Ask the Author: Anne Davidson Keller
Answered Questions (6)
Anne Davidson Keller
Ah, it's the best question. Who knows where that inspiration really comes from? I'm inspired by several things that I can tell you about... the love of reading a wonderful book; my writing group who are great readers as well as writers - these women are full of encouragement and good stories; and ideas that stir my imagination. There's a feeling in the gut or the heart that something wants to be expressed. When it keeps tugging at me, then I think I have to try and write it.
Anne Davidson Keller
I'm beginning a novel about the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead, and the grief that binds them together. Let's see if this book can actually be written! Fingers crossed.
Anne Davidson Keller
I felt like it simply arrived. I was in a writing class, and had a story due for critique. The early beginning of Joe McDowell's story came to me. I wrote another segment, and realized the story went somewhere, that I could see a narrative arc. Although it's a different book from that early draft, it took off from there.
Anne Davidson Keller
No one is a writer, until she sits down with a pencil and paper, or a computer. If you have an idea that is chewing on you, start it. Simply start! Get as much good training in technique as you can afford. Get yourself into a group of reader/writers; they will be invaluable to you. Thicken your skin, so that you can use everyone's feedback. Unless they're unkind, you can usually improve your writing by taking suggestions. And read, read, read. When you read something you love, break it down technically to understand what s/he did that blew your mind.
Anne Davidson Keller
I love how close to my spiritual bones I feel when I write, and I love getting to know my characters.
Anne Davidson Keller
For me, the worst of it comes from not making myself sit down to the computer. If you're anything like me, you can find lots of other things that really *need* tending to: toilets to scrub, groceries to buy, reading the news on my phone. Yeah, you get it. The best thing I ever do is to make myself sit down at the computer. I tell myself - and it's absolutely true - that I'll feel so much better if I work on the manuscript. If I'm still resisting, I'll break down that avoidance into tiny steps: set a timer for a few minutes so that if I'm really stuck, I don't have to stay at it for too long; open the laptop, find the document, look at the page I worked on last and begin reading. Usually at that point, I'm rolling. I have to turn off the censor in my head, and let myself just write some words. Editing can happen at another sitting. If this is an editing session, and I'm stuck, I try opening a different (new) page. I'll ask myself a question about the character I can't quite understand, or how the scene looks, smells, sounds, feels. Or I'll research some information if I'm stuck because I can't quite get a sense of what should happen. If I sort out the place of stuckness a bit more, I can usually get going.
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