Frequently Asked Questions or: Things I Sometimes Ponder

Q: When you're not writing, what do you spend your time doing?
A: Taking long bubble baths and receiving massages from my scrumptious pool boy, Julio.

No, in all seriousness, my bathtub's rarely clean enough to take a bubble bath in (because, y'know, there's that thing called writing to get done) and I don't have anything that remotely resembles a swimming pool. Or a hot cabana boy. More's the pity. In what little spare time I do have I of course enjoy reading, along with gardening, painting terra cotta pots, singing off key and playing with my horde of nieces and nephews. Oh, and there's also that thing called a day job, which helps to pay the bills.

One day, though I will at least have a clean bathtub. One day.

Q: Where do you get your story ideas?
A: Oh, man, from pretty much anywhere and everywhere. I'll, um, accidentally overhear a snippet of conversation and a phrase or even the entire exchage can get my brain to working. Or I'll read a news story, talk to someone I've never met, read something in a magazine or on the internet. Hell, I even get ideas while watching SportsCenter and watching flight attendants perform their oxygen mask demonstrations. Of course, there's the tried and true real life experience, either mine or someone else's who happens to be close to me. The only problem is that my real life experiences tend to be a little stranger than fiction...

Q: Stranger than fiction, huh?
A: Oh yeah. Great movie, by the way. Loved Maggie Gyllenhaal in it.

Q: Have you ever seen Secretary?
A: Oh yes. Love that movie. Love it. The first time I saw it was actually while flipping through TV channels one night. It was on Oxygen, I think. I'd heard lots about it, and there was nothing else on, so I watched it. Obviously they had to water it down a little bit (um, hello? naked in a bathtub!), but I went out the next day and bought the DVD so I could watch the unedited version because, y'know, I felt a little cheated by an edited movie about S&M.

Q: What's the most embarrassing book in your library?
A: You flatter me, as though I actually have room for a library. One day, I will have Julio, a clean bathtub AND a library. The list keeps growing...

As for the most embarrassing...hmmm...a two year old phone book? Seriously, I don't know that anything on my shelves is embarrassing per se. Some of it might be interesting and/or unexpected. I have a fascination with the occult--astrology especially--and have several books on relationships and sun signs. I find that astrology is actually a great way to add depth to characters and to help find potential conflict.

Q: Where do you get most of your writing done?
A: At home, definitely. Although I do carry a journal with me wherever I go, in case inspiration strikes while driving down the interstate. Not that I try to write and drive. That's just stupid and dangerous. Really. I'll write in hotel rooms when I travel, on airplanes, in airports, at the bookstore cafe...it really just depends upon where I am. The funny, light-hearted stuff is much easier to write in public, though, than say a sex scene. There are only so many strange stares from the cute barista you can take before switching gears.

Q: So are you all laughs all the time or do you have a serious side?
A: I definitely have a serious side, it's just that I prefer to laugh. Seriousness has its time and place, as does laughter, but life is far too short to go through it not giggling and enjoying the little, silly things.

Q: How much of your life is reflected in your writing?
A: I definitely write what I know. For any author, it's hard not to write what you know and not to infuse at least a small part of yourself into every page. If we were to take ourselves completely out of the story, I'm not sure it would ring as true.

Q: What do you feel is your writing strength?
A: Humor and dialogue, definitely. I'm a dialogue whore. I'll find myself skipping the narrative in books just to get to the next piece of dialogue, which sometimes causes a tiny bit of confusion. Oops. For me, though, the interesting part is reading what the characters are saying along with the beats, because what they're saying and what they're thinking and feeling don't always match up. That's very real and honest, but also helps to create conflict. As for humor, I can laugh at just about anything.

Q: What do you feel is your writing weakness?
A: Emotion. I've been working really hard on infusing more emotion into my characters and actually allowing myself to feel what they're feeling. Some writers have no problem with that, while some of us have to work extra hard to make sure the reader is feeling the character's emotions. It isn't easy, but I keep hoping it gets less difficult as time progresses.