My friend Leslie Karst has started a new blog called
Custard and Clues, which is at least somewhat aligned with her new venture of writing mystery novels. Checking it out last night, I learned about something called the
Gearing Up to Get An Agent blogfest/contest.
To be honest, I wasn't really gearing up to do much of anything in September, but on the other hand, I do have a lot of unpitched and unpublished work, and you never know, so...here we go.
Not entirely forthcoming biographical notes:
I live in Santa Cruz, California, which I first came to to attend the university here. Although I have tried several times to escape, it's never ultimately worked out, and I have worked for many years now at a large independent bookstore here. Still trying to figure out how that happened, but for your purposes, that means that I know quite a lot about the realities of the publishing world from a a very particular angle. So feel free to ask questions, as long as you know that some of the answers may be disheartening.
I've written in a lot of different forms and I like trying out new genres and new media. I've even co-authored a trivia book about
Southern California (my birthplace). I have a lot of blogs, which is probably a mistake, and the most popular one is one called
Confessions of Ignorance, which I think people like because they are comforted by the fact that I know even less than they do.
As far as actually getting published by other people, other than the trivia book, my success to date has been in the realm of short stories. I've recently put in a few links on this blog so that people who enjoy the form can access these from here.
I have several longer manuscripts, though, some of which I've tried to get an agent for, without success. I'll probably try the most recent one in the pitch festival here. Should be interesting. ("Interesting" is often used as a cover word for "terrifying").
Meet and Greet Questions and Answers:
Where do you write?
I used to do almost all my writing in coffee shops, but gradually that has shifted over to working almost entirely at home.
Quick. Go to your writing space, sit down and look to your left. What is the first thing you see?
Once you look past a truly appalling pile of clutter (I'm the kind of person who watches
Hoarders and worries) there is a really beautiful garden, which, not surprisingly is maintained entirely by my landlady, and not by me. When I first moved in here, it was a kind of dark, ferny redwood garden, which I liked. But then a giant tree fell down, luckily not on my house, and now it is a sunny and entirely different garden. There's a metaphor in that somewhere.
Favorite time to write?
I like to write in daylight, I don't really care when. At night, I pretty much like to turn off and be a complete sloth. But facing different deadlines at various times in my life, I've learned that preference is only that--preference. You can do an awful lot of writing when you're "too tired and don't really feel like it".
Drink of choice while writing?
I used to drink a lot of coffee while I wrote, but now I don't really drink anything. If there happens to be a beer nearby, though...
When writing, do you listen to music or do you need complete silence?
This is a funny thing. At home, I need it quiet. But if I'm writing out somewhere and there's background music, I really don't mind it, and usually only half notice it.
What was your inspiration for your latest manuscript and where did you find it?
I somehow got drawn into the world of spycraft. It started by reading Barry Eisler and watching Burn Notice on television and becoming more and more intrigued about how the world looks from a spy's point of view. Then I almost accidentally took a spy writing workshop from D. S. Kane at the
Muse Online Writers Conference last year, and then took the plunge and wrote out the whole thing for last year's
Nanowrimo. There are aspects of all this that are not unlike being recruited into the spy world itself.
What's your most valuable writing tip?
Don't let excuses bog you down too much. Don't wait for ideal situations or the perfect story or some aspect of your life to change before you really 'get serious'. Just start.
