Making Time to Write: Interview with E.W. Clark
I’m starting an occasional feature on my blog on Making Time to Write Mondays where I will feature a busy writer (is there ever a not busy writer?)— writer who has to juggle many hats yet is still able to make time to write.
Today’s featured writer is a member of my online critique group and fellow Hollins friend, E.W. Clark. E.W. Clark writes with speed, depth, and brilliance, all while juggling many hats.
Tell me about the many hats (jobs/responsibilities) you wear.
Nowadays, aside from being a parent (1 preschooler) and step-parent (2 teens, 1 adult), and responsible for the house (a 200 year-old, 22 acre farm — so something’s always a bit suboptimal with it), I’m a full-time writer. Prior to 2009, I was the primary breadwinner, working 14+ hour days and traveling a lot. I’m glad to be done with what a friend of mine calls “the suit years.”
What is your writing schedule? Or do you have one?
I really try to write 2+ hours a day, at least 5 days a week. My spouse (a journalist & media consultant) also works from home, and our son has started preschool (only two days a week), and both of those things help. My schedule is mornings — from about 9:30 to lunchtime. Before and after those 2-1/2 hours I’m booked — I get up around 6, usually.
I’m not a morning person but my writing quality’s best then — I can’t understand or explain it, but there you are. After my son’s in bed is when I catch up on reading, which I see as an important part of my writing schedule. I do a *lot* of research for my books, and am so lucky to have access to the collections at UVA — I read for research in the evenings, I read for my critique partners in the evenings, I read my own work in the evenings (on Kindle, noting problems).
What do you write?
Novels for young adult readers (and anyone else, of course — but that’s the marketing category). My novels fall in between some other categories, though — some fantastic elements, some mythic ones, historical, magic realism, science fiction … I just use what I think works for the idea and the characters. What’s close (hopefully) to publication is the first in a four-book series. I’m working also on a standalone novel, partly about gangsters, which I’ll complete in the next month or two.
What keeps you from writing when you really need to be writing?
Family illness or upset. My incredibly great mother-in-law died just before Christmas last year, for instance, and that kept me from writing for a good while. I was sad, our family was sad, and since my in-laws live in another part of the US, my spouse needed to be away a lot too.
Do you have a special place where you write? Or does it matter to you?
It doesn’t much matter. I have a desk in the bedroom at which I love to work (see photo below) because it’s so beautiful, and because several of my favorite things are on or near it — a 1920s painting I love, an old ivory thermometer, a jade lamp my great-grandparents brought back from their time in China as missionaries. But I can work anyplace, so long as no one’s looking over my shoulder.
Where can we find you on the web?
I also tweet, boringly I’m afraid (though I’m a highly discerning RT-er) @EWilsonClark
FB and ewclark.net are where news about publication will be found. I’m hoping to have some news in the weeks ahead!
