Who are you?
I’m Gayle Forman. I’m a professional author. I live in Brooklyn.
What do you write?
I write novels, primarily for children and teenagers, sometimes for adults. Though, I’ve come to realize I am better at writing for children than adults. Maybe because the impulse to be self-important and performative is snuffed when writing for kids who have no patience for such BS. My latest book, Not Nothing, started as an overlong adult novel and improved vastly when I realized it was meant to be a middle-grade novel. It’s the same general story, deals with the same themes, but with more directness and less self-importance. Which is something people don’t know about children’s literature. You can write for a young audience, in a young voice, but you can still grapple with some meaty themes. That’s the challenge, and joy, of writing for young people. And in case it’s not obvious, I love what I do. I get to make things up for a living and then go out and have rad conversations about the work with children and educators. What’s not to love?
I started storytelling before I could write, making up elaborate stories to keep from getting bored. I suppose I started writing when I first picked up a fat kindergarten pencil. I started writing professionally when I dropped out of pre-med and started taking random classes that spoke to me, which were creative writing and journalism (also pottery but I did not go that career route; too hard on the nails). I was a journalist for a dozen years before I turned to novels and realized I could tell the truth better in fiction--that old adage fiction is the lie that tells the truth is truth!
Where do you write?
Do I admit that I am answering this questionnaire from an ergonomically disastrous reclining position in bed, which is my preferred winter-time writing location? Mostly I can work anywhere I need to. Writing for me is the escape; I don't need to escape to do it. As for tools, a laptop is all I need (I can’t read my own handwriting so freehand drafting is out for me!). I sometimes, begrudgingly, draft in Scrivener, but I don’t really like it and always have a bit of a welcome-home party when a draft is ready to be migrated back to Word. For scripts and screenplays, I love Final Draft. I wish novel writing had such elegant software but maybe it wouldn’t matter because it’s less dependent upon formulas than movies. Oh, right, I also write scripts sometimes.
When do you write?
This has evolved for me. When I was younger, or rather when my kids were younger and my time more in demand, I would write as soon as I got back from putting them on the school bus until it was time to pick them up. Then. the other parts of the author career started to intrude on that time. Now I work very differently than I used to. For one, I try to write the entire book before I sell it. This gives me time to do what has become my new normal: write a draft of a book, or portions of it, put it aside, for months, maybe years, work on other things, come back to it, lather, rinse, repeat. At first, this process felt like avoidance, or quitting, but what it’s actually done is slowly, and without force, over a period of years, advance several projects forward on their timeline, not my own. I recognize that being able to do this is a privilege, and not everyone can or wants to work this way. But right now, it’s working for me.
Why do you write?
I love to tell stories. I always have. It’s how I keep myself company, how I work through my issues. I am very fortunate that I have been able to make a living doing this thing I love (even if I don’t love it all the time). I love the people I work with, my editors, other kidlit authors, booksellers, librarians, teachers and the kids. The kids are amazing! The kids fuel me. They inspire me. The stories I want to share with them fuel me and inspire me. Coffee also fuels me.
How do you overcome writer's block?
The aforementioned process of round-robin work on multiple projects helps me. Oftentimes, for me, writer’s block was really a product of forcing a book on my timeline, not the book’s. Which is something I needed to do because deadlines and this is how I earn my living. Still, once I figured out how to be patient with my work—and myself—it lowered the stakes and made the entire process so much more enjoyable.
If that’s entirely and annoyingly unhelpful, here are some other things I have done to get over writer’s block. Take a shower. Something about the water unharnesses the creative part of the mind. Take a walk. Write non-chronologically. Go on social media. (Kidding! I quit social media and it’s given me back years of my life to procrastinate so much more fruitfully!)
A general way to ease block is to start a new day’s writing by backing up and revising the previous few pages so that momentum will catapult you into the new work. Similarly, quit writing for the day before you’ve reached the end of your ideas. Hemingway had that quote about never emptying the well but leaving a bit so the spring could be replenished overnight and he was right about that. Also about the joy of having lots of cats. Playing with your pets is also a nice way to ease writer’s block, or just relax.
Bonus: What do you enjoy doing when not writing?
I play with my pets! Walk my dog in the park. Snuggle with my cat. I cook. I bake, I garden. I read and listen to books (often while gardening and baking). I arrange flowers (I just learned how using Trader Joe’s blooms!). I hang out with my friends and my family and bake for them and bring them flower arrangements. I travel. I plan travel for my friends (I am excellent at this; in my next life I’ll be a travel agent). I do the Wordle and the Connections and occasionally the crosswords and very occasionally because it’s mildly painful, the Spelling Bee. I have dance parties. I listen to a lot of Taylor Swift (and others but Taylor has dominated as of late). I do political organizing. I boss my friends into writing their books. I live my life.
My thanks to Gayle Forman for today's interview.