24 sharpened pencils - all in a row, ready to go!

In a recent interview I gave as a children’s author, I was asked if I had any interesting writing habits. Interesting? Hmmm….well, I do write at all odd hours – whenever the inspiration for a poem or story hits. But habits? I prefer having my writing table organized and fairly cleared off or it feels too chaotic for creative focus. And I have written with Paper Mate medium flair black pens for many years, but I even change that up a little now and then. I like to snack on something sweet while I’m writing, but it’s not necessary. Because I couldn’t find an interesting habit of my own, I decided to look up other famous authors’ habits, or if they had any at all. Oh, I found some goodies!

Children’s author Roald Dahl (BFG, Matilda) had a strict writing habit - he wrote every day for 2 hours in the morning, exactly 10-12 noon and 2 hours in the evening, from 4-6 p.m.!

John Steinbeck started every day with 24 sharpened pencils using them until all 24 were dull before sharpening them again. He used up to 60 pencils in a day, and sometimes nearly 100.

How fun was this? So my interviewer asked WHERE the most interesting place was I wrote one of my books or poetry. I knew that was when I composed my 2017 picture poetry book, A Star Full of Sky. And that was because I wrote all those poems during the overnight hours outdoors, usually under starry, magical skies which were super inspiring to me.

I thought that was an interesting enough answer until, once again, after I looked up other authors and interesting writing places, I found that JK Rowling came up with the names for the houses of Hogwarts while on a plane ride and wrote them down on a motion sickness bag! Ok, way cooler. Ha! It’s all good though, and most important, I hope it’s as inspirational to you as to me.

Happy reading and writing trails whatever your habits and wherever you may be!