Shannon Mayer Interview

I always find hearing about other authors’ experiences and processes inspiring, and when I had the opportunity to interview Shannon Mayer, author of the Zombie-ish Apocalypse series and the Celtic Legacy series, I jumped at the chance to ask her some questions.

I hope you enjoy what she has to say (her answers are in blue font)—and I doubly hope that you’ll check out her books!

  1. Sundered has a fascinating premise. Is there a story behind what triggered the idea?

 Thank you! The story started to develop as I considered all the zombie-esque books available and      thought that it would be fun to do my own version. I really hadn’t thought beyond making a unique twist on what has become a story line that has become very familiar to us all. From there it was just figuring out the details, how would it be passed, would it be contagious, were the monsters really     zombies of the un-dead, or something unique to my story, which I think I managed.

 

2. Can you describe your personal journey from first deciding you wanted to write through to publication?

Roller coaster, I think would be the best descriptor. I started to write seriously about 7 years ago. Last summer, after much writing, rejections and re-writes, I snagged an agent. Not much has happened in that department for a variety of reasons, so I then stepped into the self publishing world. Since September, I’ve released three books and am looking to release the first book in a new series December 2011. Huge swing of emotions go along with this journey as all writers can attest to. Indescribable highs and lows, but I wouldn’t trade any of it, not a second of it because it has all made me a better person, and writer.

3. So far, how is publishing what you envisioned it to be? How is it not?

Well, I expected it to be a learning curve, I did not expect that curve to set me on my butt a few times. As a self published author, everything is on me, from the writing through to the promotions, marketing, cover art, editing, proofing, copy editing, and so on. I expected it to be hard, but I had no idea how hard, until I stepped into the ring.

4. I understand Sundered is Book 1 in a trilogy (always great news for a reader—to find out that a new author they’ve enjoyed has other books!).

All three book are available. I released them close together because, as a reader myself, I HATE to wait on a writer if I’m in love with the series.

 

 

5. What do you enjoy about writing a series? What are the challenges?

 A series gives you a chance to layer your world and characters, to develop them as they face each       obstacle within the story. I really enjoy watching my characters grow and flex. The challenge is making sure you have the series well plotted so you don’t miss something that should have been in book one, that you need for book 7. Missing important details can really mess up your storylines; forcing you to change things mid stride.

 

6. What’s your favourite part of being a writer? What do you like least about it?

I love being at home, writing, my dogs and cat hanging out with me. Early mornings are my favourite before the world wakes up. Worst part for me right now is sheer frustration, as I struggle to mesh my day job with writing as full time as possible.

10. What book(s) are you reading right now and what’s on your to read-list?

Right now I am reading “The Alchemist” which I would highly recommend to anyone looking to follow their dream, whether that be writing or something else. My TBR list is HUGE, really backlogged with the time I put into writing. And, doing interviews. ;p But, all joking aside, I think the next book I will be reading is by Jonathan D Allen, his debut novel “The Corridors of the Dead” looks fascinating.

11. Last but not least, do you have any word of advice, wisdom, or encouragement for aspiring novelists?

Don’t be afraid to have others do work for you. Hire an editor, cover artist, copy editor. These people specialize in what they do. You specialize in what you do. Writing. So, focus on your writing and allow others to do what they are best at, in the long run, you will have a better product in the long run.

I love the beginning of her last answer. Don’t be afraid . . . Perhaps we should just put a period there. Don’t be afraid.

Shannon is incredibly personable and has achieved a lot in a short time — inspiring and motivating to me because of how she goes after what she wants with huge passion and drive. She welcomes readers and feedback on her blog, Wringing Out Words  and would love for you to follow her tweets: @TheShannonMayer.

  Please click on the pictures of her covers about to find out more about each book and/or to buy one!

Happy reading and writing,

Ev

 

Not the writer I wish to be

I was reading Louise Penny’s latest novel, A Trick of Light, the other night and as is the case with all of her Three Pines mysteries, I was completely moved and challenged by it, even while I was wildly entertained.

One of the continuing characters, 50-year-old artist Clara Morrow, after thirty-plus years of endeavour and dedication to growing in her art, has just become an “overnight success” and been given a solo show in the prestigious Musée d’Art Contemporain in Montréal.

