Next on our author interview series, StarkLight Press talks with Virginia Carraway Stark, whose writing resume is rivalled only by her acumen in helping fellow authors find and refine their mots justes. You can find her at the sites listed below!
1. Tell us a little bit about yourself and what you’ve been up to in the past few years.
The past few years have been a time of change and acceptance for me. A lot has changed and I’ve had to adapt to a lot of new things. I’ve endured betrayals from friends that I thought I would always have in my life and made new friends that I never imagined being in my life. Through it all; I’ve kept on writing.
I think the biggest thing that’s changed for me is that I’ve had to take a walk in the wilds. I had to take some time of introspection and quietude and get to know myself all over again after the things I’ve been through in life. I’ve explored myself deeply and I’ve written profoundly about my family and my childhood. I’ve explored the world through others perspectives while keeping the writings private except for a very few, trusted friends and family.
Nevertheless I do have a lot of new publications. I have several drabbles coming from Black Hare Press, a new novel coming from New Moon Press, and I have the third book in Verna’s Saga coming out as well as the fourth novel in my ‘Daughter’s Series’ starring the always popular Sasha Wheaton. Interspersed is the novel, ‘DoYou?’ which explores some of the concepts looked into in the collaborative novel Space Stranded and problems with anti-matter beings meeting matter beings. The SegDeb Galaxy is explored by Sasha and ‘Shroom.
My bookshelf has swelled to bursting with the coming releases of The Decay of Man and the release of Gendler’s Landing.
The personal set of based on true biographies that I’ve written about my family will also be coming soon, Preacher Man being the first and based on the life of my deceased elder brother. Coming close on the heels of that will be the story of my mixed race half sister.
Recently I’ve done interviews for Joshua Pantescellara’s award winning Vlog and been on a panel for historical fiction for CyCon.
After this April’s poetry month I also have enough poems to release an illustrated book of poetry, my second book of poetry that is only my own writing. I’ve been part of many poetry anthologies but having one just for me is always very special!
2. Explain for our audience a little bit about the inspiration for your tale, and the themes that inform it.
I contributed a few stories to StarkLight 5, but I think the one I’ll address is “Looking Glass”. The inspiration for it came from a series of dreams. I think it’s probably an unusual thing to dream about being summoned by a Pope who wants to use your wings for spells and bathing in a pool of mercury… but that’s just me!
This was a series of dreams that started many years ago and I felt a close relationship to many of the people in the world of the past. I’ve tried to pinpoint it to what Pope it would likely have been, but everything is all a dream. I’m pretty sure it’s a highly offensive story, but I’ve given up all thought of not offending people. I’ve learned in life that someone is always going to be unhappy by something that one does, so one might as well do as one pleases.
It’s liberating when you get past the depth of pettiness people can go to!
3. What’s your preferred method for writing: computer/smartphone, typewriter, hand, voice transcription? Tell us the most unusual place you ever wrote down a tale- in the elevator at work, on horseback, in a crowded subway?
My favourite place to write is on my laptop, ideally in a nest of cushions. I often write on my notepad on my phone or in my bullet journal or on any scrap of paper that’s handy when desperate. The most unusual place that I wrote was to write nearly an entire screenplay in between making lattes at Starbucks. I wrote it all on those brown, recycled napkins and some on my arms and hands when I ran low on napkins. It wasn’t even quiet, it was during the Christmas season and Starbucks was a madhouse. Thankfully I had an understanding manager and I was able to keep up with orders as well as writing so I didn’t get into trouble! My screenplay did go to Cannes, but that particular one didn’t get made into a movie…yet!
4. Where do you like to go best to recharge your creative batteries?
Nature is best. Animals are definitely a plus. The best place to go is to the other worlds that I imagine with my husband and creative partner. We met creating and we have continued creating together for many years now. There’s something about the way our minds meld and merge beautiful and magical worlds and characters that is like nothing else.
If I was to pick anything, I would say, with my husband, in the trees, by the water and or in the water. That’s my bliss.
5. What, in your opinion is author kryptonite? (antithetical to the creative writing process)
Reading too much about what people think about you. The worst thing is to let that influence you. I think that’s why so many television shows get punched with the suck fairy. People go through Google and FB etc to find out what people think about their writing and they lose control over their worlds. It’s really easy to get ‘feedback’ that is poisonous. Pick your feedback carefully and reject the stuff that sounds like crap. Be the ruler of your own worlds and people.
6. What are your three favorite mainstream books, and what are your three favorite indie/independently published works?
I’m going to give my three favorite mainstream authors: CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien and Richard Adams… although there are a lot more and I could probably go on and on! Indie authors are a little bit more difficult because a lot of them started off Indie and quickly became more mainstream. I tend to think of them as Indie more because they are friends than because of the nature of their writing. I really enjoy a lot of the writers from Writer Punk, I’ve published with them and always look forward to picking up the book at the end and reading everyone’s work. Robert Sawyer is by no means Indie, but he’s a friend along with Randy McCharles who also has a conventional contract, still, being more chummy, I’d list them as ‘Indie’. My absolute favorite is my bias but it’s absolutely true, my husband. He’s a wonderful writer and I can always count on co-writing with him without ever being let down. His novels are superb and his science fiction is the hard, well developed kind that could actually turn into real technology one day. His characters have seduced me a thousand times over and there’s no one whose work I’d rather read… not even Tolkien!
7. What is the last movie you saw? Give our authors a brief review.
The last movie that I watched was Solo… it was, umm, okay. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be from the review that I had heard, I think that most people didn’t like it because there was a total lack of Jedi and clearly written intending for most of the questions to be answered in a sequel. The actor who played Hans did a good job of it, his voice was eerily like Harrison Ford’s voice and he may possibly have been cloned off of Harrison Ford at some point to play the role… well, it’s science fiction, anything is possible!
8. What are your next big projects, so that our audience can keep an eye out for them.
I have a lot of projects coming out soon! The Family Series, The Daughter Series, a whole lot of short stories and poetry, the Royal Maze series… gosh… yeah, lots. Once I bring out all the things I’ve been working on in private over the past year or so it’s going to be a deluge!
Bio:
Virginia Carraway Stark has published numerous novels. She has been part of dozens of anthologies, collaborations, guest blogs, drabbles and has written screenplays that starred Rowdy Roddy Piper and Nick Mancuso. She has upcoming releases from a variety of presses including Dark Moon Publishing, Simon and Schuster, Black Hare Press and StarkLight Press. Virginia enjoys new writing experiences. She has taken part of many writing marathons both for poetry and novels. She’s a regular for the yearly novel writing exercise NaNoWriMo, the 24 hour poetry marathon and the 3 day novel writing competition. She writes a poem a day for poetry month and once went three years writing at least a poem a day. Some of her poems have been turned into songs. She has even contributed to online ‘choose your own adventure’ series! Virginia has won awards for her novels and poetry, her works have been part of other award winning series and nominated for her essays, blogging and other writing. She is well known for her passion her spirit of adventure both on and off the page. Her stories range from science fiction. Supernatural, horror and the true stories of her life, historical books (one of which was endorsed by the Prime Minister of Canada as well as the Army Corp of Engineers) or studies of the paranormal. You can find her by Googling her or at www.virginiastark.wordpress.com,
on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/Virginiacarrawaystark/
and @tweetsbyvc. She loves to get fan mail and to take part in new adventures in writing and always, to share her passion with the world.
Thanks for taking the time to fill out our StarkLight Volume 5 Questionnaire!
