Debut Author Interviews

Is your main character like yourself?

• Sara Zarr on...Character and Self
• Paula Chase on...Character and Self
• Ruth McNally Barshaw on...Character and Self
• Carrie Jones on...Character and Self
• Melissa Marr on...Character and Self
• Kelly Bingham on...Character and Self
• Thatcher Heldring on...Character and Self
• Sarah Beth Durst on...Character and Self
• Tiffany Trent on...Character and Self
• A.C.E. Bauer on...Character and Self
• S.A. Harazin on...Character and Self
• Sundee T. Frazier on...Character and Self
• Greg R. Fishbone on...Character and Self
• Ann Dee Ellis on...Character and Self
• Rebecca Stead on...Main Character and Self
• Laura Bowers on...Character and Self
• Judy Gregerson on...Character and Self
• Karen Day on...Character and Self

Is your main character like yourself?

This is a great question. People often assume that primary characters are thinly disguised versions of the author. It’s an understandable assumption, and one I often make myself when reading a book. Sometimes it’s a pretty safe assumption - like when Dan Brown, in The Da Vinci Code, describes his hero as a tweed-jacket wearing, chin dimpled, fit guy and you flip to the author photo and see a tweed-jacket wearing, chin dimpled, fit guy…well, you see my point. But most of the time while there may be autobiographical elements in a story or character, by the time the finished book is published the resemblance is only slight.

My main character, Deanna Lambert, is really nothing like me on the surface. I don’t think anyone who knew me in high school or knows me now is in danger of thinking that she is me. (I did borrow aspects of myself for Deanna’s friend, Lee, but she isn’t me, either.) Deanna and her brother were inspired loosely by some kids I knew in high school whose lives seemed vastly complicated in comparison to mine—-they seemed world-weary at age 15 or 16, with every trace of childhood innocence or naivete totally gone. When actually writing Deanna and her life and her thoughts and issues the secret is that she is like me, but only in that way that every good character is relatable. If we can’t imagine being them, we can at least look at them and recognize some common experience of what it is to be human—-to be hurt and disappointed, to be humiliated, to want something you can’t have, to feel trapped, to feel like you’ve really screwed something up, to want to fix it and not know how, to long for family, to want to belong to something. I can certainly relate to all of those feelings, and whether or not Deanna and her specific experiences are “like me,” those common human experiences are like me, and I think like most people—-at any age—-and that’s what draws us to stories in the first place.

Is your main character like yourself?

My character, Mina, is equal parts:

- me as a teen
- the teen me I wish I were
- my daughter and her friends

She’s all those things, but mostly she’s a potpourri of teen-ness. A little bit confident, a lot insecure, always hopeful and optimistic, yet afraid what change will bring. She’s a roiling mass of emotions bubbling all at once. I hope that roiling mass makes her more real. The way she lectures her friends, yet is guilty of the things she’s lecturing them about; the way she’s materialistic and realizes that’s shallow - she can even see the negatives of it, first hand, yet, she can’t stop herself from wanting what she wants.

So while some of who she is hits close to home, I think Mina represents a lot of girls her age.

Is your main character like yourself?

Many people, including my agent and editor, have declared that Ellie McDoodle is me.
I don’t mind the comparison at all.
Ellie’s got a lot of great qualities. : )
There’s a lot of me in her (including faults).
Actually, each of my characters has stolen a bit of my personality.
I’m lovable, hateful, nice, mean, forgiving, spiteful, bold, timid, entertaining and boring…

Is your main character like yourself?

1. Belle plays the guitar really well. I don’t.

2. Belle is a socially conscious teenager who overthinks everything. Um. Okay. I was.

3. Belle is not shy. I am.

This is hard for me to answer, really, because I’m not sure how self aware I am. I can describe Belle really well, but can I describe myself in a way that corresponds with other people’s perception of me? In a way, that’s what TIPS ON HAVING A GAY (ex) BOYFRIEND is about. It’s about whether or not we can ever really know other people or ourselves, and what to do when our perceptions are really, really wrong especially when those perceptions are about someone we love.

Is your main character like yourself?

Wicked Lovely has 3 MCs, and I suspect I have traits in common with each of them. With Keenan, I share volatile emotions; with Donia, I share a stubborn streak; and with Aislinn, I share a need to keep my identity intact. They have many other traits I don’t share (for example, Aislinn is an optimist; I’m not), but I suspect that to identify with a character it’s handy to have some trait or core belief in common.

Is your main character like yourself?

Jane Arrowood, like all characters from my work, is a mesh of different things. Yes, parts of me are in her. But most parts of her are borrowed from friends and family, strangers I’ve observed or overheard, and nebulous teen emotions and ways of thinking that I remember from myself and friends at that painful age.

And of course, large parts of her are her own, entirely fictional, the result of an identity that mysteriously comes together when you mesh different pieces of people and imagination into a fictional character. That’s one of my favorite parts of the writing process—when your characters begin to take life as you write, and THEY start telling YOU how they would react, what they would say, etc. It’s very fun.

