About Robert Joe Stout:
Robert Joe Stout
Poet, fiction writer and journalist, Robert Joe Stout’s books include the poetry volumes Monkey Screams (Future Cycle Press) and A Perfect Throw (Aldrich Press), both of which have received critical acclaim. Three nonfiction books about the culture and politics of Mexico have appeared since 2003 in addition to articles, reports, essays and creative nonfiction in dozens of print and online publications including The American Scholar, America, The Tishman Review and Modern Maturity among many others. He has served on human rights delegations, boards of directors of non-profit organizations and the editorial staffs of newspapers and magazines. Other books that he’s authored include the novels Miss Sally, Running Out the Hurt and Where Gringos Don’t Belong. He currently lives in Oaxaca, Mexico.
What inspires you to write?
As a career journalist I'm accustomed to write about what I see and know, real world people, what they say and do and dream. An immigrant's experiences inspire me to write about them, women I love inspire me, frigate birds riding thermals in the sky above me are an inspiration to write. So are conversations, what I read, what I see and have seen, including riots, theater appearances and the ways my children cope with growing up..
Tell us about your writing process.
For both fiction and nonfiction I have a clear mental/emotional concept of what I want to achieve before I start. As I journalist I learned to write every day–it's my job, my profession, if I don't like what I've written I throw it away but I continue writing. I experience emotionally what I write about, consequently events create themselves from the writing experience, the participation in and with what I'm writing. I edit as I write–go back over what I've written before I continue with something new. Usually I have several projects going on simultaneously–a fiction, a nonfiction and poetry. Going from one to the other keeps me fresh and gives me time to mull over, delve deeper into characters or subject matter during the intervals when I'm not directly involved in writing a certain piece.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
In fiction I experience what they are experiencing (or they experience what I feel and think). I am them and they are me. I write about real people in real life situations–no sf, nothing futuristic, no genre romance–so all of my characters have part of me in them.
What advice would you give other writers?
Write and write and write. Asked that question on Author's Radio I responded with a baseball metaphor: Major League ballplayers don't show up at game time ready to hit and throw. They go through spring training, they spend hours every day throwing, stretching, batting, preparing, working out in gyms. They spend years in the minor leagues honing their skills before they get to the Big Time. Writing is not that different. It takes dedication and constant work.
How did you decide how to publish your books?
My first books were published by established presses–Bobbs-Merrill, Praeger, etc. Because I live in Mexico I decided not to self-publish print books but chose to go with indie publishers to simplify promotion–not having to manage print book mailing, accounting, etc. I believe it's important to analyze one's capacity to handle cover design, text, distribution, promotion before deciding how to go. Many authors do as I'm doing with the re-issue of my first novel and the reissue of a more recent novel and go just with ebook publication.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
It's here to stay. One change I anticipate is the participation of libraries in book publication as they try to stay contemporary and not become museums of the past. Another is a trend towards quality rather than sheer volume, both on the part of publishers and marketers.
What do you use?: Professional Cover Designer
What genres do you write?: Contemporary fiction; contemporary nonfiction; Poetry
What formats are your books in?: Both eBook and Print
Website(s)
Link To Robert Joe Stout Page On Amazon
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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.