Her description of the morning after the vernissage (or, in English, the “opening” of her show) captured me.

“Clara rose early. Putting on rubber boots and a sweater over her pajamas, she poured herself a coffee and sat in one of the Adirondack chairs in their back garden …

“She closed her eyes and could feel the young June sun on her upturned face and could hear birdcalls and the Rivière Bella Bella gurgling past at the end of the garden. Below that was the thrum of bumblebees climbing in and over and around the peonies. Getting lost.

“Bumbling around.

“It looked comical, ridiculous. But then so much did, unless you knew…

“Clara held the warm mug in her hands and smelt coffee, and the fresh-mown grass. The lilacs and peonies and young, fragrant roses.” (Louise Penny, A Trick of Light, Saint Martins Press, New York, N.Y. 2011)

Clara is thrilled and torn by her success (and will experience a myriad of other emotions as she faces jealousy from her renowned artist husband and the fall out from a murder that occurred in her garden during her celebratory party), but even before she sat in the early sun and pondered where she’d come from as an artist and where she was going, another of her inner observations kept coming back to me: “Art was their [her and her husband’s] work. But it was more than that. It had to be. Otherwise, why put up with all those years of solitude? Of failure? Of silence from a baffled and even bemused art world?”

Something in these passages that I can’t quite identify upon rereading and quoting in isolated chunks, in combination with comments a dear friend (and very astute, wise reader) made about one of my current works-in-progress triggered the recognition of a hard truth deep within me: I am not the writer I wish to be.

Now, this is not to say that I’ve ever felt that I was all that I wanted or hoped to be as a writer—not even close. But maybe what happened is that as the realization formed in my head and I saw all the colours and shadows and shapes and sounds of what I yearn to express collide with what I actually manage to get out—and that mess of thoughts bumped into Clara who I couldn’t separate from her author, Louise Penny, I realized that it will always be thus. It never changes. The great secret about aspiring to any Art is that you ever grow—and you ever fall short. There’s no arrival.

And maybe that sounds negative, but it didn’t feel like that to me. Instead it felt like some huge vice that had been holding my heart and mind—one that I was unaware of until I felt the pressure ease—unclenched. I think I’ve been operating under an unexpressed tyranny: “One day, I’ll get there—wherever there is—and all my writing dreams and aspirations will be met. Fireworks will go off. I’ll cease to be filled with self-doubt and lethargy. I will know I am good enough.”

Bunk! I have a lot of so-called successes (albeit they may seem small in some peoples’ eyes) and while I’m delighted and derive huge comfort and satisfaction whenever a reader identifies with, enjoys or connects to something I’ve written, I’ve never yet felt, “Aha, this is it.” Instead, I worry—when will the imposter police break out of wall yelling, “I’m sorry, Ma’am, you’re not a writer at all. You’ve been read and found lacking”?

But it’s not about that. It’s about, as Clara expressed, something more. It has to be.

It’s about striving, yes, but also being content to just be.

To diligently, joyfully—and sometimes sorrowfully or with anger—try to render every moment truthfully. To face (in real life and through my fiction) what I care about. What I question. What makes me rage, cower, cry and scream. What causes me to weep, laugh, smile, or take a deep contented breath and think, ahhhh . . .

It sounds so simple: Just be honest about what’s inside you, Ev!

But I find it so terrifying to face my naked emotional self—to not look away, to not avert my stare—out of discomfort, denial, fear of being revealed (and possibly rejected) for what I am, who I am. . . .

Yet as I pondered what I’d read, what my friend said, a warm coffee cup clutched in both hands, gently steaming as I sipped, and contemplated not just the pages immediately before but all those I written previously, I finally got it—get it. I am not the writer I wish to be. I am only the writer that I am. And it’s okay. More than okay. Perfect, in fact! (And after all, it’s the only possible option on any given day or page or part of a tale.)

I’ll continue to fight to remedy my failings, work hard to grow and change and be better as a writer (and a person), but there’s no magic day to wait for. The reason I write, the value of writing, the reward of writing is here right now. Found in the unyielding sheen of frozen-diamond snow, in the heavy contented sigh of my dog sleeping on my feet, in the questions I have as I stare at the sky, in breakfast with my adult daughter and the sweet complex flavours of conversation and freshly made pumpkin pancakes with syrup, pecans and whipping cream. . . .

