Written Author Interview
- Tell me about yourself. What do you like to do outside of writing. What is a day in the life like for you?
I’m a gardener and a beekeeper. When I’m at my family’s farm in Missouri during the summer I’m wrangling my bees. I’ve got 18 hives and I bottle honey, collect wax, etc. When I’m back in Maryland for the fall and winter, I like to garden when I’m not writing.
2. What inspired your first novel? What was the thing that got you into writing in the first place?
I’ve liked writing since I was a kid, and I used to write short stories when I was in college. I’m not quite sure why the characters of The Stonebound Heir came to me, but I knew that the friendship and betrayal of the two main characters was going to be the heart of the novel.
3. How do you come up with characters? Are they spontaneous or meticulously planned?
Spontaneous. I am a solid pantser in the beginning.
4. What are some of your favorite genres to read? Are there any books you’d recommend to first time readers or people looking for something new?
I like a lot of different kinds of books, but I lean hard on fantasy, science fiction and horror. Fantasy is so varied it’s hard to recommend only one or two authors unless you know what the person likes in terms of a subgenre, but I’d say you can’t go wrong with Ray Bradbury or J.R.R. Tolkien or Mary Stewart. I would tell people who want to read science fiction to hit a couple of the classics – Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, and I really like Nancy Kress – but my favorite these days is Adrian Tchaikovsky’s series Children of Time. Horror, for a newbie, should start with short stories. Read Poe’s great stories or any number of ghost stories. One of my favorite short stories is a climate horror short called “Sweetlings” by Lucy Taylor.
5. What’s the most difficult thing about being a writer?
Trying to figure out who your readers are. All the advice says ‘know your target audience. Describe them in detail, what they look like, where they go, what tropes they like,’ blah, blah, blah. That advice is garbage, in my opinion. Maybe when I write a few more books I’ll have a better profiling system.
6. What is your process to completing a novel from outline to final product?
I start with character sketches and try to figure out what they want and what they really need. Then I take eons thinking about the plot. I draft chapters, roughly trying to hit the beats for rising and falling action while keeping each chapter lively at the same time.
Once I have a draft I’m reasonably sure is going to hold together, I look for beta readers to share it with. That’s the real test, in my mind. If they believe in the characters, even if the plot is full of holes, I will go at it again and rewrite as much as necessary.
Once I’m confident in the characters, I fix the plot. Then it’s off to the editor, more revising/editing, then the proofreader, the cover artist, and final tweaks. Then, I have a friend to help me with formatting and prep for the epub as well as the print version.
7. What’s the most unhinged thing you’ve written in your novel? Don’t worry, we don’t judge here.
Well, I wasn’t really trying for ‘unhinged’ in The Stonebound Heir, but I am proud of how manipulative the villain is.
8. What’s one thing about being a writer that absolutely drives you up the wall?
Trying to make epubs work on multiple platforms.
9. What does being a successful writer look like for you? What type of life do you want to live as a writer?
Success is knowing that my story touched at least one person’s heart. I
just want to write what I feel is true and vital.
10. Describe your writing journey. If you had to write a story centered around it, do you think you could pull it off?
Nope. My own story would lack plot and pacing.
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About
Hello Reader Friends.
What should I tell you? That I’m so relieved to have finally delivered my first novel into your hands? That I’ve written short stories and nonfiction for many years? That I’m an independent author/publisher and I hope you’ll give my story and so many other fabulous stories by independent authors a chance? Or do you want to know something about what has inspired me?
You should know that I grew up on a farm in the Ozarks, and I was lucky to have parents who appreciated reading and literature in a community not very interested in that. I had a few critically important teachers in my early life, and I became a voracious reader who read many, many books that were far too mature for me at the time.
My vocabulary grew along with my imagination, and books helped me learn about the lives of others, real and imagined. Jump ahead to college at the University of Missouri-Columbia, where I earned a journalism degree that satisfied my curiosity in the world around me while providing coverage for my more artistic bent, which I did not have the courage to pursue as a career.
I studied abroad and lived in India for a short time in the 80s, and that world, so different from my own, became my second home. I married, had children, worked in policy development and communications and enjoyed a wonderful life for decades, but the urge to write stories only grew stronger.
Finally, I committed to writing a novel–well aware of the mortality rate for first novels. Somehow, this fledgling survived. And so I bring you The Stonebound Heir. It will not be my last story. I’m already writing books 2 and 3 in The Cursed Cycles series, and I have a few short stories brewing as well.
Social Media
Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0D845Y24K?ingress=0&visitId=c2aa8f15-2002-4401-9767-b0e42641f73d
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/l.a.barnitz
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