Image Credits: Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay images. The Writers’ Narrative image was supplied by Wendy H Jones with text added by me, Allison Symes, via Book Brush.
As many of you will know, as well as writing for the fabulous Chandler’s Ford Today, I also write for a monthly online magazine called Writers’ Narrative. I am also their copy editor. The magazine has a monthly theme and the October edition will be about Short Form Fiction.
I’m delighted to say I will be their Featured Author for October and have been interviewed in depth by the Editor in Chief, Wendy H Jones. I also wrote a separate article breaking down one of my published flash tales and looking at how I wrote it, as well as sharing some of the influences which led to its creation. Am very much looking forward to sharing this via my website and social media later.
It was interesting being on the other side of the interview. The questions were thoughtful and challenging and a joy to answer. So I thought for this post, I would look at what makes for a good interview, what authors can do to prepare themselves for interviews they face, and how to make the best of them once they are “out there”.
A Good Interview
A good interview should, in the case of a printed one, read as a conversation between interviewer and interviewee. There should be no questions an interviewee could simply say Yes/No to, as there’s no interest in that. The questions should draw the interviewee out to share more about their work.
One question I was asked by Wendy was What draws you to short form fiction, and how does it challenge you differently than longer works?
This is a great question because I could share something of my lifelong love of short fiction (via the classic fairytales as is often the case for many). I could also discuss what I love about short fiction plus I could share something of the challenges of writing it. In depth answers to an in depth question, basically. I wanted to convey enough of my enthusiasm here without going on too much (but having read other interviews in Writers’ Narrative, I knew what was required here. More on this thought later).
I’ve long loved author interviews because I always learn something useful from them. In being interviewed myself, I hope other authors can learn something from what I share. There’s a reason I always ask writers new to Chandler’s Ford Today for their three most useful writing tips and three most useful marketing ones. None of us can know it all here. There can be a collective sharing of knowledge here. I know I’ve benefited from that in the past and have no doubt I will do so again.
A good interview is also set up in good time. It does take time to put questions together. The authors I interview here do share some questions in common (especially on writing and marketing tips!) but I tailor their questions to what they write, their latest writing news etc. I also want to draw them out in conversation. It makes for a more interesting interview experience for those on both sides of the fence and for readers, especially other writers hoping to pick up useful advice (which is the other purpose of a good interview, of course).
Prep Work – Interviewer and Interviewee
Research is a backbone of a lot of writing (and, yes, for fiction too). For interviews, I am checking out the author’s website, their books (especially the current one), social media links and so on to pick up topics of interest which could be elaborated on further in the interview.
If I know Author X has just released a book which is going to be part of a series, I can then ask them about their hopes and plans for the series, when they hope the next book will be out and so on. Sounds sensible and plain common sense to do this, and it is, but it takes time so part of my prep work is to build in another time to ensure I get this done.
I’m not writing interview questions, getting them off to someone, and then putting it on the CFT site the moment I get the answers back either. I need to read through what the author has sent me and go back to them with queries – sometimes, there are some.
As for this angle from the interviewee’s point of view, give yourself enough time to answer the questions thoroughly. Do have a look at other author interviews your interviewer has carried out to get a feel for their style (and their usual word counts too, see my thoughts re Writers’ Narrative above – I knew the requirements. Studying things like this is all part of your market research, something all writers have to do if they want their work out there. You need to know who you are trying to reach with your work after all and how much “space” you have).
Remember this is a great opportunity to share your work with others so let your enthusiasm for writing your story come across in what you share with your interviewer. The first person to be excited about a book should be its author. Have your author bio, buy links, author head shots, and book cover photos ready too. It helps enormously when you can send all of that back to your interviewer along with your answers to their questions.
When you share links to your social media, website etc do check and double check they are correct. It’s amazing how a misplaced full stop can scupper a link working. You want to make life simpler for your interviewer here too. They will think kindly of you for doing this. I do!
Post Interview
Do share the link to your interview on your social media and website. It gives you interesting material to add to the latter and shows you do have a track record (and are naturally working on building that up further still). When sharing your interview on social media, you might like to add in a line or so saying what you most enjoyed about taking part in the interview.
I’ve used interviews as opportunities to update my author head shot, bio and more too. Knowing an interview is coming up, it gives me the chance to review these and update as necessary.
Later, you can look back on the interview and share what you learned from taking part in this. Again, that can be useful additional material for your website.
Not Published Yet? How Can Author Interviews Help You?
Long before I was published, I read as many author interviews as I could. I still do this too. I still subscribe to Writing Magazine, for example, where there are plenty of such interviews. I wanted to learn from what the authors shared but I also learned from the questions being set.
I asked myself how I would answer these questions if they were put to me and drafted some answers. That kind of prep work is amazingly useful. It also built up my confidence knowing I could answer the questions myself should I need to do so. Later on, I did need to be able to do that. It also made me focus on getting my writing CV and other materials ready.
Once I started having work published, I could update what I had already prepared and add in a useful question to have ready to answer – how did you react to the news you were about to be published and what does this mean to you?
One question all writers can prepare to answer in advance is what do you write?
Even if you’re not interviewed, at least at this stage in your writing, if you meet up with other writers, in person or otherwise, you are bound to be asked this. Every writer I know, including me, wants to know what other authors are working on! If you are working on a specific project how could you sum that up in a couple of lines? Preparing this will be useful for later.
As well as reading interviews, do listen to them as well on podcasts etc. Listen to how the author comes across. You can learn from that too.
Conclusion
It’s a great joy to interview and be interviewed. Good prep work makes the joy even greater because you know you are ready for the inquisition, sorry interesting questions. And it is a lovely thing to be able to share your interview as part of your overall marketing. It gives you a chance to show who you are as an author and that, in turn, is more likely to encourage further interest in what you write.
Related Posts:-
Read interviews with Chandler’s Ford writer Allison Symes: Part 1 and Part 2.
Read blog posts by Allison Symes published on Chandler’s Ford Today.
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