Ask the Author: Patrick Robbins
Answered Questions (11)
Patrick Robbins
I can't. I just can't.
Patrick Robbins
The '74-'83 New York City of Emma Who Saved My Life.
Patrick Robbins
How will I make it to payday this week?
Patrick Robbins
I have to go with Sherlock Holmes & Dr. Watson. Intelligent, adventurous, curious, and deeply appreciative of each other's company. Also, no matter who plays them in TV and movie versions, their true character remains intact, perhaps amplified by the actors' performances but never obliterated.
Patrick Robbins
Thanks, Cindy, that's very nice of you to say. I'm really more of a Bill Simmons fan than a basketball fan, so I'm probably not the best choice for reviewing a book on the lingo of the sport. Still, I appreciate you thinking of me in that regard, and thank you very much for the request. - Best, Patrick
Patrick Robbins
My prescription is time. Lots and lots of time. And no distractions. If you give yourself the right writing atmosphere, and give yourself permission to write *anything*, with no regard *whatsoever* for how good it is, or for what happens after you cross the finish line, the block *will* dissolve.
Patrick Robbins
I've got a couple ideas - wunza road trip / treasure map type deal, the other's inspired by the life of Jimmy Workman. To say more would be a mistake. In fact, to have this much could be a mistake. But that's the risk I'm willing to take!
Patrick Robbins
Taking a perfectly good sentence you've written and making it better. I was writing about a Fourth of July fireworks celebration and wrote, "I wondered how many millions of dogs were hiding under their masters' beds tonight." In the rewrite, that became "I imagined millions of dogs quivering under their masters' beds." The satisfaction I got from that lasted for days.
Patrick Robbins
There is no greater gift to a writer than time. If you use it well - writing, rewriting, reading (always reading) - you'll be rewarded. Empty pursuits are far easier, but every bon mot of a status update is a moment of inspiration that wasn't used toward a manuscript.
Patrick Robbins
I like a quote of Somerset Maugham's: "I write only when inspiration strikes. Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o'clock sharp.” Point being, you don't wait for inspiration to strike - you go to work and meet it. And it never happens before I write. Only during. I have to write if I want to write, if that makes sense.
Patrick Robbins
From an interview with Goodreads author Stephanie Doyon:
TO MAKE OTHERS HAPPY has its origins in a series of Peanuts comic strips that has intrigued me for decades. Lucy asks Charlie Brown why we're put here on Earth, and without hesitation he says "To make others happy." It's an answer that stays with her for several days. (I won't give away the rest, but you can find the originals in The Complete Peanuts 1961-1962; they're in mid-August of '61, I think.)
One day I was thinking about the strip and what someone who makes others happy could be called, and the phrase "joy facilitator" came to mind. The contrast of such a strong emotion with such a clinical word really stayed with me, wouldn't leave me alone. I thought of someone passing out business cards with the phrase "joy facilitator" on them, on how his business would work, on what might endanger it - a novel's got to have conflict, right? The more I thought about it, the more pieces of the puzzle I had, until I had so many that I had to start fitting them into place.
TO MAKE OTHERS HAPPY has its origins in a series of Peanuts comic strips that has intrigued me for decades. Lucy asks Charlie Brown why we're put here on Earth, and without hesitation he says "To make others happy." It's an answer that stays with her for several days. (I won't give away the rest, but you can find the originals in The Complete Peanuts 1961-1962; they're in mid-August of '61, I think.)
One day I was thinking about the strip and what someone who makes others happy could be called, and the phrase "joy facilitator" came to mind. The contrast of such a strong emotion with such a clinical word really stayed with me, wouldn't leave me alone. I thought of someone passing out business cards with the phrase "joy facilitator" on them, on how his business would work, on what might endanger it - a novel's got to have conflict, right? The more I thought about it, the more pieces of the puzzle I had, until I had so many that I had to start fitting them into place.
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