Ann Jacobus

How did you become a writer? Acting or directing were my early aspirations but I was too inhibited, had four kids, and didn’t live in LA or NYC. In fiction writing I get to do both plus produce, design sets and costumes, stage manage, etc. and can work at any hour any place—a necessity if you have four kids. I didn’t start writing seriously though until my mid-thirties and didn’t publish a novel until my fifties.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). I keep a running list of all my favorite writers and books in order to answer questions like this because I tend to go blank on the spot. But it’s seven pages long now, single spaced. Writers learn by reading—and watching and listening. I’ve always been obsessed with story and felt that plotting and premise were weaknesses of mine. So I studied screenplays, plays and watched films for homework. A few screenwriter-playwrights I revere include Thornton Wilder, Charlie Kaufman, Nora Ephron, and Stanley Kubrick for the way they tell a story as much as for the stories they tell. Novelists whose writing I’m in awe of include Miriam Towes (The Fying Troutmans, All My Puny Sorrows), Jeffrey Eugenides (Middlesex), Virginia Woolf (anything), and J.R.R. Tokien (the Lord of the Rings Trilogy). Other inspiring writers for me include Dr. Suess, Dav Pilkey, Carlos Castaneda, C.S. Lewis and Annie Dillard.

When and where do you write? Mornings—I have just a few hours of semi-productive multi-neuron firing in me and then I’m useless. My “office” is a comfy chair with my laptop screen raised to eye level thanks to a small, foldable stand to reduce neck and shoulder wear and tear. I recommend it. Long plane flights are good—Isn’t there some writer who flies to Tokyo and back to revise manuscripts? I’d like to try that if someone will pay for it.

What are you working on now? A ghost story/thriller set in Arkansas about a religiously conservative family and their increasingly clairvoyant daughter’s relationship with an agitated spirit.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? Yeah, right now. After I send the above ms. off I don’t have any ideas for my next novel. I envy people with a long list of premises just waiting to be spun into prose. Mine come slowly and piecemeal, similar to extracting molars. But I’ll start researching something that fascinates me and wait for a story to bloom.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? An author I admired told me early on that the only writers he knew who were successful were the ones who made it their first priority and never gave up. More myopically, I go by, “Just do it.” Just get something—anything—down and don’t judge yourself. Then, improve it. Also research and write about what pulls you and what you feel passionate about. You may be improving it for a long time.

What’s your advice to new writers? You are perfecting a craft, no different from learning to play a musical instrument to the point where people will willingly pay to listen to your version of “Für Elise.” Don’t be afraid or put off by the work you need to do, but don’t kid yourself either. Write every day, if possible (grocery lists count), take classes, find good readers and/or a writing group. Then, even something that’s well-crafted, and has readers responding enthusiastically, STILL has to be promoted vigorously by you the author, a whole new, unpaid skill-set. If there’s anything else you’d rather be doing, then you are better off doing that. Harumph. But not to be too discouraging—if you can get beyond all the nay-sayers, you’re golden. I wouldn’t do anything else.

Ann Jacobus is the author of YA novels The Coldest Winter I Ever Spent, and Romancing the Dark in the City of Light. She graduated from Dartmouth College, and earned an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She has published essays, articles, poetry, and short fiction; teaches YA novel writing for Stanford Continuing Studies; and is a former suicide crisis line counselor and always a mental health advocate. When she’s not reading, she enjoys swimming, sailing, dogs and kids, and binging Netflix series. Find her at www.annjacobus.com, and on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest.