Ask the Author: David Patneaude
Answered Questions (9)
David Patneaude
I have a number of books on my Kindle, waiting for me to get to them, but I think I'm going to try to get to the most recent (2016) Printz Award winner and honor books--Bone Gap, The Ghosts of Heaven, and Out of Darkness. Those are some great titles! Right now I'm reading Trevor Noah's Born a Crime. What an interesting (and often difficult) life he's had so far!
David Patneaude
Tomorrow I might come up with a different answer, but right now (and maybe tomorrow, too), I'd have to say my favorite fictional "couple" (an odd one, for sure) is Mattie Ross, age 14, and Rooster Cogburn, age vintage. They're both brave, they're both opinionated, they're both vocal, they both have a set of ethics (although they're not necessarily the same set), and a sense of right and wrong and justice (again, not necessarily the same sense). What really endeared them to me, though, is the chemistry they make together. It's a chemistry of mutual disdain, mutual annoyance, mutual goal-setting, mutual respect, mutual caring, mutual achievement, mutual self-sacrifice, and in the end, mutual love. Their madcap interactions had me constantly engaged and frequently laughing out loud. This was great, except while I was riding the train through France and laughing uncontrollably and the French people (not to mention my wife) were giving me strange looks. Worth every bit of it!
David Patneaude
Wow! What a memory, Amy! Yes, I was at Ronald Elementary in second, third, and fourth grades, so I'm figuring 1951-54. Was I in your class for one of those years? I think I had Mrs. Carlson in fourth grade (cut short when we moved back to Seattle), but I'm drawing a blank on my other teachers. I do remember they were all nice, I loved the school (unusual for me at that time), and I didn't want to leave. If you had a hand in getting me off to a strong start, I appreciate it!
David Patneaude
I deal with writer's block by nipping it in the bud. I outline. Before I begin writing that first draft, I write a scene outline, which is a series of short (a few sentences) summaries (synopses) of the scenes I visualize will make up the story. Once I begin the actual writing, I might add or delete scenes and move them around, but the initial outlining gives me a map. I don't get halfway into the writing and hit a wall and have to ask myself, Now what?
David Patneaude
I used to think the best thing was the initial writing, getting the story down on paper, getting that first draft finished. But for me it's kind of evolved. What I enjoy now is going back to the first draft and the dozens of subsequent drafts and making them better. Revising, in other words.
David Patneaude
No magic formulas or secrets, unfortunately. It boils down to reading and studying the kinds of stories you want to write, hanging around writers and other industry people who are willing to give advice and feedback, taking classes, reading good books about the craft, and getting into a critique group made up of folks who are serious about being writers. But the most important advice is just do it. You have to write. You have to write lots of bad stuff before you write something good. And then you have to be persistent. You have to be persistent with your writing, and you have to be persistent when you get those first rejections. Don't give up. If you give up, you for sure will never get published. If you don't give up, if you work hard and pay attention to criticism and what's going on around you and what the industry is doing, you just might.
David Patneaude
I have a lot of stories in the works but the one I'm spending most of my time on right now is a YA mystery with some significant speculative elements going on.
David Patneaude
I love to write, so it's mostly a question of deciding which idea is worth spending a few years of my life working on.
David Patneaude
The idea for EPITAPH ROAD came from simply looking around at the world and observing how badly our so-called leaders, predominantly men, have screwed things up. After that it was just asking myself that What if? question, and in this case it was What if women were in charge?
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