Interview with Jess Keating, author How to Outrun a Crocodile When When Your Shoes Are Untied {Blog Tour}

The wonderful Jess Keating is at The Hiding Spot discussing her debut entitled How to Outrun a Crocodile When Your Shoes Are Untied, her writing process, and her inspiration behind main character Ana!

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About the Author

As a zoologist turned middle grade and picture book author, Jess Keating has been sprayed by skunks, bitten by crocodiles, and been a victim to the dreaded paper cut. Her debut How To Outrun A Crocodile When Your Shoes Are Untied is out now from Sourcebooks Jabberwocky, with a sequel to follow. Her nonfiction picture book, Pink is for Blobfish, will be published by Knopf in 2016.

She has a Masters degree in Animal Science and a growing collection of books that are threatening to take over her house. She lives in Ontario, Canada, where she loves hiking, watching nerdy documentaries, and writing books for adventurous and funny kids.

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Did you have trouble writing any of your characters or specific scenes within the novel? Alternately, were any characters or scenes particularly easy to write? 

Like all books, this one was a labor of love and there were definitely growing pains. I had to work very hard to keep my 'adult' brain out of it, especially in scenes where Ana and Ashley are interacting. For example (without spoiling things), I can say that in book two, we learn a lot more about Ashley. But to 12 year old Ana, she's just a Sneerer. It was so important for me to let Ana's view (however clouded it might be by her hurt feelings!) run the show, because I wanted to let the story unfold without me oversteering.

On the other hand, any scene with Daz came quite easily for me. I'm not sure what that says about me! It's possible I'm a criminal mastermind?

Ana, your main character, is a whiz with animals, but she’s also painfully shy and insecure. Did you have a specific inspiration for Ana’s character and the situations she encounters in the novel?

Yes! Although I'm not shy like Ana, many of her experiences were amplified versions of things that have happened in my own life. Most of my childhood was surrounded by animals, and then I went to university to study zoology. Obviously many of the things I've learned have found their way into the book! Thankfully though, I've never embarrassed myself on live TV. *knocks on wood*

I do think that, shy or not, we all feel like Ana does at some point or another. The struggle to fit in while still being yourself is something that feels universal to me, so getting to write about Ana's journey somehow made me even braver.

Tell me a little bit about your writing process: Do you outline? Start at the beginning? The middle? The end? 

Most of my books start with the character and the setting. I love voicey characters and unusual, quirky places. This part involves mainly research, and I bury myself in facts until I get a feel for how a character would relate to it. This is also the point where I start to conjure up the character's overall arc, and where I want them to end up after I've put them through the ringer.

Once I know the voice I'm aiming for, that's where the hard work of plotting and drafting comes in. I do outline, but often find I have to shift gears as I learn more about the character's growth. I spend a lot of time working on the beginning, which is pretty ironic considering I normally end up changing it anyways! (CROC used to start with Ana waking up with a five foot snake in her bed!)

As far as writing in sequence, I tend to go all over the map, particularly when I'm just starting to draft. If a scene hits me that I know will have a place, I usually trust myself and write it, hoping that it will make sense in the end when I puzzle-piece it all together. This does mean I have some scenes that get cut, but I don't see it as wasted writing, because I've learned that much more about the character!

Has the title changed or stayed relatively the same as your novel journeyed towards publication? 

The title is pretty much the only thing that hasn't changed about my book! The moment it popped into my head, I knew I was on to something. The rest of the story came later, through a lot of work!

What jobs did you have on your way to becoming a published author? Is there a certain work experience that has shaped your writing or provided inspiration? 

I had several jobs, most of which revolved around science and animals. One of my favorites was at a wildlife rehabilitation center, where I spent all day chasing animals and doing outreach and education. I also wrote nonfiction articles for magazines and led zoology workshops at university, where I got to yammer on about animal bones and kooky behaviors. The biggest thing I have in common with Ana is a love of the natural world, and a really deep desire to express that to anyone who will listen. She looks better in the safari hat, though.  

If you had to pick a favorite word, what would it be and why? 

Ooh, tough question! Zephyr is one of my favorites. It means 'soft breeze', and I love it because my best days are spent outside. I also love the word 'nefelibata', which is super weird, but means 'cloud walker', or, someone who lives in the clouds of their own imagination. Beautiful, right? 

My blog is dedicated to my personal hiding spot, books. Who, what, or where can be credited as your personal escape from reality? 

I have so many! Like every writer I know, I love escaping into books, especially funny ones, or anything that takes me to a magical place. I keep a copy of INKHEART next to my bed just in case I need a fast escape. 

And, as nerdy as it sounds, I actually love escaping into research. The world is JUST SO COOL. I can spend hours poring over books, watching documentaries, and often get lost in so many blogs I need to remind myself to get back to work. I get a big thrill every time I can add something I've learned into one of my books. For example, I just discovered there is a fish whose scientific name is Boops boops. Tell me that isn't hilarious!

