Interview with Jenn Johansson

I'm lucky (or cunning) enough to have lured yet another successful writer over to my blog for an SAT - Successful Author Talk. SAT authors have conquered the query, slain the synopsis and attained the pinnacle of published. How'd they do it? Let's ask 'em!

Today's guest for the SAT is Jenn Johansson, author of INSOMNIA, and a fellow Friday the Thirteener. Jenn loves writing, playing board games, and sitting in her hot tub. Her dream is that someday she can do all three at the same time. In INSOMNIA, instead of sleeping, Parker Chipp enters the dream of the last person he’s had eye contact with.

Are you a Planner or Pantster?

I’m a hybrid. I write a very broad, very general outline to give me a blueprint and then I feel very comfortable veering off of it when it feels right.

How long does it typically take you to write a novel, start to finish?

Straight through drafting without taking time off in the middle…it takes about 6-8 weeks. And then I start editing and revising. 

Do you work on one project at a time, or are you a multi tasker?

Definitely one project at a time, except if they’re in different phases. I can draft one and edit another, but I really prefer focusing on one and putting the others aside until later.

Did you have to overcome any fears that first time you sat down to write?

No. I really didn’t even think I was writing a book at the time. I just wanted to get this idea out of my head. It wasn’t leaving me alone. By the time I realized it was a book I was too far in to get suddenly nervous about the whole thing.

How many trunked books did you have before you were agented?

One…but it had been revised/rewritten about seventeen times.

Have you ever quit on an ms, and how did you know it was time?

Yes. I knew it was time because I was finally so sick and tired of it that I didn’t want to look at it anymore. I also had a new idea that was really starting to pull on me and I didn’t want to make that one wait any longer. So I moved on, and I’m so happy I did.

Who is your agent and how did you get that "Yes!" out of them?  

My agent is the amazing Kathleen Rushall of Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. I got her through a traditional query slushpile process. She read the first 50 pages of my book and then offered…I told her to finish the book and let me know if she still felt the same. She did. I squealed. We lived happily ever after.

How long did you query before landing your agent? 

My first (trunked) book, I sent over 100 queries and got quite a bit of interest but no offers. With Insomnia, I sent just over 30 before I got my offer. 

Any advice to aspiring writers out there on conquering query hell?

Most authors I know got their agent through the slush pile. It does work. You just have to keep writing, keep trying and keep improving. There is no shortcut or keyword, it’s all about hard work and perseverance. 

How did it feel the first time you saw your book for sale?

A convoluted mixture of thrilling and terrifying. I’m not sure if it’s ever going to stop feeling this way. 

How much input do you have on cover art?

Very little. They showed me what they liked and I gave a couple of minor suggestions. They took a couple, said no to the rest, and it was done. I love what they did with it. 

What's something you learned from the process that surprised you?

Nothing smoothes out after you get an agent or a book deal. The roller coaster keeps going and still has just as many violent ups and downs. I think people just get a little better at holding on and enjoying the ride. 

How much of your own marketing do you?  

Quite a bit of it. Flux helps out here and there and opens doors I can’t get through, but I do a lot of it on my own. I'm on Twitter, I blog, have my own site, Tumblr and Facebook. Of course I'm also on Goodreads, as is INSOMNIA. 

When do you build your platform? After an agent? Or should you be working before?

I think it’s a good idea to start before. It takes years to get people to listen and pay attention to what you have to say. It never hurts to get a jumpstart on that. 

Do you think social media helps build your readership?

Yes! I think there are many people I know through social media who otherwise wouldn’t have heard of me or my book who have ordered it and are excited about it. The internet makes the world even smaller and gives even more weight and power to word of mouth. We should all be trying to take advantage of that whenever possible. 

Mindy's Law

The basic tenant of Mindy's Law is much like Murphy's Law - but with more swearing.

For those of you who follow me on Twitter and Facebook you know that I had eye surgery last week. For the full effect of Mindy's Law to be clear to you, I first have to give you a brief overview of my medical history, ophtamologically speaking.

I've never been able to see jack shit, but I never realized this wasn't normal either. I always had a book right up to my face, or my cross-sititch right under my nose (go ahead, make fun - I'll stab you) and since these are kind of close-up style things no one thought much about it - including me. Sports is another story but I honestly think sports is 90% intuition and the fact that I played a few - and played them well - while being nearly blind for a long while says a lot.

In any case, in about 7th grade I noticed that my friends could spot other friends coming into the cafeteria at a much higher rate than I could. I was kind of mystified by this, and was even more so when I asked how this was possible and my friend said, "Duh. I can just *see* them."

Wait - what? You're supposed to be able to distinguish facial features from across a room? This was news to me.

Away to the eye doctor I went. Hello glasses and contacts. You can imagine what a shock it was to me to experience the world. I enjoyed it. In fact, I enjoyed it so much that when I went to college I decided I never ever wanted to stop enjoying it, and I acted how most most college kids do - I did some things I shouldn't have, and I didn't do some things that I should have. Like take out my contacts. Ever. Sleeping, eating, walking, whatever, you name it - I had them in. I managed to give myself a nasty little disease called GPC (I call it GPS becuase it's easier to remember and the doctor always knows what I'm talking about anyway). Also - don't click on that link unless you want to see something really nasty.

So, my own case of GPC was so nasty that my doctor called in all the nurses to have a good look and declared that I should be the poster child for GPC. Apparently I was much more disgusting than anything that has ever been witnessed. So I was banned from contacts. Forever.

