How did you become a writer? 

The first time I started to think of myself as a writer was after writing a feature on my English teacher for the high school newspaper. It was a simple, observational piece, just the two of us baking her mother’s sand tarts in her odd little kitchen, but it meant something to me. Then, when a number of people stopped me and told me how much they were moved, I became hooked. Not just making people feel things, but helping them feel what I was feeling.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). 

There’s a storytelling cadence I find difficult to attribute, but I think it’s an amalgam of the people in my life. I come from a line of big talkers (though I’m not one myself), readers, dealmakers, cooks, restaurateurs, housewives, cattlemen, oilmen, artists, Texan ladies, both polite and no so very. I also come from people who talk a lot about death and the dead, which is a favorite topic. Specific works that marked me early on: The Last Picture Show by Larry McMurtry, Sula by Toni Morrison, Lolita and Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov, Carrie by Stephen King, Orlando by Virginia Woolf, In Cold Blood and others by Truman Capote, plays by Tennessee Williams. I think movies have influenced my writing as much as books. I love the Coen Brothers, Cassavetes, Wes Anderson, small rural films like Tender Mercies and other Old Salt redemption stories, nineties thrillers like The Hand that Rocks the Cradle and Fatal Attraction. The Silence of the Lambs is etched in my soul. 

When and where do you write?

I finally have a proper workday in my home office, a pretty, crowded, old fashioned room with cracked paint and a view into the backyard. It’s a fairly strict 10-3 while the kids are in school. In a perfect world I would write 8-1 and then do something physical or take an art class and then do household stuff, but I let a lot of things slide when I’m writing. I write a lot in my mind when I’m out in the world and frequently use my notes app to jot down the scenes that find me in the school drop-off line. 

What are you working on now?

I’ve just finished a draft of my second book, MURDER BALLAD, another dark southern novel, this time about a young songwriter, a gruesome crime, and a stolen song against the backdrop of the 1977 Nashville country music scene. I’m also romancing my third book, my take on an old New Mexican campfire story. I’m thinking of branching out and writing this one as literary horror. 

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block?

I don’t anymore—I can’t wait to get started every day—but I remember being younger, mid-twenties, and realizing that the act of writing regularly is its own language, and that I wasn’t yet fluent. I think I had a healthy sense of humility telling me, Not yet, keep working. It took me years of squeezing writing into the cracks of my day before I felt confident enough to treat it like I could give it the best of me. I didn’t publish until I was 41 and I really think I needed the time to incubate. 

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? 

Anchor every scene in the senses. (Janet Fitch) I also love this one for writing the unexpected: Have your character find out their husband has died, and then quietly make themselves a cup of coffee. 

What’s your advice to new writers? 

Follow the pleasure. When you hit a stale patch, walk away and dream about the fun scene you’d rather write. Avoid dutiful or didactic writing. Write the lively and the daring. 

Caroline Frost is the author of Shadows of Pecan Hollow: A Novel. www.carolinefrost.com; Instagram: @carolinefrostwriter; Facebook: @carolinefrostwriter.