What can readers look forward to next?

More books! The second book in the My Life is a Zoo series, called How to Outswim a Shark Without a Snorkel is coming out in January, 2015. I'm really excited for people to read this one, because we get to learn more about Ashley. She's a total pill in CROC, but as always, there are two sides to every story. 

I've also got my first nonfiction picture book coming out in 2016, from Knopf! It's called Pink is for Blobfish, and it's all about subverting the gender expectations of the color pink, using cool animals to tell the tale. As you can tell from the upcoming titles, animals are still going to play a major role in my writing!

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Author Site / Goodreads / Buy It

 

Interview with Bethany Neal, author of My Last Kiss {Blog Tour}

Today debut author Bethany Neal is at The Hiding Spot talking My Last Kiss, writing, and how the wrong job led her to the right one! Find out more about My Last Kiss here .

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About the Author

 

Bethany Neal writes YA novels with a little dark side and a lot of kissing from her Ann Arbor, Michigan home. The things she is obsessed with include, but are not limited to: nail polish, ginormous rings, pigs, dream analysis, memorizing song lyrics, pickles, dessert, predestined love, not growing up, sour gummy candies, music videos, Halloween, and fictional boys who play guitar.

MY LAST KISS is her first novel. Connect with her online at www.bethanyneal.com and follow her on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @BethDazzled.

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Did you have trouble writing any of your characters or specific scenes within the novel? Alternately, were any characters or scenes particularly easy to write? 

Initially, the flashback chapters were the easiest for me to write because they were like little teasers that I could leave tangling in front of the reader (which at the time was me!) to entice them to read (or in my case write) on. They were fun and short and I had a blast writing them. 

Once the first draft was complete, however, they mutated like turncoat little gremlins into the most difficult writing endeavor I’d faced to date because I had to make sure they told a continuous story without being told in a continuous format. I spent entire days, nay, weeks copying and pasting all of the flashback chapters into a separate Word doc and arranging them into chronological order (not how they appear in the novel) then combing through every detail to make sure somebody didn’t say or do anything that would counteract what they said/did in an earlier or later flashback. It was pull-my-hair-out exhausting to keep everything straight, but totally worth it in the end. At least that’s what I tell myself to remain sane(ish). Writing a novel with an incongruent storyline is not for the faint of heart, friends! 

Tell me a little bit about your writing process: Do you outline? Start at the beginning? The middle? The end? 

I don’t outline—hangs head shamefully—but I do usually write from beginning to end in an effort to maintain some sense of order. I also try to do a lot of character development (using the exercises in The Plot Thickens by Noah Lukeman) along the way to help me when I’m unsure of where to take the story next. I write flying by the seat of my pants, but when I take flight it’s charted along the basic flight plan of the Three Act-Four Part structure that I learned from books like Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell and Story Engineering by Larry Brooks. If you’re an aspiring author, these are both must reads! 

Has the title changed or stayed relatively the same as your novel journeyed towards publication? 

I lucked out and got to keep my original title! I’m so happy I did too because there were times (like when I was trudging through flashback hell) that the title MY LAST KISS was the only thing that kept me writing this novel. Every time I doubted the importance of the story or my ability to tell it in a coherent/entertaining way, I always reminded myself that if I saw a book on the shelves at a bookstore called MY LAST KISS I would pick it up. Those three words alone would hook me as a reader, and that was enough to keep me going. If I wanted to read it somebody else would too…theoretically speaking. 

What jobs did you have on your way to becoming a published author? Is there a certain work experience that has shaped your writing or provided inspiration? 

Oh, man. This question is such a silly one for me to answer because it’s where I have to admit that I got a college degree in interior design, hated my first job out of school so I started my own photography business instead, substitute taught on the side, and didn’t start writing until I was 27 years old. 

I guess I could reflect on my totally unrelated job experience and say that I learned how miserable a “regular” job is and became inspired to both escape that reality and generate a profit from being irregular a.k.a. awesome by writing YA. The substitute teaching is technically what kick started my writing though. I had so much down time while the kids were at Art, P.E. or lunch that the voices started to creep in—the character voices, that is. Just so we’re clear on my sanity level. 

If you had to pick a favorite word, what would it be and why? 

Forever is most definitely my favorite word. The way it forces your lips into a kissing pucker not once but twice, and just the whole idea of it has always intrigued me. I think we all long for that one thing—whether it’s love or companionship or really great hair—that will be with us for all of time. I also really enjoy how it sounds when movie villains say it.

My blog is dedicated to my personal hiding spot, books. Who, what, or where can be credited as your personal escape from reality? 

What: writing. Who: Jared Leto. Where: Paris, France. Happy to say, I’ve visit them all at least once!