Ask the Author: Victor A. Davis
Answered Questions (11)
Victor A. Davis
Easiest question ever: DINOTOPIA!!! And, everything.
Victor A. Davis
I don't really read that way. I have a "list" to be sure, but it's a few hundred books long, more like a "ten year plan" or "bucket list" and extremely malleable, with additions and deletions all the time. When I'm reading a book I have very little notion of what I shall read next, and when I finish it's a flight of fancy to pick the next. I try as much as possible to "mix it up," switching authors, genres, medium (kindle/paperback), etc, to give myself the surprise and refreshment of variety.
Victor A. Davis
He woke up shivering in the darkness, the thermometer on his porch reading an unseasonal -17, even though there was red hot wood in the stove that October morning. If the clock on the wall said 8:17, more than an hour past dawn, then where was the sun?
Victor A. Davis
No, I'd never heard of the "Hey Victor" meme before. Enjoy Faulkner!
Victor A. Davis
Without a doubt William Faulkner. I'm so seduced by his deep, conflicted writing. If I aspire to any particular style, it's that tense, subtle, toe-dipping language he uses to describe such a beautiful place with such a dark history. I'm embarrassed to admit that I have not read his stuff since grade school. A Light in August was a summer reading book and I read many of his short stories in lit class. As an adult, his very long portfolio has always sat and gathered dust on my TBR list.
Thank you so much for the question! I'm glad you got it out of your system.
Thank you so much for the question! I'm glad you got it out of your system.
Victor A. Davis
I feel like this means different things to different people. For me, it's when I get off track with a story. I have a great premise (or so I think), and I've written a few pages, but then I get stuck. I can write, but what comes out feels rushed or stilted or contrived, like I'm moving my characters instead of letting them move themselves. I can abandon a story here for weeks or months or years, and think about it constantly. Then it becomes a puzzle, and I grind away at the solution. Sometimes, the simplest idea can unclog the flow and get me typing again. Freewriting helps.
Victor A. Davis
Sounds cheesy, but I love the process. The actual writing, editing, and research can be tedious, but the inspiration/creation/accomplishment cycle of actually conceiving and then completing a work can be euphoric. Recognition? It's just the cherry on top. I'd keep writing even if nobody read it.
Victor A. Davis
Find a good day job. Harsh advice, but that's what I've got for you. If you aspire to be a writer, you're probably imagining yourself in a villa in the south of France pounding away at a typewriter, with an agent begging you for a manuscript so you can tour the world giving speeches and book signings. For me, writing is a business, a very low-paying side job. I don't do it for the fame or the money, but to create a legacy. No one will remember the products of my day job, but that's where I get the capital to run my side business without a handout from anyone. The products of my side job (my stories) are how I hope to be remembered. Sure, I dream of that villa too, but I'm willing to take the long road to get there, so that hopefully, that will be me at 60. But as a young person, I have to focus a lot of my time on a valuable career, and throwing myself headlong into that writing dream means begging for recognition and waiting for a big break. If you want total creative control, then get your non-writing life in order, use it to fund your writing life, and learn to market and manage yourself as a small business owner.
Victor A. Davis
I published my first collection,
Grains of Sand
in 2009, and I'm very excited to have just recently gathered up
Gingerbread
and other stories and released them as
The Gingerbread Collection
on April 28, 2016.
Even though I'm still heavily invested in marketing that book, I have started on a new project. I've lately become more interested in the Civil War and its effect on the everyday lives of civilians living near the battle lines, with all the shortages and raids. I've been reading up on the subject so that hopefully I can bring to fruition a new, more focused collection, stories set in the war-torn South.
Even though I'm still heavily invested in marketing that book, I have started on a new project. I've lately become more interested in the Civil War and its effect on the everyday lives of civilians living near the battle lines, with all the shortages and raids. I've been reading up on the subject so that hopefully I can bring to fruition a new, more focused collection, stories set in the war-torn South.
Victor A. Davis
"Artist: An art lover who sees a hole in the art they love and seeks to fill it." I'm an avid reader, and I love movies. When something is really good, I say "I wish I'd written that." Whenever I'm struck with a concept or an idea that's never been addressed, or only barely, in the movie/book landscape out there, that's what really inspires me to pen it. Other inspiration I draw from Jungian psychology and from keeping a dream journal.
Victor A. Davis
My two most recent stories, Courthouse Wedding and Poinsettias, are both inspired by real events. I myself was married in a courthouse, and although what happens in the story didn't happen to me, the setting is stolen straight out of the real thing. Poinsettias is based on an anecdote I heard when staying with a friend in Tennessee, about a housebound woman living alone. I need one of those T-shirts that say "I'm a writer. Anything you say or do may end up in a story." Neither of these is available for download like most of my other ones. You can read them exclusively in
The Gingerbread Collection
.
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