Please tell us about yourself.
Hi! <Waves>. I’m Carly Anne West, author of YA novels The Murmurings and The Bargaining.
What made you choose what you are doing right now?
I’ve always loved writing, but for some reason, I kept refusing to see myself as a writer. I didn’t consciously refuse to see it, but anytime I’d picture myself with a career, I always imagined something a little less nebulous. A teacher, maybe. Perhaps something in an office. Something stable. Then I hit collage, and I thought film-making was my path. I loved film, and I guess by then I’d determined that my path wouldn’t be stable regardless, so why not go for what I love? When I learned that my college didn’t have a film program, I opted for the closest thing – television. I was never interested in appearing in front of the camera, but I was fascinated by the production. Yet writing always played a part, always managing to sneak in there somehow. I found a screenwriting course at one of the local community colleges and gave it a shot. In screenwriting, there’s this rule that states your scene descriptions aren’t supposed to exceed five lines (and we’re talking about VERY narrow margins on the page), and to write in too much subtext for your characters steps on the actors’ and directors’ toes. Anyway, I was writing line after line of scene description and subtext despite that rule. I couldn’t help myself. Finally, my teacher wrote on my paper “why not just write a novel?” A few years later, I went back to school and got my Master’s degree in writing and wondered what took me so long.
Tell us more about your typical day
I have two small kids and therefore no typical day. If I had to identify common occurrences, I’d say no day passes without cleaning up two spills, changing eight diapers, repeating the same request about a million times, fielding the ever-present “why?” and wondering where I left my keys at least three times. And coffee plays a large role in my day. I wake up to write at 5:00 a.m. That part of my day is relatively consistent because it has to be. I’ll squeeze writing in wherever else it fits (journals are key, and I carry them with me at all times these days), but 5:00 a.m. is my time to explore those jotted notes on journal pages and on the backs of parking tickets and napkins and Post-its.
What do you do when you are not working?
This is where you learn, in case you hadn’t already picked up on it, that I’m not an incredibly interesting person. I spend a lot of time with my little family. We do that mundane stuff on the weekends – runs to Target, swimming lessons or soccer practice, the grocery store. I read as often as I can, but even when I love what I’m reading, I have this tendency to fall asleep two pages in these days. We hang out with friends who are shuffling the same activities, and we have distracted conversations. I break away for lunches with writer friends and meet monthly with my precious writing group. I love movies, especially the scary ones or the strange ones.
Tell us the best part of your work
I get to daydream for a living. Not that it’s all hours and hours spent staring out windows and making the occasional note. But I spent a lot of my childhood daydreaming. Maybe more time doing that than living. I had a vivid pretend world, and I preferred existing in it most days. There was a lot of cheek-against-car-window time, and I watched a lot of the world go by that way. I understand now why I did that so much. I was just preparing for a life as a writer. The hard part is translating those scenes to the page.
Where do you see yourself and your work in 3/5 years?
I think writers are naturally superstitious people, so I think the best way I can answer this question is to say I see myself writing. I have no idea what I’ll be writing, but I’d be surprised if it wasn’t for Young Adults, and I’d be surprised if the stories I was writing didn’t have a grim or quirky or sad or melancholy element to them. Those qualities have always existed in my writing, and I adore writing about and for teens. That stage in life is sort of eternal. We are always, somehow, still our teenage selves, with all that boldness and vulnerability. But we get to be adults who form protective shells around those cores, so it gets much better.
What do you think of the world's obsession with technology?
Great question! I honestly never saw it as an obsession, but rather an inevitability. I’m happy for the progress, and I’m astounded that I’m living through it. It’s remarkable to think that when I was growing up, there was no Internet for a long time. Our computer at home was a Tandy 1000, with a blue screen and yellow DOS text, and a dot matrix printer that made so much noise, we could run the blender behind it and not even notice (our computer was in the kitchen). Forget about smart phones. I always had to carry a quarter growing up in case I needed to use a payphone while I was out (a quarter for emergencies!) So I suppose I am incredibly grateful for the technology. I’m also intimidated by it, if I’m being honest. I’m well versed enough to be able to update my website on occasion and participate in social media at a fairly low level. But God help me if I have to do anything too complicated. I still make lists on paper. I write longhand a lot of the time. And I still prefer sending paper thank-you cards. In the mail. With a stamp.