Is your main character like yourself?

There is a major difference between me and Toby. I was a walk-on benchwarmer in high school. I had nothing to prove and no life lessons to learn. A book starring me as a benchwarmer would put every anesthesiologist from here to Chicago out of business. To me, being on the team was cake. Playing time, when it came, was icing. Toby, on the other hand, wants to show the world he can play “real” ball. He is like me in some ways though. I think we are both on the young side of eighth grade. Friends I had built forts in the woods with a year earlier were now smoking, going to parties with girls, and clashing with the police (sort of), and this is what happens to Toby in the book. Except for the smoking and the police.

Is your main character like yourself?

Probably. Julie came from inside me so I’m sure there are similarities. For one thing, we’re from the same hometown (in central Massachusetts). But I’m not Rapunzel’s daughter, and my brother (so far as I know) is not a talking cat. So clearly there are ways in which we differ.

Is your main character like yourself?

Corrine probably has little bits of me somewhere—her curiosity, her stubbornness, and, I hope, her generosity and loyalty to her friends. But we grew up in completely different time periods in different cultures, so I feel quite sure that Corrine is her own person.

Is your main character like yourself?

If I were a bullied, shy, awkward, 11 1/2 year old boy, who liked to sing, then Augie would be like me—or, more accurately, I would be like him. I wrote his character as if I were him, and so he is me, in many ways. His circumstances are not mine, but what makes him human came from me. Every character I create, on some basic level, is me: I work from the model I know best. :-)

Is your main character like yourself?

Any resemblance of my main character to me (or anyone) is purely coincidental. He would never do what I wanted him to do—or what I would have done—when faced with challenges.

Is your main character like yourself?

Brendan Buckley and I share one main characteristic: We’re both question-askers. My husband has dubbed me “CG,” which stands for a certain mischievous monkey whose curiosity gets him into lots of scrapes. But Brendan is much braver than I, in that he not only asks questions, he takes serious action to find the answers, even though it requires confronting hard truths and getting into a little hot water. I can’t say I’m that bold, but perhaps that’s why I wrote a character who is. Through my characters, I can be who I’m not in real life.

One other similarity — I wanted to be a geologist when I was in 6th grade. I was destined, however, to be a writer. My theory: Writers are insatiably inquisitive people who don’t want to be tied down to any one area of expertise. All of our stories are just reasons to do more research in some area we’re curious about!

Is your main character like yourself?

Not at all! That’s why this book was so much fun to write. Septina is a “style over substance” kind of person while I’m more “substance over style” like Quinn. And I’m more intellectual, like Quinn. And I’m a bit more of a realist, again, like Quinn. But there are many ways in which I’m not like Quinn, either.

Here’s one thing I have in common with Septina: I liked to draw doodles in the margins of my school papers like she does. Mine were mostly tank battles, spaceship battles, and geometric shape battles. When I was Septina’s age, my science teacher told my parents that she worried about me because, in her personal experience, the type of doodles I did could only have been drawn by somebody tripping out on LSD. What personal experience she had with tripping out on LSD, I didn’t even want to know.

Is your main character like yourself?

Totally. Well, not totally but in a lot of ways Logan and I are similar. I never know what to say and I tend to feel like I’m on the outside of things. I’ve gotten more confidence over the years and I like to think Logan does too by the end of the novel.

Is your main character like yourself?

I have two main characters. Thea is sometimes impulsive and usually emotional (these are strengths, for the most part), while Peter holds stuff in more and feels isolated as a result. I’m probably more like Peter, unfortunately.

They are both far braver than I am.

Is your main character like yourself?

Every one of my characters is from some aspect of me, whether they’re confident or insecure, bossy or submissive, loud and boisterous or a quiet home-body because really, we’re all a little bit of everything.

While my main character, Abbey Garner, is a very loving, caring girl - she also clings on to a lot of bitterness and resentment towards her father, and has an ongoing love/hate relationship with the mother who abandoned her. To get into her head, I tapped into my own past feelings of bitterness and resentment. But unlike Abbey, they weren’t for my parents!

Is your main character like yourself?

My main character has many of the same qualities I had as a teen. She’s perceptive, has a love of the truth, and feels very deeply. I think that writers often draw from what they know, but building a well-rounded character to fit into your story requires a lot of creative thinking! And that’s the real fun in story writing.

Is your main character like yourself?

When I first started writing fiction years and years ago, I went out of my way to write characters who weren’t like me. They were more like who I WANTED to be. Then I tried writing a book where the character was completely me. Now I think I’ve reached a middle ground. All of my characters have a little bit of me in them. That’s why I know them so well. Take Meg’s dad in TALL TALES. He’s a miserable alcoholic, far from what my dad was like. Or me. For years I couldn’t get his character right because I was so focused on his disease. But then I started thinking about other aspects of his personality. Why is he so miserable? Why is he so mean to his son, Teddy? Then I realized that he hates the things he sees in Teddy because they remind him (unconsciously) of himself. I can certainly identify with that feeling. And suddenly, I knew Dad in a way I hadn’t before.