Thank to Miranda Dickinson for taking the time to answer some questions for CLP today!
When did you know writing was for you?
I wanted to write stories from around the age of five. I remember asking my Mum if she thought that my local library would put one of my stories on their shelves if it was made into a book! I wrote all through my childhood and teenage years and even when I stopped writing in my twenties, stories were always there at the back of my mind. I started writing seriously when I turned thirty, although by then very few people knew that I wrote.
How would you describe your books?
I think my books are essentially comedies with a positive message, showing true to life characters who have real jobs, face real problems and learn about their own strengths through the story. I hope they will make you laugh, sometimes make you cry and leave you with something to think about.
Why was Take A Look At Me Now a book you wanted to write?
I wanted to write about someone who doesn’t let life get her down. So many people are feeling uncertain about life right now – money is tight, jobs are shaky and it can be difficult to feel positive about the future. I wanted to show that the end of a job could actually be the start of a whole new chapter of someone’s life. That’s what happened for me. Six years ago I had just lost my job when my unpublished novel was discovered by my publisher on an online writing website. I didn’t know it then, but losing my job was actually the best thing that happened to me, because it made me consider that I could one day earn a living from the stories I had been writing for fun.
What is the hardest part of the writing process for you?
Editing! I love the creative bit of writing a first draft as a novel, mainly because I can get lost in the story and only I can see it. As soon as I begin to edit the book other people’s opinions are taken into consideration and it becomes a little like those tile games where you push around pieces until you find a complete picture. It’s absolutely necessary but can sometimes feel like surgery!
What are your favourite genres to read?
I love comedy, especially crazy comedy like Sir Terry Pratchett’s novels, thrillers for their fast pace and books that have an other-worldly quality to them, such as novels by Neil Gaiman and Sarah Addison Allen. I actually don’t read a lot of romantic comedy because it feels a bit like work!
What do you want readers to take away from your story?
That anything is possible. And that often what you think is the worst thing can be a gateway to something better than you could imagine. I also hope my readers fall in love with San Francisco through Nell’s eyes.
How important do you think social media is for authors these days?
I think it’s very important, but I think authors need to find a sense of fun doing it or else it can become a huge pressure. I have so much fun with social media and I’m fascinated by how much collaboration between author and reader it can encourage. For Take A Look At Me Now, I ran a series of #getinvolved questions, asking my followers on Twitter and Facebook to name characters and businesses, choose items for a character’s apartment and even invent recipes for an after-school baking club. Every suggestion I used as I was writing the book earned the followers a mention in my book acknowledgements – and it was so much fun to share the writing process with people who would eventually read the book.
What would be your advice to aspiring writers?
If you’re writing, don’t call yourself an ‘aspiring writer’! Aspiring writers are those annoying people who tell you that one day they will write a Booker Prize-winning novel, but who never even start… Write the stories you want to write, believe that you have stories other people will want to read and never, ever give up. Take advice and learn from other people, but keep the joy of writing at the centre of everything you do. And don’t listen to the doomsayers who tell you how impossible it is to be published. It happened for me, so it can happen for you!