The seemingly simple and obvious realization has me feeling a little awed—and strangely free and unencumbered: I am the writer that I am.

“Are you nobody too?” – Emily Dickinson

Prompted by the question, “If someone said they liked to read “vaguely romantic” poetry, whose work might that be?” posted in a writing forum I frequent, I started going through my head for poets I love/have loved and poems that have moved me.

The first names that popped to my mind were Sarah Teasdale, Emily Dickinson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Al Purdy–and one line, “A girl freezes in a telephone booth” (which comes from beautiful, if ripping, untitled poem by Andrei Voynesensky).

Then I turned to a hardcover journal that I got when I was sixteen or so. It holds favourite poems and quotes from my teen years, transposed from the various scraps of paper and spiral notebooks that the words had previously called home, along with passages and snippets that have resonated with me in later years. I’m slightly in awe of how much poetry I used to read–and by the poets I gravitated to, long before I knew they were “somebodies” in the literary world.

While I’m a fiction addict, there’s something about poetry that calls to me and speaks to me in a way that no other written form does. I wonder if it’s because poems are created with the words we find within ourselves when all other words fail us?

I don’t consider it a great work of art or anything, but I had fun with the following poem late last fall and feel satisfied that I captured, at least in part, the mood of that evening. It’s also nice now, in the heart of winter, to remember there are always aspects of deep weather that I enjoy.

Winter’s Eve

All is crinkly-crisp this night
Golden leaves are icy folds—wrinkled, whiskered
Street lamps glow and show
Grassy-green, silver-sheened
Underfoot, crushed mint
Overhead, elf-wine scent
Mountain ash berries ferment

Clear sky
Cold sky
Black with star eyes

Woodsmoke sighs
It won’t snow yet

                                    – Ev Bishop, copyright 2009

 I hope you’re digging into the words within you this week. And if you can’t find a story, seek out a poem.

To bed, to bed Miss Sleepyhead

Well, I just told a lie. Inadvertently. And now I’m fessing up. (If one fesses up almost immediately, does it still count as a lie?) I told a writing forum of friends of mine that although I should do something writerish before I head out to my day job, I was going back to bed instead (and you know what, despite this post saying that I didn’t actually do that, the verdict’s still not an entirely sure thing. I’m tempted even as I type this to hit “save draft” then hit the sack for another hour.

I’m so tired! And worse, SO LAZY feeling. The lovely stupor induced by Christmas holidays seems to have settled as a permanent fog into each crook and cranny of my brain. Though I’ve eaten no turkey this season, I’m as soporific as if I’d just indulged in a six course meal of the stuff. Though January 1st usually finds me so eager to get back to my pages, so zealous over new goals for a new year, that I’m hyper to the point of literally bouncing around, this year . . . Nada. It’s January 3rd already and I . . . well, like I said. I just want to go back to bed.

Unfortunately, some part of me that isn’t as lazy as the rest of me (my spleen, perhaps? Yes, my spleen) piped up just before I crashed again and said, “You’ll just be tired again tomorrow.”

Sigh. And as ever, Spleen was right. I don’t need more sleep. I’ve been averaging 8 – 10 hours a night (before you judge though, it’s really dark and cold where I live right now; everyone, not just me, needs more sleep). And with that cold hard fact faced, I had to look at what I really need. What’s different between this lackluster new year and my happy, excitement-filled heralding of fresh annums in the past?

I think it’s a lack of one tiny, yet apparently crucial thing. For a long time (since I was 11 or so), part of my New Year tradition has always been to curl up with a journal and a yummy drink in the wee hours when everyone else is finally asleep after celebrating, to do some private recalling, planning, and dreaming.

I’ve done a lot of other fun stuff the past two weeks. And some important stuff. But I’ve neglected . . . . my spleen, apparently.

That truth unveiled and confronted, I still want to go back to bed. But not quite as badly. And tonight or tomorrow night, I’m going to curl up by the Christmas tree, journal in hand, wine glass nearby, and do some thinking. I know I have plans and hopes (thus latent excitement) for 2012. I just have to clear the way for it to crawl (okay, pour!) forth.

