Ask the Author: Jane Ward
Answered Questions (5)
Jane Ward
Writing is a discipline. Do it everyday if you can–journal entries, essays, short stories, novels–even if the work you produce is only fragments of pieces you haven’t quite figured out how to finish. The practice helps you establish writing as a good habit.
Read. A lot. Across genres and styles. Think critically about what you read– what works, what doesn’t. For the stories that don’t quite hang together for you, ask yourself what you might have done differently to make it more successful. When you find stories that are satisfying, ask what makes them so. The more good and not-so-good work you read, the better you will understand how to construct stories of your own.
I spent many years knowing I wanted to do this work. But I would start stories and be unable to finish them. Living and aging and growing all seemed to make the process of finishing stories easier. I knew more about people, about life. My best advice is to give yourself this space and this time to develop.
Read. A lot. Across genres and styles. Think critically about what you read– what works, what doesn’t. For the stories that don’t quite hang together for you, ask yourself what you might have done differently to make it more successful. When you find stories that are satisfying, ask what makes them so. The more good and not-so-good work you read, the better you will understand how to construct stories of your own.
I spent many years knowing I wanted to do this work. But I would start stories and be unable to finish them. Living and aging and growing all seemed to make the process of finishing stories easier. I knew more about people, about life. My best advice is to give yourself this space and this time to develop.
Jane Ward
We can feel a great deal of internal pressure when struggling with a piece of writing or a deficit of ideas, and it's very easy to become frustrated when the work isn't flowing. I try to remember a college writing instructor's advice in those moments. He said, "If you're thinking about characters, even ones you know you will set aside, you're writing. If you're taking notes about what you observe around you, you're writing. If you're sharpening pencils for those notes, you're writing." He meant, of course, that a lot of writing is preparing to write, by thinking and observing and noting. When he said that, I felt a lot of the burden to prove productivity through a growing page count lift off my shoulders. It was a liberating message.
Jane Ward
I always re-read at least one Laurie Colwin novel each summer. Her titles have been reissued this year, and I’m starting with the first to be reissued: Happy All the Time.
Also in the to-be-read stack: Palace of the Drowned by Christine Mangan and The Sum of Us by Heather McGee. I have four books to read in preparation for a Friends of the Library event we’re planning for September. The event theme is Seeking Sanctuary, and the three novels and one memoir are: Wild Boar in the Canefield, Guesthouse for Ganesha, Purple Lotus, and Finding Venerable Mother.
Also in the to-be-read stack: Palace of the Drowned by Christine Mangan and The Sum of Us by Heather McGee. I have four books to read in preparation for a Friends of the Library event we’re planning for September. The event theme is Seeking Sanctuary, and the three novels and one memoir are: Wild Boar in the Canefield, Guesthouse for Ganesha, Purple Lotus, and Finding Venerable Mother.
Jane Ward
I am in the first draft stage of my fourth novel, currently titled Mothering. The main character is an older, adoptive mother, a woman who (we learn as the story opens) gave up the biological child she had when she was a young college student. It’s a part of her life she has kept secret from some of the people closest to her. When the secret is exposed, her family relationships begin to unravel. Big picture, the story is about being a mother, but it’s also about the different kinds of care women provide in all parts of our lives and the kinds of care we women allow ourselves to receive.
Jane Ward
The financial collapse of 2008 brought many stories of hardship and uncertainty into the nation’s consciousness. There was an overwhelming sense that we all would have to remake our lives and our businesses during a recovery period, but for a while no one could imagine what that future would look like.
My stories always begin with a kernel of real-life experience as I attempt to see my way through big questions such as, What will the world look like now and going forward?, and micro questions like, What specifically is happening to Character A, B, C, and so on? This time period gave me the ideal backdrop for answering those questions through a story. And also, enough time had passed that I had some perspective to know how people came through. Or didn’t.
It’s like this with every novel. I create characters and write toward my answer to a question. In this case, I began to imagine a woman caught in the fallout of the recession, and I wanted to know how, after being betrayed and abandoned by someone who loved her, she could possibly get unstuck from those emotions and move on.
My stories always begin with a kernel of real-life experience as I attempt to see my way through big questions such as, What will the world look like now and going forward?, and micro questions like, What specifically is happening to Character A, B, C, and so on? This time period gave me the ideal backdrop for answering those questions through a story. And also, enough time had passed that I had some perspective to know how people came through. Or didn’t.
It’s like this with every novel. I create characters and write toward my answer to a question. In this case, I began to imagine a woman caught in the fallout of the recession, and I wanted to know how, after being betrayed and abandoned by someone who loved her, she could possibly get unstuck from those emotions and move on.
About Goodreads Q&A
Ask and answer questions about books!
You can pose questions to the Goodreads community with Reader Q&A, or ask your favorite author a question with Ask the Author.
See Featured Authors Answering Questions
Learn more