REPORT FROM A FUGITIVE.: READ TUESDAY. TWENTY QUESTIONS WITH...R.B. AUSTIN.

Monday 2 December 2013

READ TUESDAY. TWENTY QUESTIONS WITH...R.B. AUSTIN.

Writers chatting to each other on writing. Tedious or devious? Let’s have twenty questions, and find out. In this guest-spot, R.B. Austin delivers the answers...
   Though this series of posts supports the READ TUESDAY sale, not all authors are able to host a sale on the day. We're getting closer to the big day. R.B. can't arrange a sale in time for READ TUESDAY. She's welcome on the blog anyway.

1. Fire rages in your house. Everyone is safe, but you. You decide to smash through the window, shielding your face with a book. What is the book?

Stephen King’s On Writing has been sitting on my nightstand waiting for me to read it for over a year now.
   (I’m not a fan of non-fiction books, but I’ve been told this is a must read for writers. I’ll get to it soon…I promise.)
   I’d probably grab that one, since my Paperwhite will be tucked up my shirt so I can take it with me.

2. Asleep in your rebuilt house, you dream of meeting a dead author. But not in a creepy stalkerish way, so you shoo Mr Poe out of the kitchen. Instead, you sit down and have cake with which dead author?

Bram Stroker. I’d love to converse with him about vampires.

3. Would you name six essential items for writers? If, you know, cornered and threatened with torture.

Oh, aren’t we all a little tortured? :)
   Computer.
   Bottle of water.
   Chocolate.
   Online cloud space.
   iPod.
   Comfortable chair.

4. Who’d win in a fight between Count Dracula and Frankenstein’s monster? If, you know, you were writing that scene.

Definitely Dracula. I don’t think F’s monster had much in the brains department. J

5. It’s the end of a long and tiring day. You are still writing a scene. Do you see it through to the end, even though matchsticks prop your eyelids open, or do you sleep on it and return, refreshed, to slay that literary dragon another day?

If I’m in the middle of a scene and the words are flowing and my fingers are flying, I don’t stop for anything. I’ll sit in that seat and write, much to my stomach's and bladder’s dismay.

6. You must introduce a plot-twist. Evil twin or luggage mix-up?

Evil all the way, baby.

7. Let’s say you write a bunch of books featuring an amazing recurring villain. At the end of your latest story you have definitely absolutely positively killed off the villain for all time and then some. Did you pepper your narrative with clues hinting at the chance of a villainous return in the next book?

No. If one of my characters is truly dead they will stay dead. Although I might hint about the villain’s child that will come back and extract revenge for his father’s death.

8. You are at sea in a lifeboat, with the barest chance of surviving the raging storm. There’s one opportunity to save a character, drifting by this scene. Do you save the idealistic hero or the tragic villain?

The hero. The villain would probably push me overboard so she can have the life raft to herself.

9. It’s time to kill a much-loved character – that pesky plot intrudes. Do you just type it up, heartlessly, or are there any strange rituals to be performed before the deed is done?

There would be some crying, maybe lighting a candle, a pause or two in memory of, but then I’d just start typing.

10. Embarrassing typo time. I’m always typing thongs instead of things. One day, that’ll land me in trouble. Care to share any wildly embarrassing typing anecdotes? If, you know, the wrong word suddenly made something so much funnier. (My last crime against typing lay in omitting the u from Superman.)

I have a horrible time distinguishing between lose and loose. I think I was sick when they taught that lesson in Elementary School. I’m so lucky to have Ella. She sets o and oo straight.
   (Ella being one of the girls at www.2unpublishedgirls.com - Eclectic Ed.)

11. I’ve fallen out of my chair laughing at all sorts of things I’ve typed. Have you?

I’ve always wondered how writers come up with tear-running laughter scenes. My comedy comes, if at all, in the form of one-liners. So, no chair falling when I read my work.

12. You take a classic literary work and update it by throwing in rocket ships. Dare you name that story? Pride and Prejudice on Mars. That kind of thing.

Little Aliens.
   (Alien Resurrection meets Little Women, with Winona Ryder - Eclectic Ed.)

13. Seen the movie. Read the book. And your preference was for?

The book. ALWAYS the book.

14. Occupational hazard of being a writer. Has a book ever fallen on your head? This may occasionally happen to non-writers, it must be said.

No, a book hasn’t fallen on my head, but many have fallen on my foot before. And it always happens to be a hardcover one, too.

15. Did you ever read a series of books out of sequence?

*gasps* Absolutely not. ;) My OCD tendencies will not let that occur.

16. You encounter a story just as you are writing the same type of tale. Do you abandon your work, or keep going with the other one to ensure there won’t be endless similarities?

I keep going. When the stories are in my head I just have to get them out. Now whether or not that story will ever be published is a different question.

17. Have you ever stumbled across a Much-Loved Children’s Classic™ that you’ve never heard of?

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame.

18. You build a secret passage into your story. Where?

Ooh, I’d love to have a secret passage in my house. I think one of the entrances should be in the bathroom. No one looks for a secret passage in that room.
   (Never use the bathroom in R.B. Austin's house - Eclectic Ed.)

19. Facing the prospect of writing erotica, you decide on a racy pen-name. And that would be…

Vixen Starr.

20. On a train a fan praises your work, mistaking you for another author. What happens next?

I’d tell the fan the truth and we’d either have a good laugh or if I read books from that author, a discussion about his/her work.

Thank you so much for hosting me on your site, RLL. I appreciate this opportunity to “speak” with your readers.

I’m a huge supporter of READ TUESDAY and though my novel, Fallen Redemption, will not be on sale on December 10 (it will remain its low e-book price of $2.99) I’m honored to be included in the READ TUESDAY promotion.

(The point was to invite people to the blog, whether in the sale or not - and whether published or not. R.B. was invited as she ran a site called www.2unpublishedgirls.com - though by the time I stumbled to the site, she was published - Eclectic Ed.)