Ask the Author: Robin F. Gainey
Answered Questions (7)
Robin F. Gainey
Nightly, Daniel still set two places for dinner, knowing full well how much Sheila would have enjoyed the liver. He had.
Robin F. Gainey
Writer's block can mean your story doesn't want to move the way you want it to move. Try going a different direction with a scene and see what happens. Sometimes the story knows better than the author which way to go. What works for me? WRITE! Write anything. JUST SIT DOWN AND WRITE. Writer's block=procrastination. If your hand is moving, it's moving forward!
Robin F. Gainey
Anonymity for the introverted. LOL.
Robin F. Gainey
Create a premise (I like the "what if" method) that shows character and conflict in the shortest sentence possible. Then write your story to the end before doing ANY editing. Get it down on paper, THEN go back and "groom". It's so easy to get stuck in revision of those first few pages and never get anything finished. That first draft will be very rough and need lots of work, but you will have a great template with which to fill out (and deviate from).
Robin F. Gainey
I'm currently working on a novel of two interwoven story lines. One is set in 2001 along the west coast of Canada and the protagonist is a woman who has lost her three young sons in a plane crash; the other is biographical fiction based on the life of a WWI French Ace.
Robin F. Gainey
I read something that has to do with the story I am writing. The novel I'm currently writing is partially set in WWI France, so I have been reading about that period, along with travel books about the area of northern France. I always put together a soundtrack for the novels I write and listen to it on my daily walks as I think about plot and story. I am a very visual writer so I tend to see my scenes one the "screen" of my imagination as I think. I also visit the settings if I can. My second novel (not yet published) is set in eastern Wyoming. I spent a few weeks making out the trek of my heroine. The reader will be able to follow the footsteps of the protagonist if they wish. I loved that about Michener's Chesapeake. I was reading it as my husband and I drove around Maryland.
Robin F. Gainey
I was living in Rome at the time and observed a beautiful middle-aged Italian woman in a cafe/bar with a little dog. The woman dropped a bite-sized pastry by mistake which was intercepted by her dog before it hit the floor. The premise for my story became: "what if the family dog swallowed the diamond ring intended for someone other than its mistress?"
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