[Interview] Elena Dorothy Bowman

Elena Dorothy Bowman is an honors graduate of Fitchburg College where she earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering and Management.

She grew up in Dorchester, Massachusetts and spent 25 years working as an aerospace software engineer.

She now writes full time and serves as an officer in the Massachusetts Chapter of the National League of American Pen Women.

Her books include Sarah’s Landing: Contact (Writer’s Showcase Press, 2002); The House On The Bluff (Write Words, Inc., 2006) and Gatekeeper’s Realm (Write Words, Inc., 2007).

In a recent interview, Elena Bowman spoke about her writing.

When did you start writing?

I have been writing off and on since way back when it only cost a dime to go to the Saturday Matinee, or any other time I could scrape up the price of a ticket. And in most cases when the ending was not to my liking, I felt compelled to go home and rewrite it. I discovered I enjoyed writing stories… putting words down on paper gave me a sense of accomplishment… but I never did anything with it.

When I wrote my first novel it was just for the pleasure of it. It wasn't long after that writing became an obsession with me and I have been writing for publication ever since.

How would you describe your writing ?

My first book was a science fiction, mystery, romance novel. It didn't start out to be a series, but four novels later, it was.

After completing the series, I decided to try another genre, so I settled on a mystery novel. That novel ended up being a three book series and I have since learned that it is not only a mystery novel, but it spans three genres: romance, mystery and the paranormal.

Who is your target audience?

I don’t believe I gave that much consideration when I wrote my first novel. I was probably thinking of adults who were interested in science fiction, but have since learned that a younger audience is also into the genre, so I suppose I could say, my target audience is a general one.

What motivated you to start writing?

My early interest in space and working in the space industry had captured my imagination, and was instrumental in writing my first novel. The influence of Jules Verne and the writers of the Buck Rogers, Star Wars, Babylon Five series probably had a hand in motivating me to write science fiction.

Being an avid reader, the written works of earlier scribes captivated me and I would say were the most influential in my career as a writer.

How have your personal experiences influenced the direction of your writing?

I don't believe that my personal experiences influenced the direction of my writing in any way that I could consciously say. However, there is no way of knowing if something, or some experience from the sub-conscious seeped through and wound up in the pages of my books.

What would you say are the biggest challenges that you face?

They were finding an agent who believed in me and my work, a publisher who thought my work was worth publishing and getting published.

How do you deal with these challenges?

I sent out query letters to every agent and publisher that published or represented my genre I could find in the Writer's Market. I can't say that every one of those query letters were answered, but some of them were. Most of them were just a short note that said "no thanks". No explanation, no reason given. Others were form letters that when you get down to it, basically said the same thing. But I do recall that many rejections were positive in that they were personal replies written by the agent or publisher in their own hand, and encouraging me to persevere even if they weren't in the market for my novels. I found that extremely encouraging as if they'd actually sent a contract instead of a rejection letter.

Do you write everyday?

I try to write every day, at least 10 pages… but that doesn't always happen. I spend every spare moment I have on my writing. Sometimes that takes me to the wee hours of the morning.

What is the Gatekeeper's Realm?

My latest book in print is the Gatekeeper's Realm. It's the second book in the series of a house one could say was enchanted. A house that appears to be alive because of a relic that dates back to the Crusades.

In the second book, the appearance of uninvited and mysterious spirits from an earlier era causes the unusual experiences that befall the guests. Some disappear into strange worlds, others into prehistoric times. The main characters do all they can to enlist the townspeople and the 'local' ghosts, who have inhabited the house since the 17th Century, in searching for them. But since the house has a mind of its own, and able to invoke visions that confuse and disorient the inhabitants to the point that no one can be sure where they looked was still in existence, the searchers wonder if they will ever find the answers.

Which aspects of the work that you put into the novel did you find most difficult?

This may sound strange, but I didn't have a problem with the book at all. It was as if someone else was writing it and I was a bystander watching the words as they flowed on the page.

Which did you enjoy most?

Seeing the words as they flowed on the page and wondering who and where all these words were coming from.

What sets the book apart from the other things you have written?

It's not a science fiction novel, as some of my other books are… it's a romance, a mystery, and a thriller with much of the paranormal running through it.

I would say it is similar [to the others] in that it is also a love story, with a mystery that needs to be resolved as is The Sarah's Landing Series.

What will your next book be about?

At the moment, I am working on two projects: one is a paranormal novella and the other hopefully will be an historical one.

What would you say has been your most significant achievement as a writer?