Who is your inspiration/role model?
I have soooooooooo many! My parents, my grandparents, my husband, my kids. I have authors I admire, both dead and alive, filmmakers who have moved me to the same emotions I grapple with when I read. I think too many to even name. But my mom is an artist, and I’ve always admired how she approaches art without judgment. And my grandma (of Blessed memory) for her tenacity and sharp wit.
If you could meet anyone in the world dead or alive who would it be and what would say to them?
I’d ask Edgar Allan Poe what makes him sad. I think that at the heart of every scary story is a sad one. And his are some of the saddest to me.
What is your favorite holiday spot/food/gadget?
I really love London. I felt very much at home there and found the Tube so easy to navigate (I used to live in the San Francisco Bay Area, and our public transportation there – BART – is modeled on the Tube, so I got all nostalgic). The history in London astounded me. That’s just something we don’t get in the U.S., and I thought I was walking through some of my favorite books. It was incredible. Food … nachos. I love them. I seriously can’t get enough. But also fruit, almost every kind there is. Gadget … okay, we just got an iRobot, that thing that automatically vacuums your floors for you? I think it’s changing my life. I’m not much on housework, so the fact that this thing runs at 10:00 a.m. every morning and docks itself on its own charger when it’s done is like magic to me. If we could find something like that to clean the bathroom, I’d be in heaven.
Suggest five books everyone must read
I’m going to struggle with this. First of all, too many to squeeze into five answers. And second, it’s going to be five books that I must read. But you? You must read whatever moves you. Because life’s too short to spend reading books someone else told you are required reading because they were moved by them. But here are five that moved me:
All three books in Mary Karr’s memoir trilogy: The Liar’s Club, Cherry, and LIT. I can’t say enough about the honesty of her writing, the depths to which she exposed herself and the frankness of that exposure. She is unflinching.
Lorrie Moore’s Birds of America – it’s a book of short stories, and each one makes me ache. I keep returning to them in my mind as some of the closest examinations of introverted lives.
Shirley Jackson’s Short Stories – Just all of them … of course The Lottery, but so many others. She’s the queen of unsettling the reader. I will forever try to write like her.
Give us some writing tips
I’m hardly in a position to be doling out writing advice, but I’ll share two bits of advice that I try to remember myself, knowing that I’m only repeating sage advice I’ve received over the years. First – to love your characters, no matter what. Even the almost unlovable ones. Even the despicable, pathetic, horrible ones. Even the ones that try not to be loved. Love them all. If you don’t, your readers definitely won’t. It’s so important to ensuring that you fully explore their depth. And second – to write as though no one else understands your genius like you do. Writing is full of rejection, and often it feels as though you’re creating in a vacuum. It can be a very solitary life. So learn to take helpful criticism and apply it, but also learn to reject the stuff that isn’t as helpful.
What is your next project?
I can’t say much about it at the moment (see: superstitious writer) but I’ll say that it’s another scary one, it’s incredibly intimate, almost claustrophobic, and I’m in love with this project.
What is your message to all teenagers?
It. Gets. Easier. Being a teenager is so hard. There’s almost nothing easy about it. But you won’t always have the anxiety you have at that age, and you won’t always feel as though your world is the size that has been made for you. There is life outside of those walls. And you’ll like it a lot better.
What is your message to all Pakistanis?
I would love to visit your beautiful country some day! Some of the most courageous and amazing people I’ve ever met and/or read about have come from Pakistan, and that cannot be a coincidence.
What message do you want to give to the world?
Read more. (No, but seriously, read.)