Enter the glasses. I don't mind them too much. Except for when I'm playing sports and worried about a line drive jamming the bridge up into my nasal cavity. Or when I'm gardening, and I'm so sweaty that my glasses slide right off my nose and into the dirt for the 20th time. Or when I'm swimming and can't see a damn thing and end up having conversations with people I think I know, only to discover that I don't know them, and have been conned into a poolside conversation with the type of male I'd rather avoid.

Another time being a glasses wearer comes in very unhandy is when your puppy eats your only pair of glasses, leaving you unable to find your phone, and stuck in your own house until someone shows up randomly (it was 16 hours) and you make them drive you to a Lens Crafters.

So when I decided my gift to myself upon being published would  be the gift of sight. This decided, I went to a guy who can give people that (not Jesus, but close, in my estimation) and discovered that not only do my eyes totally suck, but my corneas are on the thin side. To be cautious, the doc wanted to wait 6 months, test my corneal strength again, and see if they'd gotten any weaker in the meantime.

Over the course of those 6 months my left lens started popping out of my glasses at inopportune times, and one of the rubber leg things on the bridge that hold it on your nose broke off. But I didn't care, and I wasn't spending money on new glasses. So I go back, get the test done to find out that my corneas haven't devoured any body building powders lately and are still quite thin. But - I still have options - I can take part in an experimental test that can give us some numbers about stuff and things and those numbers regarding stuff and things would ease the doctor's mind enough to say, Yes, let's make you be able to see.

So, I signed papers to be a guinea pig. That part was actually pretty fun, but it involved three different test trips and no one ever gave me ice cream. Those numbers and stuff and things made everyone feel comfortable with letting me have surgery - but not LASIK.

My corneas are to thin for LASIK. Instead I get to have AST - which basically means that there's no flap like in LASIK. They just scrape your whole cornea off and it grows back better and more awesome and in pink. I was ready to agree to receiving donated eyes from a serial killer if he had good vision, I didn't care.

So last wek, I'm totally psyched to be on my road to vision when I take my Valium, done my paper hairnet, clutch my teddy bear (provided by the clinic, they're very nice) and have the very memorable experience of watching my own cornea be scraped away - AND -

... the laser stopped working.

No shit. I'm lying on the table with my teddy bear and my cornea gone and, well, there's no laser.

Before you ask, no, I wasn't going to some hole in the wall joint where a dude in bib overalls with a dirty pitchfork scraped off my cornea and then suddenly realized they didn't even own a laser - nothing of the sort. This place is a highly-respected, top-of-the-line, eye-dcotors-go-here type of place. And let me tell you, they were mortified.

I honestly  can tell you that I totally understood. I can't say how many SMARTboards and InFocus machines have failed me when I needed them doing presentation. Granted, nobody's cornea is flapping in the wind in my scenario, but... shit happens.

And Mindy's Law states that it's usually gong to happen to me.

Everything was sorted out the next day. My uncut eye was treated, we're waiting for my other eye to heal before we can treat it (doc said about 6 weeks) and in the meantime I'm lying around with Stevie Wonder glasses and audiobooks, petting my new cat and marveling at the fact that one day I will be able to see.

Damn I'm looking forward to that.

And yes, by the way, I have typed this whole thing out by feel. I can't see shit.

Wednesday WOLF - Heavens to Betsy!

I've got a collection of random information in my brain that makes me an awesome Trivial Pursuit partner, but is completely useless when it comes to real world application. Like say, job applications. I thought I'd share some of this random crap with you in the form of another acronym-ific series. I give you - Word Origins from Left Field - that's right, the WOLF. Er... ignore the fact that the "from" doesn't fit.

The suggestion for today's WOLF was where the phrase heavens to betsy comes from. Great question.

I freely admit that I didn't know this one off the top of my head. What I did know was that there was a handy-dandy book by Charles Earle Funk going by exactly that title right outside my office. So I popped out there just now and read the introduction to discover that Funk also has no idea where the phrase comes from, which immediately made me feel better about not knowing.

And this one... well - it looks like it's stumped pretty much everyone. There are some theories though:

• It refers to Betsy Ross, she of the American flag, and was originally used as a way of saying, "God bless Betsy," and somehow evolved into an exclamation of surprise.

• Also relevant to Mrs. Ross, some believe that it derived from the Minna Irving poem "Betsy's Battle Flag," about said lady. But no one has been able to establish that for sure.

• Another historical figure could have played a part in this little saying. Davy Crockett called his rifle "Old Betsy," and because he was a super-cool dude quite a few other frontiersman followed suit. Again, the blessing of a favorite gun could have evolved into an exclamation of surprise.

A similar expression - and one I've heard much more often because of my dear sister, and believe me it gets old really fast - is heavens to Murgatroyd.

This one we actually do have an answer for, and I'm supplying it here because of my utter failure in the Betsy arena. The phrase itself was popularized by the Yogi Bear Show character Snagglepuss in the 1960's. The show's creators based the voice for the character on actor Bert Lahr - better knows as the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz. Lahr first spoke the line "heavens to Murgatroyd" in the 1944 film Meet the People, and the Yogi Bear creators liked it so much they carried it over as a character staple line that would cement the line into pop culture. 

Um, but where did the writers of Meet the People get the line from? There are references of in literature from as early as 1887 as Murgatroyd to hit on heavily for some comic relief, and it seems it was established as a family name in England way back in 1371. 

How we made the jump from Murgatroyd to Betsy is just one of those things we'll have to know we don't know.