Ask the Author: Michael Augustyn
Answered Questions (9)
Michael Augustyn
It's an adventure story for young readers, similar to what I read in high school, though my characters are all teens and use their wits and determination to save their lands from hostile forces. Frankly, I think "the market" shies away from stories with reference to any real violence, like war. It's ok to slay dragons and sub-human ogres and demons, but my take is that anything resembling real life that includes violence isn't popular. Yet foreign audiences seem to have little problem with it, maybe because their historical experiences, including recent events, give them a different perspective. But the focus of my new book isn't war. It's meeting a challenge and using any triumph to improve the world, which kings, counselors, and presidents have often failed to do--in the real world.
Michael Augustyn
As far back as high school I had the urge. I was lucky to have good composition teachers. I was encouraged when I got an A-plus on a theme on The Old Man And The Sea from a professor who said that in two decades he only gave two such marks. The entire theme was five paragraphs. Then I saw things and people that hadn't been written about and was moved to try to write about them. It took a lot of hours to find my writer's "voice." I was rejected by a top-notch agent after he praised my first few chapters--very highly, too--so I self-published... and an agent "found" me. My Dracula historical novel is now published in the US, UK, China, Italy, Poland, and Vietnam.
May I add...? My personal belief is that we don't control results, all we can do is make the effort. If you're moved to write, do it in a way that's comfortable for you. Oh, and someone said you can get more inspiration out of half an hour of silence than a half dozen hours of straining. I like that, proved true for me many times.
May I add...? My personal belief is that we don't control results, all we can do is make the effort. If you're moved to write, do it in a way that's comfortable for you. Oh, and someone said you can get more inspiration out of half an hour of silence than a half dozen hours of straining. I like that, proved true for me many times.
Michael Augustyn
Just published an adventure story for middle grade to mid-teens and have to complete another historical novel for adults.
Michael Augustyn
I was told that to be a good writer I had to be a good reader. That's true up to a point. I believe what you really have to be is a good observer, whether "observing" books or just life as it is, paying close attention so you can write about it.
I laughed when I submitted to an agent who, like many agents, wanted to know what popular--best selling--books mine was like. I was told by a film maker that if it wasn't like any, that was a negative. Think about that. Maybe that's why we have how many films about Jason, Freddie, and Robin Hood? Or the Alamo. Be original. Don't worry if what you write will sell, if creative writing is your thing. It's like a comedian telling a joke. Either the audience gets it or they don't. Don't worry about it.
I laughed when I submitted to an agent who, like many agents, wanted to know what popular--best selling--books mine was like. I was told by a film maker that if it wasn't like any, that was a negative. Think about that. Maybe that's why we have how many films about Jason, Freddie, and Robin Hood? Or the Alamo. Be original. Don't worry if what you write will sell, if creative writing is your thing. It's like a comedian telling a joke. Either the audience gets it or they don't. Don't worry about it.
Michael Augustyn
For me, getting the chance to express a gift I've been given: the ability to write. Even if it's just a letter. Really. And you get to portray characters, real or imagined, often filling in where biographical facts end.
Michael Augustyn
I struggled with this for years while practicing at fiction, actually trying to find my writer's "voice." Then--of all things--I saw a commercial in which an ancient tribal group was sitting around a campfire, and the elder was telling a story, complete with inflections and gestures. I realized: I'm trying to be just like that guy. Tell the story!
As for ideas, like where to take the plot, I find that characters "come alive" on their own. Do you know that psychiatrists say that everyone in your dreams is you? Characters are like that. Don't let your beliefs or fears or anything else block the characters from expressing themselves.
As for ideas, like where to take the plot, I find that characters "come alive" on their own. Do you know that psychiatrists say that everyone in your dreams is you? Characters are like that. Don't let your beliefs or fears or anything else block the characters from expressing themselves.
Michael Augustyn
You wake up one morning and walk outside and see figures in monk-like robes, faces shrouded, carrying caskets from the houses around you. Do I need a second sentence!?
Michael Augustyn
How about the Game of Thrones world? Would be interesting to meet the characters in real life--most of them, anyway. Wouldn't get too close to the dragons, though. Or the Dothraki.
Michael Augustyn
reviewing some historical books, like Hunyadi, Myth or Legend by Prof. Joseph Held, and Dereliction of Duty, an analysis of what drew us into the disastrous Vietnam War. Also, more esoteric, Practice of The Presence of God, written by a medieval monk, very short, interesting.
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