Jeri Westerson

How did you become a writer? I've been writing for fun since I could pick up a crayon. And then full novels when I was a teen...until I had to put my graphic design career on hold to have a baby. When he was two I thought it time to get back into it, but the whole industry had turned to computers and I, alas, had not. So I looked for another career path that I could do at home to raise my son, and decided that becoming a novelist seemed the thing. How hard could it be? [Insert laughter here.] I researched how to get started, formatting a manuscript (had to get used to word processors at last), getting an agent, how to write a query, and, of course, writing the novels. I loved many kinds of genres, but was always more drawn to historicals, so I aimed for that. It took three years to get my first agent. I wasn't peddling the same book for years. Every year I wrote a NEW book. And with each successive agent I didn't get anywhere until my original agent suggested writing an historical MYSTERY. Once I learned how to write a mystery, and a medieval one at that, I got some success with my fourth agent, and sold my first Crispin Guest Medieval Noir to St. Martin's Minotaur (only fourteen years from when I first started writing seriously for publication). Prior to that, as the years tolled on without any contracts, I wanted to see if ANYONE would buy my writing, so I began writing magazine articles on spec, and writing for several local newspapers; two dailies and about five weeklies. Yes, they paid, but never enough. Still, it was excellent training to learn how to turn out the facts fast in a pleasing narrative. 

Name your writing influences. What AREN'T my influences? I'm a big TV watcher, I've always read books, I daydreamed and wrote, listened to music...everything around me has influenced me.  

When and where do you write? First thing when I get up in the morning, in my home office. I used to be able to write all day, but I'm a lot older now and don't have the energy to do that anymore. I used to have a max of 10 pages a day. Now it's down to five. I still end up with oodles of time for research and rewriting. I insist on having my publisher give me 9 months to write, but it usually takes me six. Two books a year is really my max. Any more than that and you begin to sacrifice quality.

What are you working on now? The third in my Tudor mystery series, the King's Fool Mysteries, with Henry VIII's real court jester Will Somers as the reluctant sleuth. This one features Henry's third wife, Jane Seymour. When I'm done with that, I will write my third in my Sherlockian pastiche, An Irregular Detective Mystery series, where a former Baker Street Irregular teams up with a friend to open a detective agency in late 19th century London, in the shadow of Sherlock Holmes himself.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? Not really. I don't call it that anyway. Sometimes you have to step back and let the story percolate (since I don't outline anymore. Or can't, really). I will write in a different location: my dining room, my backyard. But what seems best is to just let it go for several days and try NOT to think about it. It always seems that when you don't force it, it comes rolling out organically. But in the end, it is my job and so you must sit down and produce.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? Let me tell you the WORST writing advice. "Double the amount you receive on your advance to promote the book." DO NOT ever do this! I got into incredible debt, and I already make too little. Certainly not enough to live on on my own (I am a hybrid writer. I am traditionally published and self-published. Self-publishing AFTER you are established traditionally is MUCH better to get your name out there). 

What’s your advice to new writers? Certainly my best advice to new writers is to hone your craft. It will take time. Do NOT jump into self-publishing right away. You will make a career if you go with traditional publishers. Do NOT under any circumstances PAY to a vanity press to publish you. Remember, THEY PAY YOU, not the other way around. Try like the dickens to get an agent first so they can get you in the door of big publishers. You are only a debut author once, and publishers make a big deal out of that with extra publicity. But know that you will have the responsibility of promoting the book yourself: blog tours (don't ever pay for those. Network instead!), bookmarks, travel, genre fan conventions, etc. And most importantly, when you send in that manuscript, immediately start on the next book. If it's a series, sometimes that SECOND book will become the first if you can't sell the first one, so write the second with that in mind.

