My Angsty, Self-Discovery Blog

OH my GOODNESS! So muy has happened.This is all going to be a blur so gurt your loins or whatever.
1. I have become a VEGAN! yay! Again... It has happened before but it is pretty much... yeah. It is permanent. All I have to do is think about a pussy, cancerous utter and my hand practically jumps off the cheese. It feels really good too. I have much more energy and it is nice.
2. I discovered (OK, I didn't DISCOVER it but I do think it is awesome) the most awesome sport. IT is called Parkour. That is a link to some guys free running and it is just amazing. It's like being a ninja as a hobby.
3. I bought pineapple at the store and the lady had to look up the number... Yeah. Our nation is not very healthy.
4. CAROLYN TURGEON!!!!!!!!!!!! What? You haven't HEARD OF HER?!?! Well then you idiots. She wrote Rain Village and is all around awesome and guess what? She talks to me! YAY!
I did a little mini interview and she answered them and here they are the end.


1. When did you first know you were a writer?
I always knew I was a writer, I think, or at least I always wanted to be one. I loved books and libraries as far back as I can remember, and I was a super dreamy kid who liked to lock herself away in her room and read. Plus I read the Betsy-Tacy books and Betsy was always dreaming of being a writer and scribbling in her notebook and I thought it was incredibly, devastatingly romantic.

2. What were the most important steps in becoming a writer for you?
I guess it would be figuring out how to write a novel. It takes incredible willpower and discipline, and you can't be intimidated by it. Rain Village took me 10 years and that's because I wrote it in fits and starts and when I got stumped I'd stop for like two years.

3. What was the first story you ever wrote?
I wrote my first book when I was 8, "Mystery at the Dallas Zoo," about a bunch of kid sleuths trying to solve the mystery of the stolen tapir!

4. Where do you write?
Anywhere, really, with a laptop, but I prefer writing in cafes or at home at a desk in front of a big window.

5. What are your hobbies when you are not writing?
I play accordion, I do photography (just started dark room), I travel and read... I bellydance and work out with a trainer. I love film and theater and bands and old swanky bars.

6. What is your favorite book?
One Hundred Years of Solitude, definitely. It's sweeping and grand and beautiful and Gabriel Garcia Marquez is like an old time storyteller who'd weave tales around a fire.

7. What is the best story you ever wrote?
I haven't written a ton of stories. I started Rain Village in college and just focused on it for years. I'd say my second novel, Godmother, which comes out in March, is the best thing I've written. It's more structured than Rain Village, more tight. You'll see!

8. Where was Rain Village first conceived?
I started Rain Village for a college course with Paul West. It was just a short story about a place called Rain Village. At the same time I was writing a paper for an Italian class about the three rings story cycle -- three versions of this old tale about a father of three sons who has a very valuable ring and ends up having two copies made and giving rings to each son... but only the father knows which is the real one, as with the world's religions -- and was basing my original story on that tale... But as I developed this world I just felt like there was a bigger story to be told, and I plucked out a minor character, Tessa, and the whole thing ended up being her story, and Rain Village ended up being the place her mentor Mary comes from and tells her so many stories about.

9. Do you write about how you wish the world was, full of love and glamour like in Rain Village?
Maybe, but I think the world IS full of love and glamour, too. Amongst every other thing. Sometimes you do have to take special note of it, however.


10. Did you ever have a mentor like Mary?
No, but I have had various people in my life who served Mary-like functions. Friends, teachers, family members. Mary's just a combination of all of them, as well as my version of the most kick-@*$ female who ever lived