How about you? How’s 2012 so far? Are you already happily enmeshed in your writing and stories, or are you more like me, fighting not to go back to bed?

To heck with silent night; it’s more more like silent morn!

Wow, when I wrote my column for The Terrace Standard this year, I knew my Christmas would be different this year, but I had NO IDEA that I’d be the first one awake for a very long time (Well, except for the cat who is being exceedingly weird. It’s like she knows there’s a large can of Turkey giblet mess for her own festive feast purposes later!).

Anyway, the tree is brightly lit, the coffee is brewed (ahhhh) and while visions of sugar plums dance in my son and hubby’s head, I am amusing myself online (Yay, the luxury of Christmas Day Internet browsing!) and trying to restrain myself (All I wanna do is break into my ho-ho sack, a.k.a stocking!).

If you’ve managed to sneak some merry Christmas computer time, I’d love for you to peruse some of my recent Christmas thoughts: “What We Give” published by The Terrace Standard, December 23, 2011 and/or “Deck The Halls With Memories” which was just reprinted in The Cloverdale Reporter‘s Old-Fashioned Christmas Magazine.

Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope your day is special in every way and that you enjoy the blessing of family and fun and food and peace in whatever order they come!

Can (should!) a writer ever really go it alone?

Déjà vu Thursday – This is a re-post of a fairly recent pondering (written originally August 5, 2011), but it feels timely because the Internet—and its friend and foe ways—has been a big part of my writing life again lately. Just last night I was thinking, Yeesh, if it wasn’t for my writing friends and cohorts, what would I do? Maybe you’re feeling a similar blessing (or a sad lack?). As ever, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

* * *

If you have other things in your life—family, friends, good productive day work—these can interact with your writing and the sum will be all the richer. ~ David Brin

Last night I met with the Northwords Writers’ Camp writers and presented on how the Internet fits into/enhances my writing life. I mentioned how it’s a great resource for:

Support, Inspiration, Community
Education, Practice
Writing markets, Publishers
Marketing, Communicating and building relationships with readers

I also delivered the reminder that we all apparently need to hear on on occasion. Just like any super hero has their kryptonite, the Internet has a side that can cripple even the most stalwart writer. It’s called TIME SUCKAGE. Only writing is writing.

And I touched on a few other things to beware of online (in blogs or public forums):

Nothing is private
Nothing goes away
Published online (even “just” on your blog) is published.

But feeling that the pros of getting involved in the Internet writing community (how it can help one grow in and enjoy his/her writing life) far outweigh any small cons, I encouraged each attendee to start their own blog and we spent the rest of our time talking about Do’s and Don’ts of great blogs and did some writing exercise to per chance get us started.

As ever I was blown away by people’s creativity and how unique and highly individual each person’s results were, even with exercises as specific and guided as the ones we did together were. It reminded me yet again of why I write, why I read—to share, to learn, to grow. To think, to laugh and sometimes, though definitely not last night, to cry.

It also reminded me of how good it is to get together with other writers (in person, live!) and talk craft. The Internet is awesome and I’m incredibly grateful for it, but it doesn’t replace the value and importance (and fun ) of getting together in real-time with flesh and blood people who share your interests. (We talked about that too.)

If you’ve been writing in solitary confinement (as is, of course, the necessity and norm)—or perhaps are feeling that you’re not getting enough alone time with your words—re-read the quote I opened this post with. It’s good to have people and other activities in our lives. They refill the well.

Yes, only writing is writing, but sometimes to keep on track with our writing (in a way that brings joy, refreshes our inspiration, soothes our fears, etc) connection with other kindred souls—online or face-to-face—is just what the Dr ordered.

What do you think? Can any writer truly go it alone?

Day jobs—the good, the bad, the ugly!

About a year and a half ago, I decided to take a part-time day job—to supplement my writing and editing income, yes, but also (more importantly), because I wanted to free up my creative mind.

Nothing kills creativity like wondering how the mortgage will get paid and the freelance life (mine at least) was a bit feast or famine—some months were fantastic. Others—eek, not so much.

