Writer Q and A tag

A great blogger friend of mine tagged me for this Q and A tag. Thanks Brigid, for tagging me. I’ve enjoyed getting to know her and her stories and we’ve been swapping advice and fun WIP excerpts and such. Aww…blogger friendship!  You should go check out her blog Word Fare.

Sorry – it alwaystakes a while for me to finish tags because it takes forever to find the right people to tag. 🙂

Here’s the Tag info/rules:

1. Thank the blogger who nominated you and link to their blog in your post.

2. Answer the questions that the blogger who nominated you has provided.

3. Nominate up to 10 other bloggers.

4. Create ten questions for your nominees and notify them of their nominations.

Now, onto the questions I get to answer 🙂

Who do you think is your greatest writing influence?

Currently, an author by the name of Hallee Bridgeman, although she probably doesn’t know it, her christian romance novels are what really inspired me to to take on writing Christian Romance. And my College English professor because he had so much faith in my writing, even when we disagreed on everything else political and religiously LOL.

Where is the strangest (or most unexpected) place you have ever gotten a story idea?

Um…hm.  A lot of my story ideas come from other books or church sermons, or nature, or of bible verses. or people’s love stories, friends’ experiences… I think the most interesting good story idea I have gotten recently came from a dream my dad had. Sure we might have our own dreams about story ideas, but to get an idea from a dream that my dad had?? AND it was a very detailed dream, at that. We sat for 30 minutes while he told me and I typed it out. Definitely going to be a project soon here in a year or two.

Do you try to write a certain number of words per day/week/month, or do you just write as much as you feel like?

Nope, I just write. I don’t have word count goals. I don’t often have a lot of time to write. I end up writing late at night, or when my girls are sleeping or watching TV so I don’t have time to really achieve a goal anyway. Most of what I’m currently doing is editing anyhow so.

What is your favorite genre to write, and why is it your favorite?

Christian Romance. Although someday I’d love to write historical fiction, and even a Dystopian series. However, Romance is what I love to write about. Why? I suppose I’m a sucker for it at heart…which is funny b/c romantic comedies drive me nuts…

What is the first book you remember reading?

I’m not sure what the first book I actually ‘read” was. I know that I started writing stories in third grade after hearing this cute little story about an orphan girl. I didn’t read that one, I listened to a teacher read that one. I recall in 5th grade, reading the abridged  version of Heidi and falling in love with that story, which kindled the desires to continue to write stories. I just don’t remember the very first book I ‘read’. I do remember Little Women being a fascinating book that led to many written scribbles but I don’t remember when I read that one exactly.

What is the first story you remember writing?

I’m pretty sure I rewrote my own version of Little Women. (Not all the way) Loved that book as a kid. I also wrote out a story that was 70 pages long (pretty good for an elementary kid!) that was about an orphan girl living in an orphanage, who wanted to run away, until she meets another newer orphan boy who comes to live there…this was kind of loosely based on a book I heard my 3rd grade teacher read to our class.

Whenever you feel stuck in your writing, how do you get yourself unstuck.

When I’m having trouble writing, it’s tricky.  I think sometimes to get unstuck I have to be by myself, alone to write. Often I am not alone and sometimes that’s okay, but sometimes I need to go somewhere to write alone so I can concentrate. Alone means, away from family. 2nd thing I think helps me to overcome writer’s block is by writing something new. If I hit a snag in the particular project I’m working on, sometimes I have to take a break and work on another idea or project, because my mind sometimes has this great idea for the OTHER project and won’t leave me alone. Once I get that out of my system, then I can go back to the original one at hand. Lastly, sometimes, I just have to wait it out.

If you could meet any author, who would it be?

There are so many, I could never choose just one! Lynn Austin, Hallee Bridgeman, Nadine Brandes, Ann Brashares, Frank Peretti. I’d love to meet a few screenplay writers as well.

Are you a planner or a pantser? (That is, do you plan out your stories, or do you make them up as you go?)

I’m definitely both. I love the freedom of sitting down and writing, but I still have to have a skeleton structure. I usually write an outline in paragraph form, and it’s not always in sequential order. I’m working on becoming more organized in how I approach new Works in Progress. With the first 4 completed manuscripts I’ve done, they have all been on the fly. That is, I’d write up a forth or a half of the story, go back and make an outline halfway through to recalculate my course, if you will.

Do you listen to music as you write? If so, what kind of music do you listen to?

Instrumental music. Or the sounds of nature. (rain, ocean waters, river waters,)  It blocks out people talking. I usually wear headphones b/c I don’t have a secluded spot to write. Me wearing headphones says “GO AWAY. Don’t talk to me.” I swear, every single time I would sit down and write my first MS (back in the Spring of 2014) someone would want to come up and talk to me. As soon as I sit down.

Instrumental music calms me down, and helps me focus and write without being distracted.

Now, my 10 questions for YOU

  1. How do you organize your writing projects?
  2. Has an author you formerly respected/loved ever disappointed you somehow?
  3. What is easier for you to develop, your characters, or your plots? Why?
  4. Do you have a Fandom? If so, what is it?
  5. Do you read fast or slow?
  6. Describe your most recent Work in Progress in one paragraph
  7. Why do you write?
  8. What inspires you to write?
  9. Name a bookish pet peeve that you have.

I tag:

Faith, 

Zac,

Hannah at Ink Blots and Coffee Stains

Katie: @ A Writer’s Faith

Alyssa: @ 1 Six 1 Five (really cool blog title, you should read the ‘why’ behind it!!\

Rachel: The art of writing for him:

Happy writing 🙂

 

Comments

4 responses to “Writer Q and A tag”

  1. Katie Grace Avatar

    Thanks for tagging me! Hopefully I can squeeze a post with this in it somewhere in the month. 😀

  2. faithrivens Avatar

    Thanks for the tag 🙂 I’ll definitely try to get to this soon!
    These are some great answers. I love Little Women. Such a classic novel! Always great to learn more about you <3

    1. S B Williams Avatar

      Thanks faith! I always like finding out more about you and your writing too.

  3. Hannah White Avatar

    Thank you for the tag! I will get to it as soon as I can! (Instrumental music is the best yesyes)

Sara Beth Williams, Author