Question and Answer

Q & A with JoAnna

How did you get the ideas for Restless Mind and The View From The Fishbowl?

I started writing a short story during my junior year of High School that was the ultimately the hatching of Restless Mind.  The short story turned out not to be so short, and I abandoned the project for over a decade.  Eventually, I returned to the core idea of writing about a woman with mental illness; this time with greater skill and enough follow through to write the whole novel.

I really liked writing about mental disorder, and how that impacts the protagonist, so I started researching other conditions to write about.  Fishbowl was originally conceived because I have a friend who suffers from agoraphobia.  My friend's experiences are nothing like what Caleb goes through, but the emotional attributes of agoraphobia is what planted the seed for the book to bloom into Fishbowl. 

How do you come up with plotlines?

I brainstorm a lot before I write.  I hated pre-writing when I was a kid, but now I realize it's a necessity.  I start with one character and one general plot concept and keep adding other characters and subplots until I have an entire outline of the story.  This outline changes multiple times throughout the writing process as I continue to think of new ideas during the rough draft stage.  I think of it more as a map, with many directions, rather than a turn-by-turn that I have to stick to.  That way, if I want to change course, I can because I will always know where else I can go if it doesn't work out.

Where do you seek inspiration?

I use music to inspire me.  Songs help me capture a character by listening to what I think the character would choose.  If I want to write about a cowboy, I wouldn't be as successful doing so while listening to rap. 

I also look to my own life experiences or the experiences of people I know for inspiration.  I often model my characters after people I know or have known, even though I usually change certain attributes to make them unique and separate from the person the character was inspired by.  Sometimes, I just like one thing in particular about a person, like a devilish laugh, the color of someone's eyes or a mannerism that I think is endearing.

How long does it take you to write a novel?

My first novel, Restless Mind, was written in 5 weeks from start to finish.  I was writing up to twelve hours a day, though, so that's not representative of the time frame that's actually necessary to write a 100,000 word novel and be thorough about it.  The View From the Fishbowl took a bit more time, about four months to write, but I got writer's block half way through and took close to a month off from working on it.

The story I'm currently writing, Under the Maple Tree, has been a work-in-progress for almost two years.  I haven't had much time to write, and it has slowed my progress down immensely.  Plus, writer's block comes and goes and when I can't write I go back to pre-writing.  Maple Tree has already been through a lot of pre-writing and has morphed into a tale far different than what I started out with.  I am looking forward to finishing it and see how it turns out, that's still a long way off from now.

Do you feel self-conscious about allowing others to read your work?

The first time I was asked this question, I was surprised by it.  I'm not overly confident, by any stretch of the imagination, but it also never occurred to me to be self-conscious about my writing.  I guess I have always been too excited to share it to ever be shy about being judged.  I also invite feedback from all my readers, because there's always room for improvement!

Which one of your books is your favorite and why?

Fishbowl is my favorite.  I like it better than Restless Mind because I feel like it's a more skillfully written novel.  The plot and subplots are more complex, the cast of characters is bigger and the emotions run much deeper.  The whole novel is a lot heavier than Restless Mind, but in a good way, probably because it's more suspenseful.  Fishbowl more entertaining for the reader.  Altogether, I feel like it's just a much better book.

That being said, I would still say that I enjoyed writing Restless Mind the most simply because the excitement level was much higher since it was my first book.

You never know though, maybe my seventeenth or my seventieth novel will be my all-time favorite!