MJ Rose.com
About writing
When did you realize you were going to be an author?
I was eight years old, sitting at my grandfather’s typewriter pecking out a short story about a man who wore five hats and very large green shoes. My mother asked me what I was doing and I told her I was practicing writing for when I grew up.
She loved that and at dinner that night announced to the family that I had decided to be a writer.
I took a detour away from writing when I was 17 and studied art in college. But I didn’t stay away long and was back to writing fiction by the time I was 25.
When you started writing your first novel Lip Service, did you know how it would end?
Yes, I believe a book is a journey and I have to know where it it ends before I can begin to put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard as the case may be.
When you write, do you like to listen to music?
It’s impossible for me to write without music. My tastes are eclectic but tend toward the classical and the music of Doug Scofield who is my significant other. (His music can be heard in the new movie premiering at the Avignon Film Festival this summer - "Trifling with Fate" and on www.MP3.com/dougscofiled.com
Do you know some of your fans?
I answer all the email that I get and in the process have met quite a number of my fans and have gotten friendly with several of them. That’s one of the amazing things the Internet makes possible.
Were you inspired by other authors?
I am still. Whenever I read something I like, it inspires me to push myself further.
Are your writings pure fictions or does inspiration come from real facts?
I think I am inspired by life but what comes out on the page has gone through many permutations and changes and winds up very much pure fiction.
It seems your theory on gender is based on Jungian psychology. Did you do some research about it?
I do a lot of research for all of my novels. But psychology is a subject that continues to fascinate me and I have been a student of psychology for years. My novels all have themes that matter to me they are all adventures often of a psychological nature - that my main character takes and in the process winds up taking a journey of self discovery.
About Lip Service
Before writing Lip Service, you worked a lot to make it as "real" as possible. What kind of research did you do?
I interviewed two police detectives, two lawyers, several therapists, and several phone sex operators. Then I wrote the book. When I was done with the first draft I asked one phone sex operator if she would ask a few of her customers if I could talk to them and she set up several phone calls for me. I needed to know that the scenarios I had created were true to life.
How did it feel like?
I was very much a writer when I spoke to those men. I imagined I was my character and tried to find out what I needed to know in order to make sure that what I had written in the book was accurate.
How did the idea of the characters come?
The inspiration for Julia and her husband Paul came from a dinner party I attended. I didn’t know the couple who inspired my characters, but their demeanor with each other fascinated me. For weeks I couldn’t stop thinking about this shy woman and her so obviously controlling husband and finally the only solution was to start writing about them.
Who is your favorite character in your book? Why?
I don’t have a favorite but I relate the most to the psychiatrist, Sam Butterfield because I agree with many of his views about human sexuality.
One could say that the book is pro feminists. What do you think?
I think that I am something of a feminist so it doesn’t surprise me, but it I didn’t intent to make a feminist statement with the book. I simply wrote about a woman who is paralyzed by her life and how she overcomes that paralysis to become a whole person.
Can you explain why so many female readers so easily identified with Julia's character?
Unfortunately I think that marriage is very difficult and that the problems that my main character faces in her marriage are the same problems many women can relate to though perhaps not to extreme that Julia did. On some level, most women know what it is like to stay in a relationship even if it doesn’t make them happy or satisfy them. Many women stay either for their own sake, the sake of their children, or simply because they have bought into being a "wife" or" girlfriend" and are afraid of being on their own.
How would you describe your book?
An adventure story about a woman who finds the last thing she expected herself.
About self publishing
What was your first reaction when the publishers refused your manuscript?
It wasn’t the rejections that bothered me, it was the reasons they rejected the book. The editors loved it. But the marketing people just weren’t sure how to sell it and that’s why they ultimately passed on it. I couldn’t quite understand when they said it was a little too sexy and a little too intelligent. I thought those were good things.
How did you meet your agent?
An editor I knew introduced us.
Were you familiar with the Internet before you created your site?
Yes, I had been doing research online for another book I wanted to write and it was while I was doing that work that I really came to understand the web and what a difference it was going to make in the world of book publishing. This was in 1997.
Could you tell us how you created your site?
I hired a graphic designer and worked with her for several weeks. My background as the creative director at a NYC ad agency helped me enormously, both to supervise the design of the site and in marketing Lip Service on line.
Did you expect so many readers would buy your book?
Actually yes. I had gotten so much interest from the publishing community via my agent when she first tried to sell Lip Service, that I felt fairly certain if I could find the right audience and tell them about the book - it would sell.
Do you think Internet is a new media?
Yes but I prefer to describe it as a new delivery system. A book is still a book. A news story is still a news story, but the net gives us an alternative to how we obtain these things. As a communications vehicle, the net continues to evolve and excite me. I love the ability to meet people and work with people all over the world whom I otherwise would never have gotten to know.
Do you think it could be dangerous? If so, how?
There are inherent dangers in every thing we do, but for the most part I’m not frightened by the web.
Some people say self-publishing will do harm to literature. What would you answer to this?
Self-publishing has been around for hundreds of years and has not done harm to literature. There will always be a few authors who deserve to be published that get passed over for one reason or another yet believe in their work enough to persist and publish it themselves. Mark Twain, D.H. Lawrence, e.e.cummings are among the hundreds of authors who have self published their books at one time or another.
I don’t see how it can do any harm, but I do think the internet will be flooded with self-published books by the end of next year and it will overwhelm readers. Some people expect there to be over 500,000 self-published novels on line by the end of next year. It won’t do any harm to anyone but I doubt many of them will be discovered. Its just too many books for anyone to wade through in order to find one of those hidden gems.
What would you say to young authors who want to publish themselves on the Internet?
I don’t suggest they do. I believe self-publishing should be a last resort. I think young authors should try to get agents and get published traditionally. They need editors to help them grow and improve. Self-publishing is very arduous and very speculative and a difficult journey.
Hobbies and miscellaneous
There is this cliche that says that authors love cats? Do you?
Nope, never have loved a cat. But I do love dogs especially dogs under ten pounds that can sit on my chair with me when I type and then take me on long long walks in the park.
Do you like sports?
No. But I do love the water and have always loved swimming. I walk a lot especially in the woods and at the beach. But my dyslexia has made me wary of sports I’m so bad at them.
What kind of arts do you like apart from writing?
As much as I don’t like sports, I love the arts. I could live in a museum and be very happy. And I doubt that I could live very happily without music.
Do you like to travel? What is your favorite place to visit?
I do like to travel but I must say I’m not very adventurous. I find places I like and then want to go back again and again. I’ve been to France a dozen times and very much want to live in Paris at some point. (I have a novel planned that takes place partially in Paris so I have a good excuse.) After France, comes Italy (Venice and Capri) and then Vienna, Austria.
Do you like to cook?
I like to cook occasionally. When I am deep in a book I don’t want to do anything but write. But in-between books I’ve been known to spend hours in the kitchen trying out recipes only half of which turn out all right.
