SoCNoC Month mini-interview: Fleur Beale
Born and raised on a Taranaki dairy farm, Fleur Beale is a Wellington author with more than 20 novels under her belt. The 2nd book in her Juno series, “Fierce September” recently won the 2011 New Zealand Post Children's book award for young adult fiction.
She is probably best know for her novel “I am not Esther”, about a young woman left to live with highly religious relatives.
She kindly agreed to do a Kiwiwriters, SoCNoC month, mini-interview.
1. Can you talk to us about when you knew you wanted to become a writer?
I didn't ever think about becoming a writer - it kind of snuck up on me. Mum always wrote and also told us stories when we were kids and after I'd left home, she began getting things published. She also sent me the notes she took at a writing class she attended and from there I started writing short stories that were broadcast on radio. I was at home with two preschoolers and in need of a hobby so I wrote. Then I entered a competition, got an agent (the wonderful Ray Richards) who placed the story with a publisher and that was the start. For a long time though, I just wrote in my spare time and because I was a teacher I had the school holidays. I would spend a lot of time during the term mulling the story over, then write it quickly once the holidays arrived.
2. What is your writing schedule, your daily goals, your productivity?
I go to my office in Cuba Street, getting there around 9.30 and write until 2ish, then I come home and do other stuff such as admin, or manuscript assessments. I don't have a daily goal, except just to keep the story moving. If it gets stuck the task for the day would be to try and figure out why - often that can involve large deletions. When a story is ticking along, I'd normally write around 3,000 words a day.
3. Do you have any funny habits or quirks (write in your underwear, at a kitchen table with kids screaming around you? write while in bed? Read and write at the same time? Need to be near a window? Eat while writing/don't eat while writing? etc...)
Um - I don't think so. When the kids were young I trained myself to write in the family room because I didn't want to shut myself off from family life. I do like to write where I can look out a window but it's probably not essential.
4. What are your indispensable writing tools?
My beloved Apple MacBook. And a pencil and paper by the bed to record any stray midnight ideas.
5. Do you do any writing challenges like SoCNoC or Nanowrimo (a novel in a month)? If not, then why not? If you do, how do you use it and how does it help you?
No, I don't. Didn't know about either of them until relatively recently and I guess by then my routine had become fairly established. I do think though, that it's a great tool for forcing you to just do it. It's easy to muck around at the edges of a new project, but there's nothing like a tight timeframe for concentrating the mind and making you jump in.
