5Qi

@RKClose - 5Qi

Q1. Why do you write?

Answer: Wow, that's a deep question. I guess you could say I'm the creative type and need outlets such as painting, drawing, photography and now writing to feel grounded. Writing satisfies my creativity better than anything else. I discovered over the years that I communicate best when I write it down. It could have something to do with my ADD, but that's how I'm wired. Reading, even a story I love, is a difficult and slow process, but writing just seems to flow naturally. Writing my thoughts down has always helped me sort them out and actually puts me at peace. I'm still an avid reader, just painfully slow.

Because my spelling and grammar are weak, I've always been afraid for others to read my writing. Posting those first few chapters to Wattpad was the scariest thing I've ever done. It's taken me years to realize that my challenges don't define who I am. Finding Wattpad has only strengthened this idea.

Q2. What is the hardest part of writing for you?

Answer: Time, time and more time. It seems I can never find enough hours in the day. I always feel as though I'm stealing time to write. As a mother, I'm terribly busy managing several young creatures in varying levels of metamorphosis. You may call them teenagers. Whatever you call them, mine keep me busy.

I dream of being published someday so that I spend my days writing to my heart's content and hire someone to clean my home so I could have even more time to write. THAT would be the life! I never want to stop writing or dreaming.

Q3. Where do you get your inspiration?

Answer: Everywhere! I have so many ideas swimming in my head that I can't keep up with them. I've started to make book covers for most of these ideas with a short blurb so I don't forget. I jot down notes on my phone whenever a random thought comes to mind. All my stories comes from my imagination but that has been influenced and sometimes corrupted by books, movies and TV shows. If I draw inspiration from any of those areas I try to keep the influence to nothing more than a shadow of an idea. I write the kind of stories that I love to read with paranormal elements, action, suspense and always a steamy romance brewing.

Q4. Do you have any strange writing habits, if any, what are they?

Answer: Well, the only thing I can think of is that I'm a pantser. Which is funny, because in most other things I'm a planner and list making sort of person. When I wrote my first story I simply had the idea of a female PI coming across a vampire while following someone else. I set the first scene in a crowed mall and ran with it. I would smile to myself when my readers would speculate about what was going to happen next because I knew about as much as they did. My characters took on lives of their own. Sometimes I felt like I was simply along for the ride. I would sit down to write the next chapter and then five hours later I'd be like, 'Wow, that was scary'! Oh, and for some strange reason I work best in a coffee shop.

Q5. What book do you wish you could have written?

Answer: This one is easy! The Fever series by Karen Marie Moning. The ninth book will be out in January 2016 and I can't wait! I can never get enough of MacKayla Lane and Jericho Barrons. It's one of those sagas you never want to end and there is so much happening with the sub-stories that it could never become boring. I want to write stories where people are fangirling over my characters and begging for more. Just like Moning has done with her fantasy series about a female heroin who battles seductive, yet evil and horrific fairies, all the while falling for the biggest badest supernatural on the playground.

I just Fangirled all over that questions, didn't I. HeeHee

Q6. How did you come up with your lead character?

A6. In my story RED NIGHT, Samantha's character changed a little from my original idea. She's a twenty-nine year old private investigator. We don't see many stories with female investigators. Traditionally it's been a male dominated profession on the pages of mystery or crime novels. I tried to make Sam's character real so that many, if not most could relate to her. I'm pleased to say that many readers do seem to connect with her.

I was new to Wattpad and had no idea how large the under eighteen readership was. I began writing the story for a mature audience, short of an 'R' rating. But quickly I realized that 30-40 percent of my audience was thirteen to eighteen. With this shift in audience, I felt the desire to create a heroin that women, especially younger women, could look up to. Sam is hip, fun, independent, as well as brave and loyal. She is looking for love but it's not her only focus in life. She's holding out for the real deal. And let me tell you, at twenty-nine that hasn't been easy. She is human, after all. And that's how Samantha Chase was born into the beloved heroin of RED NIGHT and now RED MOON.

R.K. Close a.k.a @RKClose

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#5Qi - July 24th, 2015