Ask the Author: Isabeau Vollhardt
Answered Questions (11)
Isabeau Vollhardt
She read the latest news, scrolled through to see the photos, and there he was -- the President, in a new uniform, with an armband displaying two lightning bolts. Her heart sank as she realized the democracy really was dead.
Isabeau Vollhardt
oh.....I would go to Moominland. I would want to meet the Moomins and get to know them, and take quiet boat rides on the water under the full moon with them. I fell in love with the Moomins when I was eleven. Tove Jansson created such a loving world when she created them.
Isabeau Vollhardt
finishing "The Mechanism Demands a Mysticism" and then reading "The Prophecies of Nostradamus".
Isabeau Vollhardt
why my father ended up getting trial custody of me rather than my aunt and uncle.
Isabeau Vollhardt
I had to think about that for a bit, and I'd have to say that it's Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet (I think that was her name). Didn't meet under the best of circumstances (when is a crime ever the best of circumstances?), different social circles, but equals in intelligence.
Isabeau Vollhardt
I let it happen. Like any other endeavor, there's times to take a break -- even a very long break, as I've done a couple of times. One can only write the best fiction from the life one has lived, and if there are experiences you haven't had yet, take a break, explore a new interest, try a different genre. Trust the process. It's magical, it's mystical, and it's ephemeral. It has a natural rhythm all its own.
Isabeau Vollhardt
The best thing is that it keeps me curious and searching for new stories in all media that move me.
Isabeau Vollhardt
Read. Not just the genre you're interested. Read widely. Read not just modern fiction -- definitely go to classic literature (my joke about my high school reading choices was that once I realized, and apologies to writers in the genre, that romance writers would recycle the same plot and just change the character names and setting, reading anything written by a dead author would expose me to better writing styles. Also, if you're a fiction writer, read non-fiction too. Learn how to research; it makes the fictional world more real.
Lastly, I recommend John Gardner's "On Moral Fiction" which describes the responsibility the writer has toward the reader, who is really the one who finishes the book. Also, Tillie Olson's "Silences", a survey of writers' correspondences and diaries that reveal the difficulties that come with carving out time for writing (and that dreaded dry spell; they happen). Jean-Paul Sartre's essay "On Writing" is also useful for understanding the writer/reader relationship. If you can find it, Havelock Ellis' book "The Dance of Life" has a chapter about writing.
Learn good editing skills, even if you also rely upon an editor. And remember: at some point, the manuscript is going to be as good as you can get it. It will never be perfect. Because, until it's in a reader's hands, it's not finished anyway.
Lastly, I recommend John Gardner's "On Moral Fiction" which describes the responsibility the writer has toward the reader, who is really the one who finishes the book. Also, Tillie Olson's "Silences", a survey of writers' correspondences and diaries that reveal the difficulties that come with carving out time for writing (and that dreaded dry spell; they happen). Jean-Paul Sartre's essay "On Writing" is also useful for understanding the writer/reader relationship. If you can find it, Havelock Ellis' book "The Dance of Life" has a chapter about writing.
Learn good editing skills, even if you also rely upon an editor. And remember: at some point, the manuscript is going to be as good as you can get it. It will never be perfect. Because, until it's in a reader's hands, it's not finished anyway.
Isabeau Vollhardt
Originally, I thought The Casebook of Elisha Grey was a one-off. When I redrafted it to epublish it, I realized there was more. When writing Casebook II, as I was finishing redrafting, the ideas for Casebook III spawned. So, of course, what happened? While I was writing Casebook III I was also getting ideas for Casebook IV and V. So I'm taking a break for a few days...and then, it's on to IV!
Isabeau Vollhardt
Inspiration can come from anywhere: from a memory; from an incident in my personal life or one I've read about or been exposed to from another art source. In the end, however, I have to say that my best writing comes from the characters themselves. If I'm in need of details to flesh out the story, I'll do the necessary research to render them credible. And whenever I write, I rely on music to keep me going (the playlist is long and varied!)
Isabeau Vollhardt
If Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, an esotericist, drew on memory of another lifetime when writing The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, and if he remembered Atlantis, then approaching Atlantis as a historical place, not merely a speculative one, was a natural course for me.
I began by reading the texts cited below as I drafted The Casebook of Elisha Grey, first put to paper in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s. Donnelly’s text, often derided by scholars of various scientific disciplines, provides a sense of location and time. Phylos the Thibetan's novel described technology in Atlantis during a time that would be similar to Victorian England – when old ways and new inventions alike informed and affected daily life. Waters' controversial record of Hopi wisdom, which describes four migrations to Turtle Island (the North American continent) by citing the first one as "red" planted the seed that Turtle Island was first populated by a significant part of the Atlantean diaspora, and therefore, they would resemble Native Americans & Indigenous Peoples of the Americas.
Donnelly, Ignatius. Atlantis: The Antediluvian World, Harper & Brothers, New York, 1889
Phylos the Thibetan. Dweller on Two Planets, Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1974
Waters, Frank. The Book of the Hopi, Penguin Books, New York, 1977
Hamilton, Edith and Huntington Cairns, eds., “Timaeus” and “Critias” from The Collected Dialogues of Plato, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1961
I began by reading the texts cited below as I drafted The Casebook of Elisha Grey, first put to paper in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s. Donnelly’s text, often derided by scholars of various scientific disciplines, provides a sense of location and time. Phylos the Thibetan's novel described technology in Atlantis during a time that would be similar to Victorian England – when old ways and new inventions alike informed and affected daily life. Waters' controversial record of Hopi wisdom, which describes four migrations to Turtle Island (the North American continent) by citing the first one as "red" planted the seed that Turtle Island was first populated by a significant part of the Atlantean diaspora, and therefore, they would resemble Native Americans & Indigenous Peoples of the Americas.
Donnelly, Ignatius. Atlantis: The Antediluvian World, Harper & Brothers, New York, 1889
Phylos the Thibetan. Dweller on Two Planets, Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1974
Waters, Frank. The Book of the Hopi, Penguin Books, New York, 1977
Hamilton, Edith and Huntington Cairns, eds., “Timaeus” and “Critias” from The Collected Dialogues of Plato, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1961
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