#interview #author #writing
Jane Lovering is the author of Hubble Bubble, Vampire State of Mind and Falling Apart (amongst others). She spoke to StoryWorld about her latest book, scheduling, and VAMPIRES!
Hi Jane! Tell me about Falling Apart.
Falling Apart is the sequel to Vampire State of Mind, it’s
the second in the Otherworlder’s Trilogy, and it’s very big on zombies! It
revolves around the premise that vampires live among us, and it’s set in
York. There’s a lot of angst, HobNobs,
banter and paperwork. Oh, and everyone drinks a lot of tea…
Have you always liked Vampire stories?
I like some vampire
stories, I draw the line at anything that treats vampires as Alpha-Males with
Attitude though. Surely, if vampires were once human, they’d keep all their
human attributes? So I like all vampire tales that have a bit of human versus
vampire drama (I loved the Laurel K Hamilton books until she went down the
sexsexsexsex route), but hated Twilight.
I like my vampires fallible and capable of real human stupidity at
times, and fighting to keep the things that made them human in the first place,
so Terry Pratchett’s Vampyres are probably my favourites.
What is your writing schedule like? Do you have regular times, places, etc, or can you work anytime and anywhen?
Scheduling writing is something I am very bad at. Well, I’m
bad at scheduling anything really,
but writing is the worst, because nobody knows whether you are doing it or not.
Sitting behind a keyboard making ‘mmm’ noises is ‘writing’ as far as most
people are concerned, even if you’re really looking at pictures of kittens on
Twitter. I have a day job which rules
out writing in the mornings, and when I get home there’s always something to be
done, so I try to work between 1.30 and 5pm, and all day at weekends and during
school holidays. But, you know, there
are a lot of kittens that need
looking at…
What one piece of advice would you give to
emerging writers?
I have two bits of writing advice which I usually give. One
is – read. Read everything, and read all the time. If you haven’t burned at
least one meal because you were engrossed in a book, then you aren’t reading
enough. The second bit of advice is –
don’t give up. Your first piece of writing won’t be perfect (although you will
think it is, this is normal writerly behaviour and perfectly understandable)
and will probably be rejected. Keep writing. Do Not Give Up. Ever.
Are you writing anything at the moment?
I am always writing. Presently, I am editing How I Wonder What You Are, which is out
from Choc Lit in December, I have submitted my next book, provisionally entitled
I Don’t Want to Talk About It, and
I’m heavily stuck into my Work In Progress.
This is called Crush, and is
about a young man who flies falcons and a girl who works in a Historic House.
Well, she works in the teashop, anyway. I’m currently about 25,000 words in,
and ploughing my way through the first draft. Kittens permitting, of course.
Thanks Jane! Click on the images and links above to look at her books, and you can find out more about her at the links below:
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