is why I use my book on baby names that tell you the meaning. I also like interesting titles that grab people’s attention. I am a unique person so I like distinctive names and titles.
To what extent is your fiction or poetry autobiographical? Have you ever seen yourself as a character in one of your stories or poems and, has that been a help or a hindrance?
There are tites that I add into the storyline my experiences and my personality traits. I actually find it easier to write like that. I like to write what I know and familiar with. A lot of my characters have a little of me and some of whom I wish to be.
Has a child, the family pet or another animal ever “eaten” your manuscript? If so, please, tell us that story!
I am actually disappointed that I don’t have a story for that one. Nope, not a one. I guess I’ve been lucky that way.
Who are your favorite authors? Please list a few and their titles, so we can go look for them at our local library!
I like Frank Perettie: Piercing the Darkness, The Left Behind Series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. Francine Rivers: The Last Sin Eater. Beverly Lewis: The Shunning, The Confession and the Reckoning.
Which three authors (alive or dead) would you most like invite to a dinner party and what would you like to talk about?
Frank Peretti. I would like to ask him how he nailed his demon characters so well. And what all he knows about spiritual warfare and where he gets his ideas.
I’m a school teacher. What can you offer to help me prepare 6th graders to appreciate writing, now and for the rest of their lives?
That writing has a voice that can change lives. There’s power in words and if you group them together just right you can inspire a nation. With writing, you can create a whole new world that can make people laugh, cry or make them feel as if you are writing about them. You can go as far as your imagination takes you and for me, that’s pretty far!
How do you react to a negative review of one of your manuscripts?
Cry and throw my manuscript across the room while watching all the pages fly everywhere. Oh, I failed to mention that they weren’t numbered.
Do you ever write naked?
Good heavens, no.
What was your favorite scene or poem to write, and why was it so enjoyable?
I wrote a children’s story called Up To No Good about a seventy year old man, named Carl Angus Withers, who spies on his neighbor because he thinks she’s a witch. I entitled the chapter Combat G.I Joe where he pulls out his old uniform out of his closet. He laid out his uniform on the bed along with his old broken CB. I enjoyed describing him trying to put on his old uniform. Being an old man he had lots of complications as he got all tangled up in his T-shirt like a fly trapped in a web. He had difficulty putting on his combat boots because he had to hold his breath while bending down to slid his bulging vain feet into them.
What’s the hardest scene or poem you have ever written and why was it so hard to write?
The Lord had me write a short story about my high school years of being bullied. It was hard to relive it all over again on the pages, but it brought healing to my soul. I felt I needed to write the scene where I came home to an empty home and almost committing suicide by taking a knife to my wrist while I was attempting to do dishes. That actually happened, but thank God I chose life.
Do you ever use your writing as therapy, to either work out an issue, punish a perpetrator from your real life, or fantasize about what you could have done differently? If so, give us one example of how this manifested in your manuscript.
Yes. The Lord has had me write several stories to help me heal from the past. My short story called Break Open the Crystals was about my high school years of being bullied. At the end I had the main character and her adversary become friends and they forgave each other. But in real life that never happened. I only wished it had.
Print books versus e-books; do you have a preference, and why?
I actually like print books the best because you can get them signed by the author. Plus, I love the smell of books and how cool a cover can look. There’s something about holding the actual book in your hand. Besides, I look at a computer screen for hours on end to write, why would I want to read a book on one. It can be tiresome re-reading my own work on the computer so it’s nice to look at something else for a change.
Name a topic that you refuse to write about, and tell us, why won’t you write about that topic?
I don’t really have an answer for that. I haven’t discovered that part of myself yet.
What’s the worst advice you ever received from another writer?
I’ve been lucky and haven’t run across a writer who’s given me bad advice. All the writer’s I’ve met talk about themselves and their writing.
What is your best advice for beginning writers?
Never give up!
God is my influencer. He gives me dreams, downloads and all my ideas, as well as my imagination.
How do you begin a new project? Are you a plotter (outliner) or a pantser (free-writer)?
I buy a five subject notebook and write out my thoughts and ideas. So I guess that makes me a pantser.
Do you write long-hand with pen/pencil and paper or do you write on a computer?
I do both.
Do you write every day? What is your writing routine? How do you discipline yourself to keep at it?
I don’t write every day. I write when I feel inspired or when ideas start to flow after I meditate on the story I’m working on. I enjoy writing so I don’t have trouble with not keeping disciplined.
Have you ever tried writing outside of your “comfort zone”? If so, what were the results?
