Author Interview with Diane Chamberlain!

Yes, it's finally here! My author interview with Diane Chamberlain is finally mine! Well, and yours. Anyways, enjoy:


1. You are the first adult author that I have reviewed on my blog. How does that make you feel?

I’m honored that you were willing to give one of my books a try and that you enjoyed it enough that you wanted to chat with me about it.

2. Before The Storm is a novel that covers many topic that I love to read about, (crime, love, loss, ect.) what was the inspiration for this novel?
I came up with the setting before I came up with the story. I visited Topsail Island, North Carolina for an ‘authors and readers’ event and fell in love with it and knew I wanted to set a story there. Around the same time, I had an idea for a story involving an “unlikely hero,” an unpopular boy who rescues people from a fire. That’s how Andy was born. When I first “heard” Andy speak in my mind, I recognized his voice as similar to that of children I used to work with as a psychotherapist and knew he had fetal alcohol syndrome. The way he spoke reminded me of those children. But that meant I had to come up with a reason why his mother, Laurel, drank while she was pregnant with him. Plotting is like that—it’s circular. You think of one idea and then have to puzzle out how to fit that idea into the story. I love solving those problems. Another scene that was very strong in my mind even before I started writing Before the Storm was the scene with Andy’s sister, Maggie, sitting on the demolished porch of an old beach house, communing with the spirit of her father who had been killed by a whale. I loved that scene, but I didn’t know what it meant until I wrote some of the story.

3. How long have you been writing?
I wrote a few truly terrible books when I was twelve, but then I forgot about writing until I was in my early thirties and in the midst of a career as a social worker and psychotherapist working in hospitals and a private practice with teenagers. I’ve been at it more than twenty years.

4. What made you want to write adult novels? Or did it just end up like that?
I never set out to write any particular sort of novel. The story comes to me and I just write it down, but I do find that teenagers often worm their way into my stories. I enjoyed working with teens professionally very much and they make an interesting addition to most stories. Basically, though, I like to write intergenerational stories where all ages are represented, just as in real life. `

5. How old were you when you started writing novels?
See number 3.

6. What is your favourite colour?
Red!

7. How long did it take you to write Before the Storm?
About ten months.

8. In your own words, summarize Before the Storm.
I think of Before the Storm as part mystery, part suspense and one hundred percent family drama. It’s the story of how far a family will go to protect one another. It’s about the choices people make that come back to haunt them. And it’s about the gradual unfolding of truths that keep the characters on edge and those pages turning.


9. Did you have any say in your novel covers?
Authors have very little say in their covers, unfortunately. I like most of my covers, but not all of them.

10. Is there any other projects that you are working on right now that you can tell us about?
The book I just finished is called The Midwife’s Confession. It will be out in the United States in May, and yes, there are a few teenage characters in the story!

11. Thank you so much for the wonderful interview. One last question, what is your biggest advice for aspiring authors?
My advice is to learn all you can about the craft of writing. Learn the basics of grammar and punctuation and how to string words together in a way that makes sense and sounds good. You really need to know all of that to tell a great story. And then you need to figure out that great story to tell! My strongest advice is to not give up. If you love writing and have a tale to tell, just keep working at it until you get it right.

Thank you so much Diane Chamberlain for the wonderful interview! You answered so many questions that I had rolling around in my head when I finished Before the Storm. Also, I would like to add to Diane Chamberlain's comment on my review of Before the Storm, that I did know that there is a sequel and I should be reading that soon because I love her books!

Once again, I thank Diane so much for the wonderful interview and I would like to inform you guys that I will be featured on her blog sometime soon! I will let you guys know more about that at a later date and hopefully that will be sooner rather than later!

Love,
Sierra