ALL A-QUIVER: WALKING THE STRAIGHT ’N ARROW

We Interrupt Our Regular Post . . .

Hello and good late-morning (or evening, or afternoon, or night, depending on where you are) everyone! The wonderful Lisa M. Green, author of The First, has very graciously invited me to participate in the “My Writing Process” blog tour, where I answer four questions about . . . well, my writing process.

And why is everything in the color green, you ask? Oh, I’m sure once you give it some thought, you’ll come to see the (green) light.

My Writing Process . . . answered by author Devon Winterson:

1) What am I working on? - Recently, I was working on “The Drawing Voice,” the second book in my retrograde timeline Caendorian World novels, from the youthful perspective of Eden, the mother of Marisa, my main character from my first novel, The Perfect Player. But as of late, I’ve decided to change gears and finish up my humorous middle grade novel I’ve been writing with my son (off and on) for five years called “It Happened on Tarantula Island.” A loopy scientist; two rather large, intelligent, preposition-spouting tarantulas; a crew of dunderheaded pirates; a scholarly boy of ten; and a brilliant talking chicken! What could be more fun, really? 

2) How does my work differ from others of its genre? - Well, most dark fantasy, as far as I can tell, contains either vampires or zombies (and sometimes werewolves). While the latter is way cool (Zombies! Yay!), and the former are kind of ho-hum (to me), my novels have packs of sentient hell-spawned demons who get high from devouring human flesh and blood. But since I haven’t read every book in the universe, there may be something similar out there. If there is, it’s not exactly a very popular subject matter.

3) Why do I write what I do? - I’d like to claim craziness, but I’m no crazier than any other writer. I believe I write what I write because I enjoy delving into the dark corners of the human psyche and giving animalistic creatures more humanistic traits—kind of putting them at our level, and comparing them to humans themselves. I also like to play with situations that could never happen in real life, create fantastic events that I can control (or not!), and help readers understand the messages of tolerance, love, and understanding . . . yes, through dark fantasy. (They’re hidden, but they’re there, those messages.)

4) How does my writing process work? - I sit, write, shake my head in frustration, hit the delete button—many times—write some more, get some coffee, sit down again, write some more, yell at my characters to “DO WHAT YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO DO!!”, hit the delete button again, and again, and again, write and write and write and write . . . then edit out 90% of what I’ve written. But all silliness aside, I’m pretty much a “by-the seat-of-my-pants” writer. In other words, I love to see where my characters take me as they drag me through their world and out the other side, battered and bruised but “band aided” up and “boo-boos” kissed afterwards. Then I throttle them.

Next Monday, on March 24th, three other writers will give you their own “My Writing Process” answers:

Alianne Donnelly - an author of many hats, including fantasy, romance, paranormal, and post-apocalyptic, probably weaving a brand new tale in her head somewhere at this very moment. She does that. A lot.

Monica Mynk - a mild-mannered Chemistry teacher turned Christian fiction writer. 

Robert Evert - the author of the Riddle in Stone fantasy series; he hasn't ever killed anybody.

So, have you figured out why everything’s green yet?