About Joie Davidow:
Joie Davidow’s has just completed a historical novel, An Unofficial Marriage, about the tempestuous love of the great 19th century Russian author Ivan Turgenev for most famous opera singer of her day, Pauline Viardot-Garcia. She is the author of a short novel, I Wouldn’t Leave Rome to Go to Heaven, Marked for Life, a memoir published by Harmony in June 2003, and Infusions of Healing, A Treasury of Mexican-American Herbal Remedies, published by Fireside/Simon & Schuster in October 1999. With Esmeralda Santiago, she is the editor of two anthologies, Las Christmas: Favorite Latino Authors Remember the Holidays, published by Alfred A. Knopf , and Las Mamis: Favorite Latino Authors Remember Their Mothers, also published by Knopf.
She is currently the editor of InRomeNow.com, an online magazine she founded in 2005 with Vikki Ericks. The site, which is updated weekly, gives readers more than 100 pages of information on her adopted city, Rome, Italy.
She was the founder of L.A. Style, the ground-breaking publication that chronicled the Los Angeles lifestyle, becoming the fastest growing regional magazine in the United States and winning numerous awards. She served as the magazine’s Executive Publisher and Editor-in-Chief . She was a co-founder of the L.A. Weekly, a newspaper which has been an integral part of life in Los Angeles.
What inspires you to write?
I love words. I love the richness of the English language. I love the freedom it gives me to express a human commonality in a very precise and honest way. I like the architecture of language, the endless process of refining a paragraph, a sentence. I love creating living breathing characters, painting scenes, with my fingertips. There is no greater gratification than discovering you have touched the life of a total stranger with your words.
Tell us about your writing process.
My books ruminate in my head for years. They appear in glimpses on scribbled notes, voice memos, in the highlighted sections of books I admire. I teach creative writing and I am a firm believer in using the skills of the craft. Character analysis, outlines, lists of scenes. Without that, you are just staring at a blank screen or a sheet of paper. When I am working on a book I clear my day completely, sit down with my computer and put in my hours. On good days, I write with an urgency, a need to get the story down, to let my characters sing. On most days, though, it takes me time to get started. On those days, I find it helpful to read for a while, something very well written.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
I listen to my characters, and when I have been working on a book for months or even years, I see them. I see my main character pull up the legs of his trousers with his fingertips and sit gingerly on the chair across from me, settle his hands on his belly and look at me. What do you want me to tell you? he asks.
What advice would you give other writers?
Write your passion. If you plan to write a book you are consigning years of your life, blood and sweat to the pursuit. You may experience great rewards for the effort or none it all. Do it because you care, because you must, or do something else.
How did you decide how to publish your books?
So far, I have published through major publishers, using a literary agent, but I am open to some of the newer publishing avenues, and I have kept my out of print books alive by republishing them myself through the Author’s Guild. If you are publishing because you want readers, self-publishing is a very respectable alternative. If you are publishing because you need to earn money, you’re better off trying the traditional route.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
It seems clear to me that digital publishing is the future. But many people still require a book in their hands. I don’t think the ebook will ever fully replace the printed volume. That said, the economics of the business has changed vastly, just in the past ten years, in a way that has not been beneficial to the working writer, yet has made it possible for almost anyone to become an author.
What do you use?: Professional Editor, Professional Cover Designer
What genres do you write?: Fiction, memoir
What formats are your books in?: Both eBook and Print
Website(s)
Joie Davidow Home Page Link
Your Social Media Links
Facebook
LinkedIn
All information in this post is presented “as is” supplied by the author. We don’t edit to allow you the reader to hear the author in their own voice.
