Who are you?
My name is Brittney Morris, I’m an award-winning author and video game writer, and I’m based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania!
What do you write?
I write primarily YA, although I’m currently drafting my first adult. It’s a paranormal pitched as Van Helsing meets the Golden Bachelorette. As with video games, I don’t think any words or themes are off limits in the world of books - in fact, if we can’t explore the edges of our earth through books, where can we? Writing was my first love. The day I figured out that someone had to actually create all of the magical books I saw on the library walls, I decided I wanted to do that forever. And I still want to. Every day. It feels like directing a movie with an unlimited budget. I have just one tool: words. They’re an unlimited resource, and throughout my life they’re the only thing that have come easy to me.
Where do you write?
Much of my writing is done curled up in bed in the least ergonomic position you can dream of, because of who I am as a person. It’s just me, Microsoft Word, and a coffee. Or, if I’ve stolen time away from my kiddo to retreat to a cafe, it’s just me, Microsoft Word, and a latte, in a considerably more ergonomic position (hopefully). If I’m aiming for locked-in productivity, I listen to my latest hyperfixation song on repeat with headphones, or if I’m meandering through ideas as I write or workshopping a scene that hasn’t quite come together yet, I’m watching someone play through a video game. Lately it’s been Fears to Fathom and Black Myth Wukong.
When do you write?
I don’t generally set time limits, but sometimes I’ll work in 15-minute sprints. I only set a word count goal if I’m working on a first draft under a tight deadline, which is a situation I try to avoid. I prefer to set my own deadlines whenever I can, but now that I think about it, who doesn’t? My favorite time of day to write is first thing in the morning. I’m one of those feral 5am folks. Usually I’ll stay for a few hours before getting outside and touching grass or doing yoga, or both!
Why do you write?
Like many other writers, I write because I have to. Not because I’m being forced to, or even because I’m lucky enough to have made it my profession, but because it’s such a deeply-rooted compulsion, I’d find a way to do it if I could do nothing else. If I were found on a desert island, dead or alive, I’d be near a rock wall with words scrawled across it. I have too many thoughts to keep them inside. It’s how I process the world. Is it cliche to say the entire world inspires me? My motivation comes from everywhere. Sometimes a totally unhinged question will hit me, and off I’ll go, answering it in 75,000 words. I was inspired to write This Book Might Be About Zinnia when I began to process some lifelong family toxicity I had yet to deal with, and at the same time my then-spouse and I began trying for a baby. I had to grapple with my own relationship with my mother and also sink into preparing to become a mother myself, creating a person for whom I would go to the ends of the earth to find if I ever lost them. I began asking myself questions like what makes a good mother or daughter? Is there such a thing as a perfect mother or daughter? When does unconditional love end as a parent or a child end and altruism begin? And as it turns out, all of those have long enough answers to turn into a book.
How do you overcome writer's block?
Oh, writer’s block, that tricky minx. It appears at the worst times, doesn’t it? Just when you’ve locked in a deadline, set a daily goal, poured your hot drink of choice, opened your laptop, found the perfect writing music, and opened your word processor, all thoughts leave your mind. I’ve found that for me, writer’s block isn’t writer’s block at all. It’s not that I can’t think of anything to write, it’s that the things I’m thinking of have been thought of before, or they’re not as ‘good’ as the ideas of my peers, or they’re not groundbreaking enough, or Nobel Prize-worthy, or they don’t measure up to what I’ve already published, or people might laugh or find me unrelatable, or the idea is too wacky and weird to work, or it’s a half-baked half-concept - such a small sliver of an idea that it would feel like trying to turn a quarter-sized lump of dough into a Pinterest-worthy pumpkin pie.
Take heart if you’ve buried ideas that fit these descriptions, because every category I just named has born a story that’s changed a life. Maybe dig those ideas up and look at them again, and maybe try cobbling some of them together. That’s what I do. I never toss an idea completely. I give each one a folder, and when I feel stuck, I go and read through them. Sometimes they yield award-winning ideas, and other times they were just for fun.
That’s how The Cost of Knowing was born. I started with this bizarre idea of a boy working in (of all places) a toothpaste factory, who could see the future of each tube of toothpaste he touched, and eventually he evolved into Alex Rufus.
Bonus: What do you enjoy doing when not writing?
Yoga, video games, napping, and being a mom to a very inquisitive 4-year-old. Not in that order. Oh, and traveling! I wish I had time for more of that.
My thanks to Brittney Morris for today's interview.