Ask the Author: Jane Messer
Answered Questions (9)
Jane Messer
No mysteries spring to mind now. I feel I've really gone deep into our family and my life's mysteries through Raven Mother.
Jane Messer
No, I cannot! I'm so not a horror writer. But I've been enjoying reading horror with some of the writers I'm working with - middle grade and adult fiction.
Jane Messer
Raven Mother grew out of very real, perplexing questions and situations that were arising in my own family. Some critical turning points were when my dying aunt Ruth asked me to see her and my dad's mother's grave. She said no one had gone since my grandmother died. Fifty years had passed. I had questions for my father about his childhood and Bella as a mother. And historical/political questions about her life - she lived through two world wars, the Holocaust, defended Palestine during WW2, worked in slums, with child refugees. Why did she end her life when she was still relatively young? What happened between her and others in our family? These are some of the questions that propelled me through the research and writing of Raven Mother.
Jane Messer
Tricky question because ideas come from all over the place, from life, from ideas riffing off other ideas or books or situations. But the really serious writing, the writing that I'm committed to, comes from aspects of my own life that I want to explore and develop - either fictionally or through nonfiction.
Jane Messer
Since finishing Raven Mother I've been working on short stories and nutting out some ideas for essays.
Jane Messer
You're learning a craft and techniques, it's not magic, it's practice. All writing can improve with practice. Read widely, and thoughtfully, read like a writer with keen attention. Live your life to the fullest. Takes notes, but don't be self conscious. Writing takes time, many years, keep at it. All writing is rewriting. Don't rely on getting drunk on red wine to write, don't tidy the house first.
Jane Messer
Living vicariously. Time moves, I lose track of it. Working from home, or the train or the cafe or the park seat. So flexible! The imagined world is so powerfully ... fun and interesting. Working with words and punctuation. Having friends who're writers too.
Jane Messer
It's not something I have much experience with. If I'm stuck working on a piece or a chapter, I'll go on with another piece of writing instead. I've kind of learned to gladly wrestle with those difficult times.
Jane Messer
I'd be heading into Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials worlds. For sure. Get on one of the canal boats, sit on the rooftop with Lyra, explore.
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