1. As a literacy prof, I’m always curious about how people come to be
readers and writers. Can you share some of your journey with us?
I was always a fairly bookish kid. Perhaps if I had been a better
athlete or otherwise fit in a little better I might have found other
outlets, but reading was a sanctuary for me. I was what you would call
voracious, and since there wasn't much of what you would call true YA
lit in those days I graduated fairly quickly to adult fiction,
especially mystery and fantasy. But I remember reading Shakespeare in
high school and was a little embarrassed at how much I enjoyed it,
though it was years before I engaged that interest properly, and I came
to it at least in part through theatre. But yes, I lived in my head a
lot (still do), and that meant reading--and eventually writing. I wrote
my first novel when I was 19. It was terrible, but it was a start.
2. What is your writing process like?
Usually I create a brief outline, short story length, but not always. I
plan now more than I used to because I find it more efficient (fewer
blind alleys and genre shifts mid novel) but the plan is always a very
loose guide and there's lots of room for the story to take new shapes as
it goes. When that happens, I adjust the outline accordingly so I'm less
likely to paint myself into a corner. As for the actual writing, I
usually shoot for about 10K words a week, first draft, sometimes 15.
More than that and it gets sloppy, and I find I need time between
writing, days off, weekends, when I just have to let the next stage of
the story germinate a little. That said, I have written whole books
(albeit short ones) very quickly indeed. IMPERVIOUS was done as a first
draft in 2 weeks, but that was because I wrote it in response to a
traumatic event and had to get it out. My next book, BURNING
SHAKESPEARE, I have been fiddling with for literally quarter of a
century. I kept rethinking it, tweaking it, and eventually taking a
wrecking ball to the plot, so that there was little but the initial
premise which survived into the final draft. I try to take a break after
the first draft, forget about it, maybe work on something else, so that
when I come back to it it feels fresh and I can see it as if it were
written by someone else. That helps me see the problems and gives me a
sense of where the work needs to go, assuming it's worth anything.
3. What draws you to the genres you work in, as an author who does
some genre-crossing?
Ha. I've always been an eclectic reader, and have a wildly diverse set
of interests and hobbies, so it makes sense to me that I write in
different genres and for different age groups. It's not a very smart
business model, because my readers won't always follow me from thriller
to fantasy to scifi or YA. But it's what I have. I get bored easily, or
maybe restless is a better word. An idea will come to me and suddenly
there's a story I want to explore that may be a thousand miles from what
I wrote last. I think my stories have things in common, though,
regardless of the genre: a core mystery, a sense of adventure, things
about what drives people, what they love, what they miss. My books look
very different, but I suspect that at their hearts they are actually
quite similar.
4. Please tell us where we can find out more about your work.
My website is www.ajhartley.net. You'll find links to my various books
there, my crazy YouTube channel (more hybrid randomness
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbMtvBozhQ8MbyG1jcgZUSg]) and more. My
books are probably easiest to find on Amazon, though most will be
available from physical bookstores as well, and I have a decent amount
up on Audible too.