Welcome
A stay-at-home mom with a husband, three kids and a writing addiction on
the side, Staci Stallings has numerous titles for readers to choose from. Not content to stay in one genre and write it
to death, Staci’s stories run the gamut from young adult to adult, from
motivational and inspirational to full-out Christian and back again. Every title is a new adventure! That’s what keeps Staci writing and you
reading.
Her latest release is:
Let's get to know Staci!
What made you
decide to write? What did you do before
becoming a writer?
Before
I became a writer, I taught high school English for three years. I quit that job to start my family. A year later, we had finished building our
house, which had kept me busy to then, and I had a one-year-old. And I was bored silly. So I got a book about living your dreams. It
kept asking what did you love to do and why weren't you doing it? I'd completed
a full-length novel (by hand) in middle school, and I thought, "I've
always liked to write..." That was
how it started.
Do you have a writing routine? What does it look like? Where
do you usually write?
I do not recommend my writing
schedule or my work area. My life right now looks like this: 3 kids in school, a husband, two businesses,
2 large extended families, two schools and their fundraisers, teaching Sunday
School, writing my blog, marketing, helping other writers edit, publishing new
books--therefore, doing cover design, etc., 5 cats, 1 dog, a yard and a house
complete with laundry, dishes, etc.
"So when do you write?"
That's your next question, right? The
answer is, I don't know. I don't know when I have time to do any of this and
stay sane. What I've learned is, I let
God show me the next step and I take that. I put blinders on to everything
else. When I do that, somehow I do get things written, and all the other stuff
does get done. My work space is about as
crazy as my life. So, the blinders
things helps in many ways. :)
Is the
life of a writer what you thought it be? What is different?
In
some ways yes it's what I thought it would be.
I love connecting with readers, hearing what they took from the
stories. I love connecting with other
writers--helping them with their stories and learning to write. The one thing that's tougher than I expected
is marketing. It's not that it's hard.
It's that it takes so much time.
In some ways that has gotten a lot easier with the Internet because now
I can go on someone's blog rather than traveling to a book signing. In others, it can be overwhelming because
there are so many opportunities out there, and you can feel like you're missing
so much. The blinders and letting God
figure it all out help here as well.
Do you have any special time management tricks for working
in writing time and living a normal life?
Breathe. Pray. And trust!
(I may turn this into a poster and hang it above my writing space.)
You say that each of your books has taught you something
about God and his timing. What do you
hope your readers take away from your books? How do connect with the reader who isn't a believer in God?
I don't
consciously try to connect with anyone. I write the stories that God gives me
the way He gives them to me. Then I take
the marketing and publishing steps He asks me to take and let Him worry about
who is supposed to read what. I had a
lady that I knew from my hometown who came up one day after she had read
"Cowboy," and she kept saying, "I just don't know how you would
know all of that. I read it the whole time going, yes, yes, yes. This is so right." I was in a hurry during that conversation and
I didn't get what she was telling me. It
was only afterward that I realized she had lost her husband to cancer some
years ago just like Ashton has lost his wife to cancer in the book. We got the chance to talk later and I said,
"I realized why you said that."
She said, "I was just blown away that you would understand what
that's like to lose someone like that."
Honestly, I don't know that I do, but I know God does. He used that story to minister to this woman
who was in so much pain.
That's what I see
so often. I write the story, and God puts it in the hands of the person who
most needs those words. So it's not
me. It's totally HIM!
Having
completed over 30 novels , what do you do to fight burnout? Do you ever worry
about "running out of stories"? How do you combat that?
Writing to me is
like breathing. Really. It is relaxing. I don't fight it like I hear so many people
do. For me, I don't try to get every
word perfect the first time. I just write.
I never know where the story is going. Is it one I will publish or
not? I don't know. I just write.
But here's the
thing. When I was very young, at night I
would come up with stories, "dreams," to put myself to sleep. It was like I had a movie screen in my
head. So I would lay down, remember the
dream that I liked, push play and "watch it" until I went to
sleep. So that's what I do now. I pull up whichever "movie" I'm
watching (I write 5-6 books at a time), push play, and watch the movie. Then I simply transcribe what I'm
seeing. So I don't envision ever running
out of stories. In fact, I've got
several that will probably never get written simply because I don't have the
time!
What sources do you
use for inspiration?
( Music, movies, people watching)
I don't like
camping, and I can't ski (and worse, I have altitude sickness so I can't even
go to the mountains. :) What does that have to do with writing? Well, a few times a year my husband takes the
three kids to one or the other of those outdoor activities for a weekend. During that weekend, I get enough Chinese
food to last me three days, and I watch movies.
One after the other after the other after the other. In fact, I buy movies throughout the year
specifically for those weekends.
Invariably about
midway through this movie marathon, BAM! I get a flood of ideas. In fact, I think if I was able to watch
something other than Disney Channel 24/7, I would probably have more ideas come
at other times. (Oh, I hear you about the Disney Channel!) Alas, that is not for
this time in my life, and maybe that is for the best as I wouldn't have time to
write them anyway right now!
Tell us a bit about
your work in progress.
The book I'm working on right now is about a dyslexic
writer. I didn't know he was dyslexic
when I started the book. But he would
sit in the corner of this coffee shop all huddled over his laptop. The waitress there falls for him. However, he wouldn't let me see the laptop
screen. Now, I've been through deep-down
life secrets with enough other characters that when I realized that, I was
like, "What's up with that?"
Well, at the same time, my youngest son was struggling like
crazy in school. He was a VERY bright and
creative kid, but reading and spelling were about to drive us all nuts. During that summer we found out he had
dyslexia. Shortly after that I got back
to writing, and it hit me. Jake is
dyslexic! The cool thing is that we've
found a real, honest-to-goodness answer for my son's dyslexia so that he no
longer struggles like he was. So I'm now
writing that answer into the story.
God is so cool like that!
What is next for you?
Right now I'm knee-deep in putting books up for Kindle and
Nook. I'm about to release my eleventh
novel there. The next project in October
is my first Bible Study called, "Theirs is the Kingdom." It's about the first Beatitude and living
with the mantra, "I can't but God can."
After that, I will be releasing one book a month. At the moment I have enough material to go
through 2015. (WOW!) I guess at that point,
I'll see what's after that.
How can we find out more about you? Blogs?
Facebook? Twitter?
Blogs: Spirit Light Books
Twitter: @StaciStallings
Thanks so much, Dawn!
This has been fun!
Thank you for sharing with us.
So, what questions do you have for Staci? Are you in as much awe as I am at the sheer amount of material she has prepared?
1 comment:
Umm, wow. I have no excuses for not getting anything done!
Congrats on your achievements and keep on keepin' on!
Post a Comment