Ask Naomi Alderman - Monday, April 1st! discussion
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Margo
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Mar 18, 2013 04:45PM
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Hi Naomi!I was thrilled when you retweeted my praise for The Lessons, despite saying that you don't usually do that. It was me complaining that you had made me tread in something nasty because I was compelled to keep reading, even while on my way to the shops :-)
How important do you think using social media is to authors these days, and do you read the reviews that people leave on sites like this and Amazon? Has a review ever really made your day, or conversely, ruined it?
Thanks for this- I'm looking forward to this discussion x
Dear Naomi,It was lovely to meet you `way back when` :) ( In York if I`m not mistaken, with Philip Craggs). On the 1st I will be out for my birthday, so I will write to you now, while still young and sober. I would like to ask you: what is your writing routine? And how do your ideas for books are born? I like fiddly things like that. :) I think it was the Guardian who used to run an image of a writer`s room every week - I really enjoyed that for some reason, would have loved to see an image of your desk. But don`t worry, I am not expecting anything like that. x
Naomi will be answering questions on Monday, April 1st. In the meantime if you have a question feel free to do so in this threadHi! Please share with us your feelings about writing "Borrowed Time". Was the outline for the story very detailed from the start or were you asked to write just something for the trio? Who you were enjoying the most to write for?
Hi Naomi,I really loved 'The Lessons' and will definitely be reading your new book. How do you feel your experiences at University shaped you as a writer? And what is it about characters/places/stories that make you choose to write about them?
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Hello! And thank you for that tweet, which was just awesome :-).
Sooo... in answer to your questions:
How important is social media? As important as you let it be, or want it to be. I love Twitter, I find it enriching, I'm on basically every day. Facebook leaves me cold, so I don't do much there. For authors the most important thing will always be "writing a good book". Nothing else even comes close ;-).
I do read reviews, sometimes I even respond to them on Amazon! (Especially for The Liars' Gospel, where I did a huge amount of research and if someone says "this book is poorly researched" I want to know why! If they've really spotted a mistake I'd be happy to get it taken out and credit them in the acknowledgements, but so far everyone who's said "research is crummy" and I've asked them about it has backed down...)
And has a review ever made or messed up my day? Hmm. Probably some have made my *hour* or messed it up? But one can't dwell on these things. My first ever review in a newspaper (The Jewish Chronicle, wouldn't you know it?) was so vicious that I had proper depression for a couple of weeks afterwards. But it seems to have innoculated me a bit and I feel that stuff less these days.
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Hello! Nice to be in touch! Much love for Phil :-).
My writing routine - when I'm working I aim to do 800 words a day. I've found, after much experimentation, that that's enough to crack on at a good pace and keep the book alive in my mind without being so much it ever feels overwhelming. 500 is too little. 1,000 is too much. 800 a day is perfect for me. I try to do 100 of them before I get out of bed just to "crack the seal" on the day, and then the rest of the day depends on whether they come easy or hard. Some days, it's just a couple of hours. Other days, I'm chiselling away at them all day.
New ideas for books... they usually seem to turn up for me buried in the thought "someone should write a book where...". And as it turns out, if you think that, the person who should write that book is you!
