Ask the Author: Michael Grant
Answered Questions (219)
Michael Grant
We are working to make it happen, but it's a struggle.
Michael Grant
Here's a long and probably odd answer. I don't think in terms of inspiration, I think in terms of problem-solving.
Imagine a thousand Legos of various shapes and colors each representing a character or a story line. Many of those bricks have been used - they're tropes or cliches; some of them are characters I've seen before, or too-familiar bits of dialog. I need to build a structure without a plan, while avoiding all those bad bricks, and have the end result look like nothing you've ever seen before.
Sometimes an initial idea will just pop into my head almost fully-formed. GONE did. Other times I may go in search of an idea. BZRK started with the question, "What's a new 'scary' that people haven't seen?" But as always the initial idea is just a tiny part of the whole, because on every page you may be tempted to reach for one of those bad bricks, and you need to resist that temptation and find a different way, a way unique to you. The initial idea is followed by hundreds of ideas needed to implement the one, big idea.
To me the underlying trick is to sound like yourself and no one else. That's called 'voice.' The world doesn't need another this or another that, it may well need a specific you. Figure out who you are and you start to figure out your voice. How's that for some psychobabble?
Imagine a thousand Legos of various shapes and colors each representing a character or a story line. Many of those bricks have been used - they're tropes or cliches; some of them are characters I've seen before, or too-familiar bits of dialog. I need to build a structure without a plan, while avoiding all those bad bricks, and have the end result look like nothing you've ever seen before.
Sometimes an initial idea will just pop into my head almost fully-formed. GONE did. Other times I may go in search of an idea. BZRK started with the question, "What's a new 'scary' that people haven't seen?" But as always the initial idea is just a tiny part of the whole, because on every page you may be tempted to reach for one of those bad bricks, and you need to resist that temptation and find a different way, a way unique to you. The initial idea is followed by hundreds of ideas needed to implement the one, big idea.
To me the underlying trick is to sound like yourself and no one else. That's called 'voice.' The world doesn't need another this or another that, it may well need a specific you. Figure out who you are and you start to figure out your voice. How's that for some psychobabble?
Michael Grant
You mean, MONSTER, VILLAIN and HERO? The first two are already out.
Michael Grant
I'm afraid that I have zero control over any of that.
Michael Grant
I always knew I could write. Which sounds arrogant, but it's true. That said I had no plan or intention to write. I was a guy who lived job to job. I was a working class guy - waiter, apartment manager, house cleaner - a high school drop-out who'd had some serious trouble with the law. I was, in short, a mess.
But I knew I could write. In 1989 my wife Katherine Applegate said, "We should get careers," and I said, "Okay, what career?" When she answered 'writer' there was no big doubt on my part. It felt like, "Oh, yeah, that'd make sense."
I have a very unusual origin story, I'm afraid.
But I knew I could write. In 1989 my wife Katherine Applegate said, "We should get careers," and I said, "Okay, what career?" When she answered 'writer' there was no big doubt on my part. It felt like, "Oh, yeah, that'd make sense."
I have a very unusual origin story, I'm afraid.
Michael Grant
There's no simple answer to that, because it is entirely subjective. A book is good if you enjoy it or learn from it. And a book that would be good for you one day, may not be good for you a year later - you change, the world changes, what you need and enjoy changes.
Michael Grant
That's it, I'm afraid. Although we are thinking of pitching it as a TV series since structurally it's basically a 'procedural' like Law and Order or CSI.
Michael Grant
It's actually Frangie's grand daughter.
Michael Grant
Damned if I know. There are too many characters for me to follow up on each one. But have you considered fan fiction?
Michael Grant
I needed an age well short of adulthood, but where some skills were present. Too old and it saps the drama. Too young and you box yourself in as to plot, dialog, relationships, etc...
Michael Grant
Sure, but bear in mind that this is just what works for me, you're you.
1) Treat it as a job. Get up, drink some coffee, start typing. Don't buy into all the quasi-mystical bullshit you hear from authors trying to sound important, it's your job, same as if you were stocking shelves at Wal-Mart.
2) Don't set the bar so high you can't clear it. Don't write THE book, write A book. You're probably not Shakespeare, just tell your story as well as you know how.
3) Don't start thinking you're special, stay in touch with reality.
4) Likewise don't let anyone tell you you can't make it. Maybe you can, maybe you can't, but that's your decision not anyone else's.
5) Practice the virtues of any employment: do your best work, every time, don't blow deadlines, deliver what you said you'd deliver on-time and on-spec. Be as reliable as gravity - I've gotten a lot of work based largely on the fact that I get it done.
6) Personally I avoid writer groups, critique groups, etc... The opinion that matters is the opinion of your editor and to a lesser extent your agent.
7) Never let an agent negotiate a contract without running in past an experienced intellectual property lawyer.
8) This is more esoteric, but people ask me where I get my ideas. Well, there's a silent conversation going on in my head all the time. I see things, think about them, discuss it with myself, and this goes on pretty much all the time. It's a lifestyle in which you are always looking for story.
9) Finally, have a life. Seriously. Put me in a room with 100 other writers, I'll be the only one with neither a high school diploma nor college; the only one who has spent serious time in shitty jobs being looked down on; the only one who has ever been homeless; the only one with a criminal past; the only one who has lived in more than 50 homes in 14 states and three foreign countries. This is NOT to suggest that you do those things, that's my life, but having a life - doomed love affairs, stupid decisions, passions that burn hot then burn out, being praised and betrayed, being loved and hated, being poor and desperate and other times on top of the world, all that human shit becomes story. The people you meet help form characters. Live a life.