Los Angeles native Jeri Westerson currently writes two new series: a Tudor mystery series the King’s Fool Mysteries, with Henry VIII’s real court jester Will Somers as the sleuth and a Sherlockian pastiche series called An Irregular Detective Mystery, with one of Holmes’ former Baker Street Irregulars opening his own detective agency. She also authored fifteen Crispin Guest Medieval Noir Mysteries, a series nominated for thirteen awards from the Agatha, to the Macavity, to the Shamus. She’s written several paranormal series (including a gaslamp-steampunk fantasy series), standalone historical novels, and had stories in several anthologies, the latest of which was included in South Central Noir, an Akashic Noir anthology. She has served as president of the SoCal Chapter of Mystery Writers of America, president and vice president for two chapters of Sisters in Crime (Orange County and Los Angeles), and is also a founding member of the SoCal chapter of the Historical Novel Society. See JeriWesterson.com for more info.

Brinda Charry

How did you become a writer? I’ve enjoyed writing ever since I can remember— language, narrative, playing with all of the building blocks of fiction.  

Name your writing influences. Books are my biggest influence. I immersed myself in them since I could read. I am very, very fortunate in that the books I was exposed to were very varied, from a large number of literary traditions (British, South Asian, African, Russian, American) and languages. There are so many books and writers that have shaped me, it would make a very long list if I were to name even some of them. I think much of my writing comes from all of these different voices having left traces of themselves in my head. 

When and where do you write? I have no fixed routine. It depends on my teaching schedule – but I try to write in the mornings, whenever possible. I write every day when I have a project at hand. Where do I write?  I grew up in a small house where we did not have our own desks (let alone rooms) and the idea of privacy was mostly unknown (or ignored!), so I’ve learnt to write wherever there is a bit of space. I still don’t work in an office or at a writing desk – the dining table is fine by me, or the couch, or even the bed.

What are you working on now? A historical novel set in New England in the early 1800s. It is about magic shows (and their performers) in the early American republic – a wild, wonderful, also very complex world!

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? Of course! Things happen that make it hard to write/write well – one is simply tired. But I try not to make too much of it. I think most blocks can be moved, though on some days a little extra effort is needed. 

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? I don’t know if I received this from anyone in particular, but I’ve learnt over the years that it is best if one makes writing a habit – do it every day (or nearly every day). It should become part of your life, almost a way of being, a practice. The more one practices the better one gets. 

What’s your advice to new writers? The above! Also, keep at it. It can be a long journey, disheartening at times, but it’s worth it if you truly think you have a story worth telling.

Brinda Charry came to the United States from India as a graduate student and has been living here since. She has published novels and a short-story collection in India and the UK. Her writing has won several awards and prizes. THE EAST INDIAN is her first novel to be published in the United States. Also a specialist in English Renaissance Literature (Shakespeare and contemporaries with a focus on race, cross-cultural engagement in the 1600s and 1700s, and the early history of globalization), she has published a number of books and articles in her field. She currently lives in Keene, New Hampshire.

Clémence Michallon

How did you become a writer? I was seven years old when it occurred to me that if books exist, it means people must be writing them. I was a kid who learned to read early, but before that, I had never thought to wonder how books came to be at all. I was content just reading them. 

The lightbulb moment came one school day, when my teacher put a poster on the blackboard—it was an illustration from a children’s book, and it featured a squirrel in a tree, and a bird flying close to the squirrel. We were told to imagine what the two animals might be saying to each other. Maybe the bird was lost and needed directions?

Completing that exercise was the most fun I’d ever had. And that was the day I came home and announced, “I want to be a writer.” I kept at it, writing little stories, and then detoured my way through some pretty bad poetry in middle and high school, and started a lot of things I never finished in college.

Becoming a journalist taught me discipline. It taught me to sit down and write. In a newsroom, the writing has to happen now. There is no time to wait for inspiration. And running marathons taught me that if I work on a bigger goal a little bit every day, those small efforts will add up to something larger. That’s how I ended up being able to write novels.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). Megan Abbott, for starters. The Fever was the first novel of hers I read, and it was life-changing. I was struck by her prose, and by the way she writes about girlhood and womanhood. I set out to read her other books and couldn’t get enough of her work. There is something so vivid and sensory about her writing, including her latest novel, Beware the Woman, which had me in its thrall from the first pages. All of which is to say, Megan Abbott changed my life as a reader and as a writer.

Mary Higgins Clark was also an influence: I spent an afternoon reading my mother’s copy of Loves Music, Loves to Dance, one summer when I was a kid. I started flipping through it, skipped to the big reveal, thinking I’d jump to the most interesting part, then learned a vital lesson: you cannot enjoy the payoff of a crime novel if you don’t go through the buildup first. The ending of that book is absolutely terrifying.

