Ask the Author: Krista Wallace
Answered Questions (9)
Krista Wallace
I'm from the Jack London school. He says, “You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club." I have a sister-in-law who used to have a daily column in a large newspaper. She didn't have the option of waiting for inspiration, she had to write a column, Every. Single. Day. I don't *have* to produce good quality stuff every single day, thank goodness, but I have always kept that in mind.
I know the book isn't going to write itself, so I just do it. That's not to say I write good stuff every time I sit down to write, but I do find that ideas come as I write, as I make that connection between brain and page.
If I'm really stuck on a specific problem I sometimes take a few days away and my subconscious mind inevitably solves it. There's a kind of *ping* and I say, "That's it!" and then I get back to work.
I know the book isn't going to write itself, so I just do it. That's not to say I write good stuff every time I sit down to write, but I do find that ideas come as I write, as I make that connection between brain and page.
If I'm really stuck on a specific problem I sometimes take a few days away and my subconscious mind inevitably solves it. There's a kind of *ping* and I say, "That's it!" and then I get back to work.
Krista Wallace
I am not sure whether the title came first, or the opening scene. I think I wanted to write a book with Spurious Correlations in the title. Originally the protagonist's name was going to be Marty, but I changed it because reasons. The opening scene (and I talk about this in my podcast [totallyfantastictitle], is based loosely on an actual experience playing a gig with my band. The rest of the premise ... I think the scene in the airport came to me: what if someone had this knife that she couldn't get rid of? that just wouldn't go away? and that person had to go through airport security? The story was built around that, and became Griffin and the Spurious Correlations.
Krista Wallace
Well... My mum asked for a family meeting, and we never got around to it before she died. I will always wonder what she wanted to say.
Krista Wallace
For the moment, yes. I released them in audio because I know the technology, having done narration for some other writers. But! The print and ebooks are in process and will be coming out sooner than I expected. I'm not sure exactly when, because I don't know how long it will take to put them together, but it will be fairly soon. The fall, maybe? Thanks for asking, Mackay!
Krista Wallace
My current project is Gatekeeper's Revelation, which is book four in my Gatekeeper trilogy. Yup, that is not a typo. Book two, Gatekeeper's Deception, is long enough for two books. :-) This is the final section of Kyer's story, of where she came from, why she was left in Hreth, and what her role is in the battle against Dregor, to free Rydris.
It's an enormous challenge to tie all the loose ends together!
It's an enormous challenge to tie all the loose ends together!
Krista Wallace
Giving up is the only way to fail, so Just. Keep. Going. Also, embrace rejection. Seriously. All those stories of writers' work being rejected over and over are true. If a story of mine gets rejected several times I might take a look at it and see if with fresh eyes I notice anything that needs to be tweaked, but then I send it out again. When I speak to other writers and hear about their rejections it is always a good reminder to me that I am not alone! (and here we are back at "Just keep going!")
Krista Wallace
Do I have to choose only one?? Presently the best thing is that because we are all being asked to stay home I have fewer reasons to go out. You mean I get to *stay home* and work on my writing projects All The Time???
I love that when I am lost in storytelling I can look up and find that hours have gone by. That depth of engrossment is both exhausting and exhilarating.
I love that when I am lost in storytelling I can look up and find that hours have gone by. That depth of engrossment is both exhausting and exhilarating.
Krista Wallace
I usually take writer's block to mean that there is a problem I haven't solved in the work yet. For me the best way to deal with it is to step back, and probably work on something else. Sometimes it's another story, and sometimes it's another creative project. I let it have a couple or three days and then I give it another go. I always have more than one project to fall back on, and being creative in another area gets rid of that bogged down feeling.
Krista Wallace
The pandemic never ended. I never hugged my family ever again.
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