Since all writers work to be published, I would have to say, that being published is my most significant achievement, considering all the books that are available and the difficulty an unagented writer has on being published by a traditional publisher.

How did you get there?

Perseverance! Sending my work out in spite of rejections until the right traditional publisher, Write Words, Inc, Cambridge Books, ebooksonthe.net came my way.

How many books have you written so far?

At present, I have written eight full novels. All of my books have been published in ebook format by Write Words, Inc's ebooksonthe.net. Two are presently in trade paperback editions, with the others to be released this year by Write Words, Inc's Cambridge Books.

The titles of my novels are: Sarah's Landing I: Contact (published March 2007 ); Sarah's Landing II: The Telepaths of Theon (published February 2007); Sarah's Landing III: The Barbarians (published April 2007); Sarah's Landing IV: Genesis (published May 2007); The House On The Bluff: The Legacy Series Book I (published February 2006); Gatekeeper's Realm: The Legacy Series Book II (published November 2006); Adam's Point: The Legacy Series Book III (published January 2007) and Time-Rift (published August 2006).

This article was first published by OhmyNews International.

[Blog Review] Doris Lessing, Nobel Prize Laureate

On Oct. 11, the Swedish Academy announced that Doris Lessing (87) had won the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Most bloggers reacted to the news by recounting meetings they have had with Lessing and by discussing the influence her writing has had on them as individuals and as writers.

They also discussed some of Lessing’s books and the themes she explores in her writing.

A few reacted by reviewing what has been said in newspapers about Lessing and her books. An even smaller minority, like T. K. Kenyon, the author of Rabid — used the news to launch a diatribe against the “self-appointed literati and men” who had unfavorably criticized Lessing’s science fiction.

There was an almost unanimous agreement that the award was well-deserved and long overdue.

Nury Vittachi, author of The Feng Shui Detective responded by revealing how, a few years ago, he had gone to a book signing Doris Lessing was hosting and about how she was holding one of his books when he approached her table.

“So it ended up with her signing my book and me signing hers,” he says.

Writing in the Guardian Arts blog, John Mullan, professor of English at University College London and author of How Novels Work, recounts the impression Lessing had on him when he went to interview her for the Guardian Book Club. He also tells us of the impression she had on others who met her.

“She was the first writer at a Book Club event to earn an ovation simply by dint of entering the room. When those attending asked her questions it was clear that she had one requisite of the Nobel Prize winner: readers who believed that she had changed their lives.”

Mullan goes on to review two of Lessing’s books, The Cleft and The Golden Notebook.

He describes The Cleft, as an “unsettling dystopian fable of maleness and femaleness… The very faults that some found -- the book’s freight of ideas and its intellectual ambition -- were unusual enough to appear virtues to me.”

He identifies The Golden Notebook, as one of those books that defined the feminist movement because it explored arguments between and by women about what it meant to be “Free Women.”

“For 1962 it was audacious stuff. It brought to the English novel a heady brew of new material: political debate, psychotherapy sessions, disastrous sex. It is the earliest novel I know of to include matter-of-fact mentions of pre-menstrual tension and tampons,” he writes.

J. Carter Wood, author of Violence and Crime in Nineteenth Century England analyzes how the media in Germany covered news of the award. He or his wife (between the two of them it is not very clear whose views these are) suggests that most supporters, detractors and journalists who commented on the news misjudged Lessing because they had not read much of her work.

He takes particular offense at an article which appeared in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, which suggested that Lessing was “politically correct.”

“No, Lessing has not been indulging in the facile pleasantries of political correctness… In fact, she has spent much of her career mauling the self-comforting, self-satisfied ethical certainties with which she is now being falsely associated,” he argues.

He does not explicitly explain what it means to be politically correct.

He draws on the many turns Lessing’s life, writing and ideas have taken and analyzes Lessing’s novel, The Sweetest Dream, and uses these to show how Lessing has dismantled the political ideas that she had held earlier.

“There is nothing utopian or politically correct about Lessing’s protagonist. Frances is Everywoman, trying to make do in a world of radically different individuals with conflicting interests and expectations, only to realize that, however hard one tries, there will always be plenty of loose ends left over,” Wood writes.

Robert Stikmanz, author of Prelude to a Change of Mind says he has read about 20 of Doris Lessing’s books and that half of these were her science fiction.

“There is no novelist I admire more, nor one who has had more influence on my own work. Her Canopus in Argos series was more of an inspiration for The Lands of Nod than either Tolkien or Castañeda,” he explains.

