Since today is my birthday, I decided to let a few of my friends from Facebook interview me. Here are their questions.
What do you feel is the hardest part of the publishing process? (From Vania Rheault)
Rejection – The hardest part for me is finding a home for finished work. I haven’t been brave enough to enter into the Self-Publishing world because that all seems hard to me. So finding a home for whatever completed project I have is hard in the sense a certain amount of prediction for agents and editors on what readers may want a year or more out makes it difficult. I’ll send out a query and then get a rejection and if I’m lucky they will tell me why. Sometimes I get a form letter or even worse that they liked the writing but it wasn’t a good fit.
How are you just so damn adorable all the time? Inquiring minds want to know. (From Lyn Armstrong)
Lyn is biased, her and maybe my husband. I love and miss you, lady.
Do you work plots out with writing buddies or plot all by yourself? (From Marie Johnston)
Normally, I plot by myself. But recently I asked for some input on a finished Regency I just finished and my local critique group helped me come up with a plot (it involves murder) that I will weave back in through the story. This isn’t uncommon for me to finish a manuscript and then change one, maybe two, things, and then have to layer those elements back in.
When you write so many books, what’s your strategy for keeping plots, characters, and settings fresh? (from Natalie Pierce)
It helps that I write in a few different sub-genres of romance. Once you change the setting everything else can be fresh or new based on a new place or time. I have started keeping series bibles so I can remember how old someone is at story X so I make sure to age them by story Y. I usually keep these in either Pinterest, Google Keep, or in a Notebook.
Happy birthday! Let’s see. I’d love to know more about how you got started writing stories. How much of real life is included in your books? Do you have other business ideas you might work on in the future? (from A. Catherine Noon)
Figures A. Catherine Noon would have the most questions. Here we go.
I have been writing since childhood, before my grandmother passed she gave me a collection of stories I wrote for her about the various mythical holiday creatures, like the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, A Leprechaun trying to find Baby New Year. Unfortunately, they didn’t find him because I had only gotten as far as writing their origin stories. I loved info dumps even as a child.
I include much of real life in my contemporaries, including some of my friends (you know who you are). Of course, I changed their names to protect the not so innocent. I’ve used their professional knowledge among which include a pilot, an architect, a nurse, firemen, and of course a writer. Most of my paranormal, sci-fi, and fantasy stories are entirely fiction.
Future Business Projects – Writing Wise I’m working on my Brave the Elements Series – Wind Resistant is my Nano project. I will be querying my Regency this month and maybe a bit in November. I take December off because I find I need the break for the holidays. Non-writing wise – I’ve thrown my hat in on a contest in ND pairing artists and writers. Long Term I’m hoping to get a North Dakota Writers Conference so if you are thinking about something like that my fellow writers, let me know. There are far more of us than the world knows about.
I’m wondering what percent of your writing is actually non-fiction, in a fictional book. (Brian Daly)
It depends on the fiction. In my Steampunk Series, I’d say 50%. I altered parts of the timeline significantly.
My Regency is fairly historically accurate but I did change a few things – my hero knows cane fighting which isn’t really a thing until closer to the Victorian period and was invented in France, not England. So those are pretty liberal. My Contemporaries including my paranormal books are about 25% fiction accounting for characters and the mythology of fairies. But the career choices are based on people I know.
And I would say my Post-Apocalyptic books are 75% fiction the only real elements being geography and locations in the future. 🙂
I hope you’ve enjoyed this Q&A. If I missed your question here leave a comment below and I’ll try to answer it. ~Tina
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