1) Treat it as a job. Get up, drink some coffee, start typing. Don't buy into all the quasi-mystical bullshit you hear from authors trying to sound important, it's your job, same as if you were stocking shelves at Wal-Mart.
2) Don't set the bar so high you can't clear it. Don't write THE book, write A book. You're probably not Shakespeare, just tell your story as well as you know how.
3) Don't start thinking you're special, stay in touch with reality.
4) Likewise don't let anyone tell you you can't make it. Maybe you can, maybe you can't, but that's your decision not anyone else's.
5) Practice the virtues of any employment: do your best work, every time, don't blow deadlines, deliver what you said you'd deliver on-time and on-spec. Be as reliable as gravity - I've gotten a lot of work based largely on the fact that I get it done.
6) Personally I avoid writer groups, critique groups, etc... The opinion that matters is the opinion of your editor and to a lesser extent your agent.
7) Never let an agent negotiate a contract without running in past an experienced intellectual property lawyer.
8) This is more esoteric, but people ask me where I get my ideas. Well, there's a silent conversation going on in my head all the time. I see things, think about them, discuss it with myself, and this goes on pretty much all the time. It's a lifestyle in which you are always looking for story.
9) Finally, have a life. Seriously. Put me in a room with 100 other writers, I'll be the only one with neither a high school diploma nor college; the only one who has spent serious time in shitty jobs being looked down on; the only one who has ever been homeless; the only one with a criminal past; the only one who has lived in more than 50 homes in 14 states and three foreign countries. This is NOT to suggest that you do those things, that's my life, but having a life - doomed love affairs, stupid decisions, passions that burn hot then burn out, being praised and betrayed, being loved and hated, being poor and desperate and other times on top of the world, all that human shit becomes story. The people you meet help form characters. Live a life.
Michael Grant
I don't know. I've had people say this, and it's very flattering. But I put very little conscious thought into it. I never think, 'Oh, I need to give so-and-so a distinct voice'. I just have the character in my head and when I write their dialog it sounds specific to the character. It probably helps that in dialog I'm going for a sort of elevated naturalism - in other words, how real people would talk if they had a few extra seconds to think about it. And I never want them to sound like me. The only character I've ever created to sound like me is David Mitre in A SUDDEN DEATH IN CYPRUS.
Michael Grant
Various ways. Some just pop into my head like Dekka from GONE or Rio from FRONT LINES. Other times I scan baby name lists until something feels right.
Michael Grant
I'm probably the wrong guy to ask since I don't do faith. I'm all for hope but faith, in the words of Ambrose Bierce, is "Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel.” Or in my simpler style: b.s.
That said many great men and women did have faith, including obviously MLK. But honestly after November 8, 2016, I have very little good to say about the human race or its prospects for the future. I had been making a genuine effort to not be cynical or misanthropic, but election day slapped that right out of me. I wasn't too cynical, I wasn't cynical enough.
That said many great men and women did have faith, including obviously MLK. But honestly after November 8, 2016, I have very little good to say about the human race or its prospects for the future. I had been making a genuine effort to not be cynical or misanthropic, but election day slapped that right out of me. I wasn't too cynical, I wasn't cynical enough.
Michael Grant
I don't do inspiration, I do work.
I came at writing from a very different direction than most writers. Most writers go school-college-advanced degree-writing. I went: HS dropout-stock clerk-law librarian-waiter-burglar-restaurant manager-apartment manager-cleaner-writer.
I have insisted from the start on treating writing not as some high-flown 'calling' but as a job. I do my job. Every day. Good mood, bad mood, easy times, hard times, poor, rich, healthy, sick, I do my job. On approximately 150 occasions I've sat down at a keyboard intending to write and publish a book and 150 times I did exactly that. My approach is to not start taking myself too seriously, not to get all mystical about it, and treat it as a job. I show up, I write, I deliver on-time, on-spec, and pretty near camera-ready.
I came at writing from a very different direction than most writers. Most writers go school-college-advanced degree-writing. I went: HS dropout-stock clerk-law librarian-waiter-burglar-restaurant manager-apartment manager-cleaner-writer.
I have insisted from the start on treating writing not as some high-flown 'calling' but as a job. I do my job. Every day. Good mood, bad mood, easy times, hard times, poor, rich, healthy, sick, I do my job. On approximately 150 occasions I've sat down at a keyboard intending to write and publish a book and 150 times I did exactly that. My approach is to not start taking myself too seriously, not to get all mystical about it, and treat it as a job. I show up, I write, I deliver on-time, on-spec, and pretty near camera-ready.
Michael Grant
I always think of characters as my employees. I'd say that Cruz and Armo are working out very well. Shade is a bit more problematic. There is one new character in HERO along with a new bad guy.
Michael Grant
Yeah, BZRK came after GONE, then MESSENGER OF FEAR and the FRONT LINES trilogy. Then MONSTER.
Michael Grant
I literally cannot answer this question without giving away the ending of HERO. Sorry.
Michael Grant
Interesting idea. I had thought of doing the Pacific but realized the battles were too similar, too redundant. Otherwise no, no plans at present.
Michael Grant
Well, I should explain that I'm one of those writers who can't stick to one genre. So the FRONT LINES trilogy is my only historical fiction. I've written a lot more YA but more like GONE that are speculative fiction, science fiction. But some harder sci fi as well: BZRK. And my first adult book A SUDDEN DEATH IN CYPRUS comes out in the UK end of October, and the US on February 1.
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