He finds it odd that in the U.S. and in the U.K., media coverage on Lessing’s award has downplayed the science fiction.

“One claim shared by all the press has been that she is “best known for” The Golden Notebook,” he observes.

He suggests that The Four-Gated City is “a more remarkable book” but does not explain why he holds this view.

Matthew Cheney discusses Doris Lessing in relation to his experiences with J. M. Coetzee, Harold Pinter and Joyce Carol Oates.

He tells us that while he was most affected by The Golden Notebook, The Four-Gated City and Mara and Dann, the books he remembers most clearly are The Fifth Child and its sequel, Ben, in the World.

“The first is a knockout of a novella, a profoundly disturbing and alienating book. The second recasts the whole thing, as if one writer had written both Beowulf and Grendel. Taken together, the books are marvels of manipulation, and show just how severely a writer can reconfigure our sympathies,” he writes.

He discusses the challenges he faced when he tried to read The Sweetest Dream and notes with amusement that by Lessing becoming a Nobel Laureate, it “gives us the first Nobel Prize in Literature winner who was also a Guest of Honor at a World Science Fiction Convention (in 1987).”

Lizz Shepherd develops this theme further when she expresses the hope that Doris Lessing’s win will lead to a change in how science fiction is perceived in literary circles.

“I love me some sci-fi, but it’s rare to see the genre taken seriously as literature. I hope this signifies a change in its literary reputation,” Shepherd writes.

This article was first published by OhmyNews International.

Related article:

[Blog Review] The Mind of a Working Writer, Conversations with Writers, October 22, 2007.

[Interview] Nadia Aidan

Nadia Aidan lives and works on the East Coast in the United States.

In addition to writing erotic romances, she enjoys watching, reading and writing about strong, assertive heroines and is an enduring fan of Fight Girls, Xena, Buffy, and La Femme Nikita.

Enthralled (iUniverse, 2007) is her first published novel.

In a recent interview, Nadia Aidan spoke about her writing.

When did you decide you wanted to be a writer?

I began writing about a year ago when I was finishing my dissertation, but once I finished my dissertation I didn't look at the novels again. It wasn't until my mom was diagnosed with uterine cancer that I began searching for an outlet for the emotional highs and lows of taking care of her.

My mom recently lost her battle to cancer, which gave me the courage to submit my work. My mother was (and continues to be in spirit) my biggest cheerleader and support system. She was a strong, courageous woman who wasn't afraid of anything, and she raised me to be the same. I know she would have been disappointed in me if I let insecurity and fear stop me from submitting my work. So that is really how I ended up becoming a writer, and the journey has been amazing.

How would you describe your writing?

I write erotic romance, and within that genre my themes fall under multicultural/interracial, contemporary, fantasy, sci-fi and historical.

My target audience includes professional women between the ages of 25 and 45, but I know when I write I am writing to anyone that enjoys romance with spice!

It is funny that you ask what motivated me to begin writing erotic romance because many of my mentors started writing because they became frustrated with a lack of this or too much of that. The same is true of me. I wanted to see more interracial and multicultural erotic romance novels so I figured if that is what I wanted then I needed to write it myself!

How else have your personal experiences influenced your writing?

My personal life has made me more driven to succeed in my career as a writer. It has also forced me to be more diligent in setting aside time to devote to writing and marketing my novels.

The biggest challenge I run across is not always writer's block because the thoughts are there but the will to write isn't.

I try to prevent myself from getting stuck in that type of rut by setting a 10,000-word per week writing goal. As a writer you can set whatever writing goal you want but 10,000 words per week works for me. The great thing about setting a weekly goal and not a daily goal (which is what I used to do) is that some days I may not write at all whereas others I may write all day.

I used to set a daily goal of 1,500 words per day but I hated it because I would force myself to write on the days I didn't want to and then later end up having to scrap all of it or revise a lot of it. The weekly goal has worked for me and it keeps me from hating to sit down at the computer.

What would you say your novel, Enthralled, is about?

Enthralled, from iUniverse, is my first published novel:

Strong willed and beautiful, Candace, Queen of the Amazonian planet Kush, is used to fighting battles, giving orders and subservient men. From birth she is taught the art of war and that men are the enemy. What she hates more than a man is a domineering man!

With a body as powerful as a god's, the heir to the Akkadian throne is far from subservient. A man of honor, Ares is all masculine dominance!