And, you know, I’m always reading, and I have intense memories of books I read while I was working on The Quiet Tenant. Those included Oyinkan Braithwaite’s My Sister, the Serial Killer;  Alexis Schaitkin’s Saint X; Zinzi Clemmons’ What We Lose; Sarah Moss’s Ghost Wall; Paul Tremblay’s Survivor Song; Rumaan Alam’s Leave the World Behind; Alafair Burke’s The Better Sister; Kate Elizabeth Russell’s My Dark Vanessa; Daisy Johnson’s Sisters; Hilary Leichter’s Temporary; Lucie Britsch’s Sad Janet; and Lily King’s Writers & Lovers.

Lisa Taddeo’s Three Women is why I ended up writing the main character’s perspective in The Quiet Tenant in the second person, and Rachel Monroe’s Savage Appetites informed much of my thoughts about the ways we think and talk about crime.

When and where do you write? Whenever I have time, and wherever I can. I’m on book leave right now, so I get to write at my desk during the day. When I’m working at my day job (I’m a journalist), I’ll work on my fiction in the morning and/or in the evening. Sometimes, if I feel the need for a change of venue, I’ll move from my desk to the little red cafe table in the kitchen. That’s enough to feel like I’m moving from one job to the other. But really, I’ll write anywhere. I have written on my phone in the subway. When I’m working on a first draft, all that matters is getting the words down. It’s liberating to let go of the ideal writing setup – and I offer this as a suggestion to other writers.

What are you working on now? What am I not working on? The night before The Quiet Tenant came out, I sent my agent the draft of a new psychological thriller. The following day, I broke the laptop on which I wrote that novel (which was also the laptop on which I wrote The Quiet Tenant), so you could say I’m working on not breaking any more computers! But really, I’m working on this manuscript, getting it into shape. That’s my favorite part: when I have a complete draft and can play with various aspects of it, and hopefully make the whole thing a little better.

I’m still working on a few things for The Quiet Tenant, too. I have a bit more travel planned, and as I type this, I’ve recently returned from Brookline, where I did an event with Paul Tremblay, and Houston, where I did an event with Ashley Winstead. It’s been a fun summer promoting the book and meeting generous writers and readers. I’m working on getting my life back to normal after all this excitement. As of this morning, I have groceries in my fridge, for the first time in a week!

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? I don’t think I have. That doesn’t mean I think I’m immune to it, though. Nor does it mean I haven’t struggled, been stumped, or had moments of uncertainty. So far, my experience has been: “Get an idea, white-knuckle my way through the first draft, start having more fun during revisions, endure occasional moments of intense paranoia that nothing is working, and carry on.”

I have a friend who told me countless times, when I was working on The Quiet Tenant, to just finish the first draft. A friend like that might be the best remedy to guard against writer’s block.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? I had a creative writing professor in France who was also a novelist. One day, while talking about character development, he said, "By the end, you have to know everything about a character. What are they like? What do they eat? How do they f**k?” So very French, no?

I found it a bit cliché. I mean, it seemed like something an eccentric writing instructor would say in a movie. But years later, I discovered he was right! Once you’ve written a novel, you know if a particular aspect of a character’s life doesn’t come through on the page. You just do. So, as long as I don’t know something about a character…I keep digging.

What’s your advice to new writers? Read. When you think you’ve read enough, read more. I don’t care which format you read in—paper, e-book, audiobooks, First Folio, whatever gets you to read. You cannot write if you don’t read. Read in your genre, and read outside of it, too. You never know what’s going to end up instructing your writing.

And, of course: Finish. The. First. Draft. It doesn’t matter if it’s not good. You’ll fix it in due course!

Clémence Michallon was born and raised near Paris. She studied journalism at City University of London, received a master’s in Journalism from Columbia University, and has written for The Independent since 2018. Her essays and features have covered true crime, celebrity culture, and literature. She moved to New York City in 2014 and recently became a US citizen. She now divides her time between New York City and Rhinebeck, NY.