By: Kelvin Oliver
T4JYM: Can you share a short testimony with our readers?
AT: I was blessed to have Christian parents, and have known Jesus as Lord and Savior from an early age. I guess you could call me a product of keeping grace. He claimed me early and has never let me go.
T4JYM: What advice would you give to someone interested in publishing their works?
AT: It depends on what their work is. For those writing nonfiction articles for magazines, they should buy, read and study Sally Stuart’s Christian Writers’ Market Guide (an updated version comes out every year). For those writing novels, they might do best to hire an agent to market their books. Agents are listed in the market guide. It’s also helpful to go to writers conferences where you can meet with editors and agents face-to-face. These too are listed in the market guide.
T4JYM: Who have been your biggest influences in life? Who have been your biggest influences in your life as a writer?
AT: Without question, my parents were the greatest influence in my life. If anything good can be said about me today, it’s because of them. As a writer, I’ve been influenced by people too numerous to count. But I think my greatest challenge is to write as beautifully and creatively as Frederick Buechner and Anne Morrow Lindbergh. I’m still working on it.
T4JYM: What genre type books do you write? Where do you get the ideas of writing your books from?
AT: My books fall into that rather broad category known as Contemporary. My novels are simply stories about people living out their faith in a broken world. As for where I find my ideas, I have to admit that I don’t find them, they find me As I explain on my website (please come visit at www.anntatlock.com), whenever I consciously try to come up with a plot, it doesn’t work. The ideas that work are those that come to me when I’m doing other things, like washing the dishes or driving the car. It’s as though a seed of an idea falls into my brain, takes root and begins to grow–without any work on my part. (The work comes later, when I do the research and writing.)
T4JYM: When you are writing are there lessons that the readers are suppose to learn after they have read the book?
AT: I don’t know about lessons to be learned, but I hope there are thoughts to be thought about. I see the whole of literature as one huge conversation. Every writer writes from his or her worldview; every writer is telling the reader what he believes about life, death, God, salvation, eternity. The conversation includes Christians, atheists, agnostics, and people of every religion. It may be subtle, but in every book, the writer is saying, This is what I believe –because everyone believes something, and what they believe influences their work. My books are my opportunity to join the conversation and say, I believe in the God of the Bible. I believe in absolute truth. I believe that Jesus is who he said he was, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
T4JYM: How do you find time to write? Life is busy and time management is hard to do sometimes. When do you do your best writing and where?
AT: I’m a morning person, and my ability to think creatively diminishes as the day progresses. It’s probably fair to say that after 6 p.m., I’m legally brain-dead. So naturally I try to preserve my morning hours for writing, which I do in my office here at home.
T4JYM: What college did you go to? Did you go to any classes for writing?
AT: I went to Oral Roberts University and it was there, in fact, that I realized God was calling me into writing as a profession. The school didn’t have a journalism major, but I joined the newspaper staff and loved it. Afterward, I attended Wheaton College Graduate School and earned a master’s degree in journalism. I never took a class in fiction writing. I learned by reading good fiction, and by writing very bad fiction until I learned how to write good fiction.
T4JYM: How often do you write a book and get it published? Do you have any editor that help edit the books and proofread for errors and mistakes?
AT: The time between books varies depending on how busy my life is. I should probably try to produce a book a year, but I haven’t mastered that trick yet. I do have an editor at Bethany House Publishers. She has worked with me on all my books and has never failed to make each one better.
T4JYM: When you are on your free time from writing, what do you like to do?
AT: Walk around downtown Asheville in the evenings with my husband and daughter. Visit my Dad for a chat on a Saturday afternoon. Talk with my sisters on the phone. Drive down to Hendersonville to have lunch with my best friend from high school. In short, enjoy the people I love. And read.
T4JYM: When did you start writing? What kind of writing did you begin with? Do you do any other writing for fun, like journaling, poetry, etc.?
AT: I started sending freelance articles to magazines when I graduated from college (even got a few accepted). After I earned my master’s degree, I was hired as an assistant editor with Decision magazine and spent a little more than five years there. I left in 1993 to pursue fiction writing fulltime.
T4JYM: What are your next plans for writing? Do you plan to do any more books along the same lines as this book? Will you move on to new writing?
AT: Right now I’m under contract to write three novels for Bethany House. After that, who knows? I do plan to always write fiction, but sometimes I toy with the idea of writing a non-fiction book. We’ll see where the Lord leads.
T4JYM: Do you have any new book releases that are expected to be out in the next year or two?
AT: My next book, Things We Once Held Dear is scheduled to be released by Bethany House in early 2006.
T4JYM: Do you have any advice for writers who aren’t yet writers, but want to be?
AT: I believe writers are born, not made. If you’re meant to be a writer, you’ll be one. Don’t listen to anyone who says you won’t make it, even if that person is you.
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