When war tears their planets apart, the two are faced with entering into a marriage contract in order to save their kingdoms and their people. Forced into a marriage neither wants, at every turn the two warriors clash as they battle for dominance. But what begins as a marriage of convenience quickly turns into something more as they fight their growing passion and hunger for each other.

The ultimate challenge comes when they are forced to forsake their old beliefs for a chance at a future together.

How long did it take you to write the novel?

Because I stopped and started, it took me over a year to finish Enthralled, but nowadays it can take me a day to finish a first draft of a novella and about a week to finish a short novel (approx 50,000 words). With my current writing schedule I am much more productive than I was in the past.

When you were writing the novel, what did you find most difficult?

Getting the mechanics and dialogue right. It took several drafts for me to find my voice and to stop making beginner mistakes like head hopping and talking from awkward POVs [point of views].

I enjoyed creating another world. I love fantasy so I had a ball developing another universe and just really stretching the limits of reality because it was a work of fantasy.

What sets the book apart from other things you've written?

My voice in this novel is very different from my subsequent books, which are contemporaries and historical, mainly because I can't take so many liberties as I did in Enthralled. I have to remain true to the time period and the dialogue.

Of course the erotic elements are still there! Also, while my voice may have shifted my writing style is still consistent.

What will your next book be about?

I am working on a five-book contemporary series titled Friends and Lovers. The first title, Sweet Revenge, is currently under review with an editor and hopefully it will be released in the next few months. Sweet Revenge is actually the first book I ever wrote so it is very dear to my heart

What would you say has been your most significant achievement as a writer?

Seeing Enthralled receive good reviews has turned out to represent a tremendous accomplishment to me. And while I don't believe good reviews validate my work, it does make me feel like at least there is someone out there who enjoyed reading my book, and if there is one then maybe there are others!

[Interview] Kate Hofman

Kate Hofman was born in The Netherlands. She lived in England for a few years before moving to Canada where she now lives and works.

This year alone, she has published seven romance novels, among them, A Greek Love Story (Romance At Heart, 2007), Castle in Spain (The Dark Castle Lords, 2007), Navajo Dreams (Romance At Heart, 2007), Greek Fire (Romance At Heart, 2007) and A Sensual Seduction (Romance At Heart, 2007).

Two more novels, A Greater Love (Romance at Heart, November/December 2007) and The Spanish Conquest (AweStruck EBooks, February 2008) are going to be released soon.

In a recent interview, she spoke about her writing.

When did you start writing?

On April 22, 2002. The romance author Nina Bruhns, for whom I do Internet publicity, said that I should write. I was very surprised, but decided to try it, and found that she was right. Writing came easy to me.

I’ll also tell you my most daunting moment: when I sat down in front of that blank page on my computer. I remember thinking, I must be mad to think I can do this. And then I thought, Nina thinks you can. Do it! And, slowly, I began to type WILL AND KIKI (right from the start I titled all my books with the names of the protagonists. Later, when I got published, I had to think of actual titles -- which I am lousy at…) I remember looking at my watch as I began to type WILL AND KIKI.

It was five o’clock.

By one o’clock that morning, I had 13 pages of close-typed script. Not all of it good, mind you! I did a lot of revising, rewrites, deleting, you name it, I did it. But I had a strange feeling that I could do this.

This year alone, you've published seven books. How did this happen?

I had been writing in happy obscurity for about five years, when one of my friends, the writer Jennifer Mueller (a fabulous writer!) said to me, You should submit something to a publisher. I doubted I was ready for that, but I had written 25 books in the five years since April 2002, and Jennifer persuaded me to submit.

In November, 2006, I submitted a book to Awe-Struck, and three books to Romance At Heart, intending to give RAH a choice. To my intense surprise, they accepted all three.

Later, I heard that Awe-Struck, too, had accepted the book I submitted.

In the writing that you're doing, who would you say has influenced you the most?

Rose Brungard, the publisher of Romance At Heart. We had become friends when she wrote reviews of Nina Bruhns’s books. One day she asked me if I wrote, and I said, Well, um…uh… She asked me to send her something, and I did. She pointed out what was good, what needed improvement, what I should avoid, and so on. My book Navajo Dreams which came out in May 2007, was our first collaboration.

How would you describe your writing?

I write contemporary, sensual romance.

Who is your target audience?

People who like what I write.

I prefer to write about Alpha males, mostly Mediterranean, with a preference for Spanish and Greek heroes. There was one exception: A Navajo painter who falls, slowly, in love with a tourist he met at the Grand Canyon.

