Judith, welcome to Fallen Angel Reviews. I’m so glad I have this opportunity to interview you. I have read several of your books and I’m always amazed at the circumstances your characters find themselves in.

So are they, sometimes ;-)

Would you please tell us a little about yourself?

Aside from age and weight, which I'd rather not talk about, I'm an incurable optimist, a voracious reader, and a casual housekeeper. Since you've visited my website, you know that I've had several careers--the curse of a butterfly mind. I tend to get totally immersed in every new enthusiasm, to the point of near-obsession. The down side of this is that I also have a very short attention span, so this week's diversion may be forgotten next week. On the other hand, this has paid off in my writing, because it's given me all sorts of cool ideas.

How did you feel the first time your work was published?

Let's just talk about my books, because I've had an assortment of other work published over the years, from poetry to scientific papers.

When my first book was released, I was thrilled beyond words (well, almost). After I'd sat and admired it for about an hour, I told the world. In fact, in my ignorance I broke all sorts of unspoken (and probably a lot of written) netiquette rules in my eagerness to share my good news with everyone I knew. To be honest, I still want to shout my news to the world whenever one of my books is released. It's still new and still thrilling.

What does your writing space look like? Do you have to dig to find a pen or is it the picture of organization?

Cluttered. Piles of papers, books, CDs, diskettes, magazines. Three holders full of pencils, pens, and markers, a couple of books I want to read, my camera bag, a lavender plush Rat (Chinese birth year) and a fluffy red-winged blackbird, and several 3-ring binders filled with the books I'm working on. Above my computer is a huge bulletin board covered with sayings, my book covers, drawings and paintings of birds and flowers, grandkid photos, and in one corner a cluster of fishing flies, because I think they're incredibly neat. But I know where almost everything is, and rarely have to dig for anything.

Do you still get butterflies when you submit a manuscript?

Absolutely. Even though at that point my story has been read and reviewed by at least two other people (critique partners and my elder daughter who is an editor), there is still that awful feeling of dread. It doesn’t matter how much self confidence one has, it can be shaken by rejection.

Do you write on a schedule or as inspiration hits?

Both. I set a schedule, and mostly stick to it when I'm working on a first draft. After that, I am not so self-disciplined, and might work all day on Monday and take Tuesday off, for instance. But when inspiration does strike (not nearly often enough, doggone it!), I do my best to stay with it until the whole idea/scene/chapter/situation is written. Otherwise I lose it.

Do you have a favorite spot to write?

Much as I would like to take a laptop to the park and write, or sit under a lofty fir tree in the depths of the forest, I work best at my computer, at my desk. The trouble with nature is that it's full of all sorts of interesting distractions, and there's bound to be a woodpecker or chickadee drop by that fir tree to say hello just as I'm launched into a crucial scene. So I plant my bottom in my chair before the computer and sit there until I've written my daily assignment. Some days I don't even answer the phone until I'm finished with that day's work. Some of us just have no ability to resist temptation.

Do you have a secret passion/indulgence?

Not so secret. When I feel totally self-indulgent, I find a book by a favorite author, fill the bathtub with scented bath salts and lots of hot water, and lie there and read until (a) I turn into a prune, or (b) I fall asleep and the book drowns. Needless to say, I never do this with a library book.

Do you have a defining moment in your career so far? Something that really brought it all home for you personally and you said, "Wow!!! I did it!!!"

The first time I wrote THE END to a book, definitely. That book will never go anywhere; it's a total pot-boiler. But buried in too much tedious narrative are scenes that actually work, an honest-to-goodness conflict (clichéd), some semi-sparkling dialogue, and several characters who, while not exactly three-dimensional, are not entirely flat and boring. The whole process taught me a lot, and typing those last two words showed me I could really, truly write a book.

Seeing as hindsight is 20/20, is there anything that you would have done differently in your life? Personal and career.

I would have learned to type in high school. Maybe if I could have typed, writing wouldn't have been so much work, and I wouldn't have waited until I had a computer to write my first book. The stories were there, but bottled up because I hadn't the patience to write them in longhand. I still don't type well, but on a computer, that's not as much of a handicap as it in on a typewriter where each error means work.

Is there any piece of advice you could offer to all those up and coming authors out there?

You just pushed a button and now you get my 'Lecture to Aspiring Writers'. Learn the tools of your trade. Explore story structure, characterization, conflict, dialogue. Get comfortable with punctuation, master syntax and sentence structure. Understand the rules of the craft, and practice it at every opportunity. Until you're certain your writing is error-free and smooth, get someone to proof and critique anything you plan to submit to a contest or an editor. And when you do get published, don't stop learning, because you'll never know everything about writing.

Your website states that Twice Victorious was inspired by your son’s bicycle career. Are any of your other books based on real life experiences?

Well, yes and no. In most cases. I've been to the real places where my stories are set, and even the places I made up are based on real ones. Once in a while I'll write a scene that uses something that's happened to me, or to someone I know, but never exactly. It's far more fun to make up how it should have happened--truth may be stranger than fiction, but it's also often less interesting. I'm more apt to see, read, or hear something that sparks a 'What if...?' moment, and that leads to a scene, or in some cases to a whole book. THE IMPERIAL ENGINEER started that way, when I read a sentence about the first telephone system in Idaho Territory. I couldn't believe it. 1883? Nonsense! But it was true, and in chasing down that particular story, my own developed.

Give us a mental picture of your garden.

A lot like my office in spirit--cluttered. We live in a manufactured home (fancy name for a fancy mobile home) with a small yard around it. I consider lawns environmentally incorrect, so I planted a lot of rhododendrons (low-maintenance, low water after established).and bulbs. In between the shrubs I couldn't resist planting interesting stuff, both purchased and dug out in the woods. Now it's a colorful patchwork of this and that, all of which reproduces wildly, until nearly every species takes on weedlike characteristics (weed=a plant that grows where it isn't wanted). In the north yard I have a moist shade garden full of ferns and sedges and rushes, and even a native orchid. Towering over everything is an enormous Douglas-fir tree, with a trunk that's more than two feet in diameter at shoulder height. There's also an undisciplined wisteria along the board fence in front that keeps threatening to take over the place, but so far I'm winning.

Can you tell us what you are working on now and maybe give us a “sneak peak” of your next book?

I'm working on a western romance now, set in Elko County, Nevada, in the early 1870s. Maggie Stalter and Pen Craddock are both running away from something, and that's where they end up. At least temporarily. Whether they'll stay there or not, they haven't told me, so I guess I'll have to keep writing until I find out.

In February, Awe-Struck will re-release my one Regency romance, THE ANONYMOUS AMANUENSIS. It's an old story--a woman masquerading as a man--but one I hope I've made new and interesting. As for a sneak peak, there's an excerpt at www.hevanet.com/gladhaus/TAAexcerpt.html. And in case anyone's wondering, an amanuensis is a secretary, and once upon a time secretaries were men.

What book of yours, do you think a first time reader should start with and why?

THE QUEEN OF CHERRY VALE. While all my historical romances stand alone, this one will introduce readers to Hattie Rommel and Emmet Lachlan, who first settled "Behind the Ranges" and began the saga.

Is there anything you’d like to add to this interview?

Well, I'd like to invite folks to check out the NORTHWEST TALES OF THE SEASON anthology while they're visiting my website. In it are six heart-warming Christmas stories guaranteed to put you into a celebratory mood.

Most of all I'd like to thank you, Jaymi, and Fallen Angels Reviews, for being very good to me.

Judith, thank you for taking the time to for this interview.

Check out Judith’s website for more on Judith B. Glad and her books.


Interviewed by:
Jaymi