Ask the Author: David Pierce
Answered Questions (9)
David Pierce
As shoppers at the outlet-mall boarded his shuttle bus, their expressions were by turns joyous, frivolous, disingenuous, brittle, and grim—each rendered so by the chisel of money. When his passengers were gone, he swerved into a parking lot and jumped out; in his run to the mountains, he could smell the vapor caves, and mud that would bubble away the artisan's strokes.
David Pierce
I would live for years in the Bloomwald, a continent-sized forest on the planet Belshazar that uses naturally-occuring psychotropics in the plants to induce humans to act as pollinators. From Norman Spinrad's fantastic novel, Child of Fortune.
David Pierce
This summer I am finishing up The Screenwriter's Bible, by David Trottier, as I may have an opportunity to help with the screenplay of a TV miniseries based on books by a favorite adventure author. I am also reading Understanding Media, by Marshall McLuhan; Vidya's Tree: A Mother's Legacy, by Claire Kageyama-Ramakrishnan -- a book of poems the author wrote in honor of her daughter, Vidya, before Claire died; The Poems of Rowan Williams; Let Not the Waves of the Sea, by Simon Stephenson, whose brother and brother's girlfriend were killed by the Christmas tsunami in Indonesia; Perdido Street Station, by China Miéville; City, by Clifford Simak; and Consider Phlebas, by Iain Banks.
David Pierce
A friend suggested the idea of an anthology of essays and poems by people who have experienced intense grief. It occurred to me that, inspired by William James' work, I could have a sort of "Varieties of Grieving Experiences." So, when I had found around 30 contributors, I created a kind of literary environment for them of Sanctuary for Those in Grief, which is our ethos with Friends Along the Road, the organization founded by my wife and me. The author contributions were exceptional. The book turned out amazingly well, and I realized it is actually a sanctuary -- a safe place -- for both authors and readers to explore grief from many causes on their own terms. As far as I know there is not another book like it. It shows how each person grieves in his or her own way, and that there are no limits to the duration and intensity of grief.
David Pierce
My dreams and daydreams inspire my writing. Sometimes a beautiful sunset over the mountains will get me going, or a snatch of conversation overheard in the grocery. I might be triggered by a negative social or cultural situation, or by a sudden idea of how to improve living conditions on the planet. I get a lot of ideas while wallowing in the sensuous zones between wakefulness and sleep, and between sleeping and waking up. There are myriad ways I may become inspired. And I have a muse.
David Pierce
At present I am seeking publication of my first two books: "Looking for Lilli: Living with the Death of Our Only Child," and it's companion, "A Father's Astral Diary: Looking for Lilli in the Otherworld." I'm also attempting to launch a career as a freelance writer, which sounds kind of scary. And now I am exploring an idea I came up with for a book publishing cooperative that would make it much easier for authors to self-publish, and to publish works of others. I have a bunch of stories I've written that I need to polish and begin submitting.
David Pierce
If you would like to be a writer, but worry about constructing paragraphs, try speaking what you wish to say, as if you were talking to another person. I have found that many people who talk very well get stymied when they try to put words on paper. This needn't happen. Write the way you talk. Later, you can revise it to sound more literary, if you'd like.
David Pierce
I am never happier than when I am writing -- except for when I'm body-surfing. When I write, I enter a sort of trance state, out of time and space, and become so absorbed in my work that I forget about the outside world. It is wonderful.
David Pierce
Writer's block troubled me in my teens, twenties, and thirties, but in the 1990s and 2000s I became very active on Internet bulletin boards, and wrote so much, so quickly, that I found a kind of eternal flow, and the ability to visualize sentences and whole paragraphs more or less all at once. Nowadays, if I do get stuck, I simply acknowledge that the answer will soon come to me. It may arrive in a dream, or by synchronicity, or overhearing a fragment of conversation -- by any means, actually.
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