I think the genre chose me, it wasn’t a conscious choice. My first book was partly auto-biographical, and I found myself writing about a very happy time in my twenties. Add a stunning man who fell in love with me (which was entirely mutual) and I was writing romance.

What are your main concerns as a writer?

When you are writing romance, you have a hero, a heroine, and certain circumstances. How to vary these enough to keep the book fresh, not a copy of the others, that can be a challenge. Particularly the love scenes. When you write sensual romance, you can’t spill over into erotica to make things ‘different’.

You have the same two people, a bed, or a meadow, or the hearth-rug, or the bedroom in a private plane… but they do, invariably, what the others have done before them. I do my best not to get repetitive, but it can be quite a challenge.

How do I deal with this? Mostly by remembering my previous books, to make sure I stay well clear from the exact-same circumstances. If I have an uneasy feeling that this is somewhat deja vu, I re-read the book I think was similar.

That helps me stay away from too much similarity in circumstances which are so very similar.

What are you working on at present?

The Greek Prince’s Love Affair, a book that describes Prince Leiandros in exile in France -- first on the Riviera, then in Paris -- in 1949, when the Greek civil war 1946-48 had just ended. Some extremist elements had put a price on the Prince’s head. He meets Genevieve de Villiers, an archaeologist, and suggests she might be interested in a ruin close by his home in Greece. He is careful not to say castle, because he wants her to be interested in him, the man, not the Prince. They fall deeply in love...

It isn’t finished yet!

It will be published by The Dark Castle Lords. It’s a good fit for them and me. They like historicals, which I don’t usually write, but they also like castles, and this definitely is about a castle, a ruin, etc.

There are decided advantages in finding publishers for whom you are a good fit. I have that with Romance At Heart and The Dark Castle Lords.

What sets The Greek Prince’s Love Affair apart from the other things you've written?

That’s easy... I had never before written anything but contemporary. This time, I am writing 1949. It makes a lot of difference.

In what way is it similar?

It is similar because it is a love story. They meet, meet again by accident, begin to fall in love, trying to keep the details a little different every time, but the similarity is there. Then the difficulties put into their paths, and how they deal with them, triumphing, of course.

What did you find most difficult when you started working on the book?

This was my first ‘historical’ -- admittedly only going back to 1949, but it meant constantly checking: was this or that available in 1949? For instance, they have mineral water. In Paris, in 1949, what mineral water? You have to check, and I discovered in April 1949, a few months before the beginning of this book, Vichy brought out their Celestins water. Eureka!

It is difficult for someone living in 2007 to imagine a time without cell phones, freezers, microwaves, to mention but a few. So you’re not only writing the book, you’re constantly on the qui vive: Did they have this, then?

Another example, when Lee and Genevieve begin their love affair (I didn’t want an unexpected baby in this book) what contraceptives were there? Ah! the diaphragm! Condoms are reported to have been unreliable in those days.

I deal with these difficulties by Googling. I doubt I would even have started this book if it hadn’t been possible to find details of the most esoteric things in Google.

Do you write every day?

Yes, I write every day. The only exception was when my sister was dying. All my thoughts were for her.

I go to my computer with my first cup of coffee, check my emails and answer them. Then comes the good part, I go to Word and find my present book. I read over the last few pages and start writing. I usually forget to eat, but eventually I become aware that I’m hungry, and I stop at the first convenient place. This goes on, with frequent checks of the emails. I have no set times for working, stopping. I keep writing until I feel I’ve set down everything that was in my head. I am a widow, so my time is my own.

What has been your most enjoyable experience as a writer?

I think my first most enjoyable moment was when I mentally wrote ‘The End’ after finishing my first book. That feeling of accomplishment wears a little thin after 27½ books.

My next ‘high’ came when Rose Brungard of Romance At Heart emailed me that they would accept the three books I had sent them.

I printed her email up!

My final ‘high’ was when Rose gave me the url to a site she had made for me: There were all my books, the covers shown, a brief synopsis, the review sites, with brief quotations from the reviews…

What will your next book be about?

About two people who meet, and fall in love.

Hopefully I can make the circumstances as different as possible.

Usually, a new book begins to ask for my attention when I’m about three chapters from the end of my present book.

Sometimes the temptation is too great, and I’ll write a quick synopsis (which I’ll deviate from on p. 2, I know that already). Sometimes I even go so far as to quickly start Ch 1, to see if this will work. Only once it didn’t, that was my tenth book, which does not exist any more. It richly deserved the Delete button.

Oddly enough, the book I wrote in its place is one of my favorites.

This article was first published by OhmyNews International.