I’m not alone in extolling the benefits of working—at least part-time—for someone else when you’re in an artistic field. Over the years I’ve heard many professional authors and writers warn not to quit your day job too soon. Some even advocate never quitting your day job entirely—always keeping a ladle in the stew, so to speak. . . . Sometimes the recommendation’s based on the issue of money. The freelancer or novelist’s income can be irregular, like I mentioned. Sometimes it’s because the speaker feels that having a job in the “real” world gives inspiration to draw from, plus a much needed break (at times) from the solitary, inner realms that writers live in.

I can see both sides.

Most of us understand the comfort (and necessity) of at least a certain amount of dependable income, so I won’t spend much time on that. Ditto, we tend to be able to understand that having co-workers—both the ones easy to get along with and the ones that . . . aren’t—can inspire, perhaps act as sounding boards, etc. . . .

The big lure of going out one’s own is time. After all, what’s more tempting than the idea of business casual (or business professional) equaling pajamas? What could be more ideal than having an uninterrupted 8 hours to write—well, an uninterrupted 8 hours, minus the two hours for a cool lunch with other like-minded, pajama wearing intellectuals, that is. We romanticize (or I should say, I romanticize) the image of the madwomen in the attic a little too much. And there are, of course, days when the daily grind feels, well, like a grind—and we just want to be free from it.

I maintain, however, that if you really want to write a lot, to make your writing be your life’s work (a very separate thing from your primary source of earnings, by the way)—whether or not you have to do other work to pay your mortgage or buy groceries won’t stop you. It might even motivate you (when you have eight hours stretching ahead of you, it’s easy to wile away 6 of ‘em. When you want to get in 1000 words and you only have an hour or two, you tend to get on it).

And less than satisfactory days at work—even the occasional rotten days? Even better. (Just make sure that you’re not in a job you absolutely hate, because that could be muse-killing—though that’s a side tangent.)

If your “day job” is too perfect, too all-absorbing and fascinating, there’s the danger that you will feel, well, fulfilled by it and the desire, the drive, the compulsion to write will diminish.

If your job is creative and calls for imagining and envisioning and brainstorming—it could feed your writing, sure, but it could also easily satiate the part of your psyche that craves all that creating and thinking.

Chaffing a bit at work—whether it’s because the job doesn’t stimulate you mentally or inspire you creatively, or it doesn’t pay enough, or because of personality clashes with other staff members—is a good thing.

If you’re lucky enough to have job to go to that pays the bills, gives you fodder for characters (maybe even villains!), and you have the added benefit of not loving it too much, good on you! You’re in the perfect place to kindle your writing fire and motivate you to get your stories out. (Or that’s what I tell myself anyway. Heh heh.)

Annual Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day!

I just learned about this new “annual” day and I’m stoked! As my own kids are getting to the age where they’re often busy (though my daughter at least would never say no to a trip to the bookstore with me), I’m using it as a great excuse to hang out with my two of my sweet little nieces. We’ll each buy a book, then go for a coffee shop treat—and after that, I think we’re heading to my sister’s to make Christmas cards all afternoon. They’re almost as excited as I am!

How about you? Had you heard of this day before and are you planning to celebrate it? I’m definitely planning to make it an annual tradition (because I don’t go to bookstores enough, lol) because it’s fun, yes, to have a special day, but also because bookstores are important and I don’t want them to disappear from our towns and cities. Buying books online is great, but you tend to shop already knowing what you’re looking for. Browsing bookstores (and libraries), you discover stories and authors absolutely brand new to you. If going to bookstores isn’t something our kids do now, it’s not something they’ll do as adults—and the chances that they’ll only read what’s “popular” will be all the greater. And did I say it was fun?!

Find out more about Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day at http://www.takeyourchildtoabookstore.org/

Quiet Daze

I wish I had some great graphic to post: a sprawling barren desert—its emptiness broken only by the odd three-armed prickly cactus here and there and errant ball of tumbleweed bumbling through every so often. (Add a whistling, lonesome soundtrack too.)

Or perhaps, more in keeping with a landscape I’m familiar with, perhaps I should insert a deep dark night with no recognizable landmarks, everything swathed in thick white snow—the only movement, the only sound, the occasional tree branch failing under its load, bending or breaking in a wet, heavy swoosh.

