Rock Star Writers: Susan Kaye Quinn

Author Susan Kaye Quinn took time out of her busy schedule to answer some questions about her new book, Open Minds. It's awesome, by the way. 

I so wish I could come up with an original idea like Open Minds. How did the book and the idea of mind jacking come to you?

Like any idea that bubbles up in a writer’s head, I think it’s a combination of things that just come together. I wanted to enter a 1st paragraph contest online, but the 1st paragraphs of my then-current novels weren’t snappy enough. So I figured I would just make up a 1st paragraph for a novel that wasn’t written. I had been toying with the idea of a boy who was a touch empath (he could feel all your emotions via touch, and thus was very isolated), but hadn’t decided whether the idea could carry a novel or not. As I went to bed one night, wrestling with how to put that idea into a killer first paragraph, another image popped into my head: a girl in a high school classroom filled with mindreaders, only she couldn’t read minds. She was extremely (painfully) isolated, like the empath boy, but for a different reason. I immediately wrote the paragraph, and later decided I had to write an entire novel about this girl’s story. I didn’t realize there were mindjackers in the story until about 1/3 of the way through the first draft.

Your plot moves like an action movie. Do you plan your plot twists ahead of time or do the characters direct the action along the way?

I pantsed my way through the entire first draft, and while many of the plot twists were there in that first draft, much of the structure was rather … saggy. Through the subsequent (seven!) drafts, I built up the structure and made the twists more twisty and the decisions more agonizing. Now, for Closed Hearts, I plotted almost all the structure ahead of time, which speeds up the writing part considerably.

You started out as an engineer. When did you realize you wanted to move into writing as a career?

I left engineering to stay home with my kids, but always figured I would go back to it, once they were launched off to school. When my youngest was in Kindergarten I started writing again, not as a career, just as something I was playing around with. It wasn’t until it grabbed me by the throat and wouldn’t let go that I decided I better try to make a career out of it.

As a mother and wife, how to you balance your writing life with family time?

It’s tough, there’s no way around it. But my kids are in school full time and that’s my writing time. I try to keep it sacred – no shopping, no cleaning, just the writing. And when the kids are home, there’s homework and piano and fencing. Somehow I figure out how to feed and clothe them as well. Yeah, I’m still figuring it out. If you know the secret, let me know, k?

What or who inspires you to write?

I’ve never needed “motivation” to write – writing is like a crack addiction that I have to force myself to stop doing (it’s crazy; I still don’t understand it). But I’m inspired when I read Across the Universe by Beth Revis, or look at gorgeous art in Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld or read about the writing process of amazing authors like Holly Black. I also get pumped when I teach writing classes for teens at the library. Pretty much anything writing related gets me juiced.

Open Minds is an Indie book versus Life, Liberty, and Pursuit, which was traditionally published. Which type of publishing do you prefer?

Interesting question. At this moment, I’m greatly enjoying the Indie process – controlling everything A-to-Z, writing exactly the book you want to write, the way you want to write it, marketing it in a way that suits your style and vision. It’s crazy amounts of work, but it’s also very freeing – no one is telling me I can’t release the second book in six months or that I can’t give away copies if I want to. I think the Indie process suits my personality very well. At the same time, I’m working on a middle grade project that I will send through the traditional publishing route (big six publishers). I think it’s important to go that route for middle grade, because traditional publishers are better positioned to reach the middle grade audience. I realize I have to give up some control to get there, but that trade-off is worth it, because I really would like to see my middle grade works published!

Who would you like to see play your characters in the movie version (because I can definitely see this book on the big screen)?

Oh my, I’m terrible about picking out actors. I use no-name models for my “character casting” (see attached pictures). If I’m ever lucky enough to have Open Minds optioned, I’ll trust the movie people to figure that out!

Raf

 Simon (this is so how I pictured him, too)

Finally, when can we expect to see Closed Hearts, the sequel to Open Minds?

I’m planning on May 2012, depending on how well editing goes (first draft is done). I’d love to keep to that schedule, but I won’t release the book until it’s ready. Thanks so much for hosting me today!

Thanks so much to Susan Kaye Quinn for being so generous with her time to answer questions about Open Minds and about writing. If you haven't read it yet, DO IT! It's only $2.99 and one click away. RIGHT HERE.