Yes. I did a correspondence writing school through the mail and had to write an article. I don’t do articles. There not fun for me. However, my teacher did like how I wrote the article and that’s because I wrote it in a story form. Of course, that’s because I’m a story teller!
What are your favorite writing and research tools?
Google and the thesaurus bar on my computer. And of course my good ole’ dictionary along with my book on baby names.
How many drafts does it usually take to bring your manuscript to “The End” and ready to submit to your editor?
Too many to count. Let’s just say I’ve run out of ink on the printer way too many times and even broke it from over using it.
Are the names of the characters in your writing important? What about the titles? How do you choose them?
One of my favorite things to do is name my characters and the titles. To me, it’s like the cherry on top of a sundae. I like to pick names that have meaning that matches up with the characters personality and the meaning of the story. That is why I use my book on baby names that tell you the meaning. I also like interesting titles that grab people’s attention. I am a unique person so I like distinctive names and titles.
To what extent is your fiction or poetry autobiographical? Have you ever seen yourself as a character in one of your stories or poems and, has that been a help or a hindrance?
There are tites that I add into the storyline my experiences and my personality traits. I actually find it easier to write like that. I like to write what I know and familiar with. A lot of my characters have a little of me and some of whom I wish to be.
Has a child, the family pet or another animal ever “eaten” your manuscript? If so, please, tell us that story!
I am actually disappointed that I don’t have a story for that one. Nope, not a one. I guess I’ve been lucky that way.
Who are your favorite authors? Please list a few and their titles, so we can go look for them at our local library!
I like Frank Perettie: Piercing the Darkness, The Left Behind Series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. Francine Rivers: The Last Sin Eater. Beverly Lewis: The Shunning, The Confession and the Reckoning.
Which three authors (alive or dead) would you most like invite to a dinner party and what would you like to talk about?
Frank Peretti. I would like to ask him how he nailed his demon characters so well. And what all he knows about spiritual warfare and where he gets his ideas.
I’m a school teacher. What can you offer to help me prepare 6th graders to appreciate writing, now and for the rest of their lives?
That writing has a voice that can change lives. There’s power in words and if you group them together just right you can inspire a nation. With writing, you can create a whole new world that can make people laugh, cry or make them feel as if you are writing about them. You can go as far as your imagination takes you and for me, that’s pretty far!
How do you react to a negative review of one of your manuscripts?
Cry and throw my manuscript across the room while watching all the pages fly everywhere. Oh, I failed to mention that they weren’t numbered.
Do you ever write naked?
Good heavens, no.
What was your favorite scene or poem to write, and why was it so enjoyable?
I wrote a children’s story called Up To No Good about a seventy year old man, named Carl Angus Withers, who spies on his neighbor because he thinks she’s a witch. I entitled the chapter Combat G.I Joe where he pulls out his old uniform out of his closet. He laid out his uniform on the bed along with his old broken CB. I enjoyed describing him trying to put on his old uniform. Being an old man he had lots of complications as he got all tangled up in his T-shirt like a fly trapped in a web. He had difficulty putting on his combat boots because he had to hold his breath while bending down to slid his bulging vain feet into them.
What’s the hardest scene or poem you have ever written and why was it so hard to write?
The Lord had me write a short story about my high school years of being bullied. It was hard to relive it all over again on the pages, but it brought healing to my soul. I felt I needed to write the scene where I came home to an empty home and almost committing suicide by taking a knife to my wrist while I was attempting to do dishes. That actually happened, but thank God I chose life.
Do you ever use your writing as therapy, to either work out an issue, punish a perpetrator from your real life, or fantasize about what you could have done differently? If so, give us one example of how this manifested in your manuscript.
Yes. The Lord has had me write several stories to help me heal from the past. My short story called Break Open the Crystals was about my high school years of being bullied. At the end I had the main character and her adversary become friends and they forgave each other. But in real life that never happened. I only wished it had.
Print books versus e-books; do you have a preference, and why?
I actually like print books the best because you can get them signed by the author. Plus, I love the smell of books and how cool a cover can look. There’s something about holding the actual book in your hand. Besides, I look at a computer screen for hours on end to write, why would I want to read a book on one. It can be tiresome re-reading my own work on the computer so it’s nice to look at something else for a change.
Name a topic that you refuse to write about, and tell us, why won’t you write about that topic?
I don’t really have an answer for that. I haven’t discovered that part of myself yet.
What’s the worst advice you ever received from another writer?
I’ve been lucky and haven’t run across a writer who’s given me bad advice. All the writer’s I’ve met talk about themselves and their writing.
What is your best advice for beginning writers?
Never give up!