In both those scenes, the viewer would feel nothing was going on—and in both those scenes, the viewer would be wrong. Somewhere deep below the apparent nothingness, life would be stirring or going on full tilt—or, at the very least, hibernating, waiting for the exact right combination of natural elements to spring it forth. (Insert two new images here, please: the legendary bloom of desert flowers that occur after rare, precious rains and whatever greening, blossoming spring photo you have handy.)

That’s the case with my writing life these days too—outwardly things are pretty quiet, without a lot of news or action or ideas to go on about. Yet inwardly, I feel like I’m on the cusp. Any day now, new energy will flood through me, refreshing me and bursting my current projects to completion. Any week, new ideas—mere murky presences, buried deep in the compost of my mind for now—are going to sprout, and going into 2012 I’ll be overcome with plans and enthusiasm and questions about what’s to come.

But for now (Turn up the volume on that whistling, lonely gunfight showdown tune again.) I’ll just have to wait in eager (if quiet) anticipation.

Sticky Note Solutions

November—already, can you believe it? Some of you are probably happily bogged down with Nanowrimo this month. It’s early in, the inspiration is thick and humid, the words and ideas are growing like crazy, but despite your amazing work ethic and exciting word counts thus far, you’re ever cognisant of the reality that you need to log 1666.66 words per day (better round that up to 1667!) to nail this bad boy.

Others of you, like me, decided to forgo the 50 000 word extravaganza this month, because you have other writing priorities yelling loudly in your head that you don’t want to ignore.

Whatever camp you fall in, I suspect that because you have spectacularly lofty goals this month, life will throw a lot of unexpected distractions at you this month, including but not limited to things like: surprise visits from old friends, birthday bashes, baby showers, or other celebratory not to be missed events, extra work hours, a small family crisis or two, etc . . .

Wait? Am I talking about November particularly or the writing life in general? Rats, you caught me. Nano or no Nano, my writing life, despite my best laid plans, always gets interrupted. I still manage to get quite a lot done most months, however, and one of the easiest ways I’ve learned to motivate and focus myself (not to mention remind myself of what I actually want to accomplish) is to use sticky notes. And not the sticky note app—the actual, messy little pieces of paper that one scrawls notes on and sticks up all over the place.

The idea is not uniquely mine, of course. After all, sticky notes were invented to leave memos for yourself. And I took a class with author Kerri Nelson, called “The Book Factory—Produce Multiple Novels in a Year” that I raved about before in “Take 15 . . .”

Kerri advocated constructing a brief list of things you need to get done in a day or in a chunk of writing time, keeping it in a highly visible place, then before you got to bed that evening making sure you’ve accomplished each one.

There’s something powerful in the act of prioritizing (only so many goals fit on a sticky note) and then crossing each accomplishment with swift stroke of ink. The more specific the goals, the better.

When I jot down “Blog post,” it’s a little tougher to get down to, than if I write “Blog post + TITLE,” because just writing a title is consideration of an idea—and idea that stirs about in the muck and mire of my brain, and is then more than ready to muddy up the page once I sit down to it.

When I write “Edit TITLE,” it’s not as effective as when I write, “Edit three chapters of TITLE.”

“Write a chapter” is not as forward-driving as “Write scene where blah-blah-blah.” (Of “blah blah blah” is actually spelled out on the note—even if so cryptically that only I know at a glance what on earth I’m talking about.)

I also write mundane, non-writing tasks on my sticky notes (“Toyota Payment, “Park Optometry,” etc.), not because I consider them writing-related per se, but because my brain sometimes uses menial chores and other trivial “must-do’s” as a way to avoid writing. “You shouldn’t write right now. You should insert-silly-but-practical-distraction.” Once those chores make it to the sticky note, I can make my procrastinator shut-up. (It’s on the sticky note, it’ll get done. Now be quiet, I have work to do!)

I don’t know if sticky notes will revolutionize your writing days or the short sessions you try to sneak in around the other demands of life, but I know that when I’m using my sticky note system, I’m always a little blown away, by how I manage to get things done when I have no time.

I wish you crazy productivity this month—especially if you’re Nanowrimoing! And if you have special methods or tips for breaking down your big goals into smaller, manageable ones, please share.:)