Guest author - Carol Westron
Oct. 22nd, 2013 11:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
charlie_cochraneSo, Carol, what inspired you to start writing?
I can't remember a time when I didn't make up stories in my head. I had a very solitary childhood; I'm an only child who was brought up in a flat situated over shops and, from the age of eleven until eighteen, when I went to university, I used to come home to an empty flat while my parents were at work and spend hours reading or writing when I should have been studying.
Do you have another job (paid or otherwise) apart from being an author? If so, how do you juggle your time?
I have several jobs, both paid and unpaid. I am a Part-Time teacher of Creative Writing; copy and line editor for our small, independent publishing imprint, Pentangle Press; I write reviews and a monthly article about a Golden Age author for Mystery People. Most important of all, I am second Prime Carer and educator for my ten-year-old, autistic grandson, whom I have two or three days a week while his mum is at work or at university. I juggle my time by making the most of small windows of time to do reviews and sort out lesson plans. Rain or shine, he usually spends up to two hours on his garden swing as part of his Sensory Integration Therapy and wants somebody out there with him. If the weather is dry I try to ignore the pleading looks of my grandsons' two pet rabbits, who want to come out of their hutch and eat the vegetable plot, and get on with some work, usually editing or writing reviews. I try to leave first-draft creative writing for points when I've got two days clear, so I can really get into it.
What does it feel like watching your first book fledge and leave the nest?
Exciting and a bit scary. There was a feeling of 'did I really write this?' And another, even stronger feeling of, 'What if everyone hates it?' I was so relieved when the reviews were all so positive and my pride in it has certainly increased because it has been so well received. To be honest, by the time The Terminal Velocity of Cats hit the world, most of my creative mind was focused on the next book.
Are you character or plot driven? What do you do if one of your characters starts developing at a tangent?
Definitely character driven, which means if one of my characters starts developing at a tangent I can follow them. For me, that's what makes writing so exciting. Once, when I was just starting writing full-length crime, I spent several chapters trying to force an unfortunate woman into a sexual relationship with a perfectly nice man because my plot required it. However, as she'd just left a violently, abusive marriage, she, quite rightly, resisted with all her might. The book wouldn't work until I realised that she couldn't do that and I couldn't, and shouldn't, make her. It's a mistake I've never made again.
If you were in a tight corner and had to rely on one of your characters to save you, which would it be and why?
It depends on the sort of tight corner. If it required an intelligent, intuitive, 'thinking outside the box' approach, it would have to be Mia Trent, the central character of The Terminal Velocity of Cats. Mia has a warm heart, however hard she tries to conceal it, but this is balanced by her intellectual curiosity, her training as archaeologist and her scientific determination to get to the truth. If the situation required good-sense, decency and an ability to thump the enemy, I'd have to go for Detective Sergeant Luke Warden. Luke was one of those characters that took me by surprise: he has got plenty of sense and works hard but he's not particularly ambitious, so his attitude isn't tainted by envy. Luke also features in my next novel, About the Children. The action here occurs soon after The Terminal Velocity of Cats, when Luke is back with his permanent Serious Crimes Team, in a nearby town. I always enjoy reading and writing books where characters from one series turn up in another. Perhaps, one day, Luke will get a book where he's the lead detective.
If you had no constraints of time and a guarantee of publication, what book would you write?
The guarantee of publication is no problem nowadays, when so many of us have taken the independent publishing route. The question for us is, 'Would anyone want to read it?'
However, if I had no constraints of time, I think I could take the time to write the two books I have been planning in my head for many years: 'Bounce, Grandma, Bounce' and 'Swinging In the Rain.' These would be about the progress of an autistic, non-verbal, non-compliant and incontinent three-year-old to our totally continent and increasingly independent ten-year-old, who is incredibly loving and holds really exciting, if somewhat bizarre, conversations and usually processes people's responses. I'd want to include an over-view of autism interventions, both behavioural and dietary, and some gluten and dairy free recipes. The trouble is it will take more time and more emotional energy than I can spare at the moment, not to mention opening my grandson to unwanted public attention. Ironically, I could almost certainly find a mainstream publisher for it without any problem.
Is there a classic book you started and simply couldn't finish?
Shamefully, the answer has to be Lord of the Rings. I read the first few chapters, looked at the length of it, and gave up... Three times!
What’s your favourite gay romance/other genre book? And why?
To be honest, yours are the only gay romance books I have read. I love the relationship between Jonty and Orlando and the perils that their love creates but I'm really in it for the crime and the way they solve it. I've just finished Lesson for Suspicious Minds and found it fascinating, especially the psychological insights into the attitudes of the privileged Late-Victorian aristocracy and the involvement of Jonty's delightful parents as part of the investigative team.
Apart from that, my favourite other-genre books are Jane Austen's Persuasion and Mary Renault's The King Must Die. Persuasion is a wonderfully understated story of family manipulation and selfishness, and the belief held by well-intentioned people that what they decide is right must be right, whatever hurt it causes. The King Must Die is just magnificent: incredible language and a sweeping, heroic tale, laced with passion and inescapable tragedy.
What's your next project?
I've got to do a final edit on About the Children for publication in January 2014. Then I'll finish off the comedy crime book I started a few months ago, The Curse of the Concrete Griffin. That should be finished by the end of the year, and I will start 2014 by beginning to write the next Mia Trent, Scene of Crimes book, Karma and the Singing Frogs.
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Date: 2013-10-22 09:46 pm (UTC)jealousimpressed that Carol has titles for everything even the ones that aren't started yet.I was going to ask if there was an ebook edition, but then I engaged brain and followed the link! The Kindle version is on offer at the moment, so my To Read virtual pile has increased.
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