Spotlight on: Liane Moriarty

I’ve decided to do a little “Spotlight On” post about authors I really love and admire. I’ll scour the Internet for interviews they’ve done and essays they’ve written to gather up some interesting tidbits about their lives and writing process. Sound fun? I think so.

First up: Liane Moriarty.

I fell in love with Moriarty after reading Big Little Lies. I followed that up with The Husband’s Secret. Also good. Next in my queue: What Alice Forgot. Moriarty is great with making everyday life salacious and suspenseful. And she’s freaking hilarious.

On her writing process:
“I don’t plan my novels…[In Big Little Lies,] I came up with the idea of the school trivia night where things went terribly wrong, then I just tend to start writing…It just seems to happen in an organic way. I guess I wrote it in that way because that’s all I knew [about this story]. I’m not a planner, and as I look back, I find it hard to remember how it all came about…I just flail about a lot at the beginning. Obviously by the end I’ve worked it all out, so then I can go back and put in some little red herrings. I sometimes worry that when I say I just make it up as I go along that it sounds so easy.” (Source)

“I just tend to come up with a premise and dive in and hope that an ending will come to me. It means there is a sense of anticipation because I think, I wonder what’s going to happen?” (Source)

On having multiple characters:
“One of the complaints people have—if they’re going to criticize something about my books—is that there are too many characters. I can’t seem to help myself. As a reader, one of my earliest memories of reading was one of those huge sagas. It was a whole section of the book from one character’s perspective, and then suddenly you went into a new section. He opened the door, and suddenly we switched perspectives to the person on the other side of the door. And I just remember getting goosebumps, suddenly seeing him from that other character’s perspective, and as a result gaining a whole new perspective on that character. I just enjoy writing and reading in that way.” (Source)

On empathy (which I think is essential for writers to really get characters right):
“If you allowed yourself to feel complete empathy for all the terrible things that are going on in the world, you wouldn’t be able to get out of bed. So in a way you have to protect yourself by living in your own little bubble, but then at the same time finding a way to do what you can and not close yourself off completely. It’s something I personally struggle with. When you watch something on the news about some terrible atrocity, you can cry and allow yourself to feel it. And then you switch the channel, and something else is going on. So how do you adjust to that? I don’t actually know what the answer to that is. There’s so much more awareness. Obviously in the world today we hear straightaway of terrible things that are going on. We know what’s going on, but what we do with that information, I don’t know.”  (Source)

On creating characters:
“I always say that I never steal an entire personality, but I do take little bits and pieces from people. For example, the character of Madeline [in Big Little Lies]—there’s a friend who’s one of those people who’s always beautifully dressed with the right accessories. I just find those people fascinating. It’s a pleasure to look at them. I started out with that little personality attribute, and then from that I just build them into somebody entirely different. Some authors have little folders, and they really plan out their characters. But I just start writing the characters, and in the beginning they’re quite wooden and I can’t make them move properly, and I sort of get to know them by writing. And I go back again to the beginning and say, OK, Madeline wouldn’t say this, because now I know her.” (Source)

On fiction:
“Friends and family do not believe you write fiction. They truly believe that every word you write is either autobiographical or based on them. I once had a character say that she never wanted to be invited to another children’s birthday party, and I never received another children’s birthday party invitation ever again.” (Source)

On doubt:
“You feel a little bit silly writing your first novel, thinking, What’s the point of this? Even right now I still feel silly, to just sit down and make up a story and think—this is my job—sitting at my computer, making up a story. It just feels sort of foolish sometimes. I can’t let it take hold of me, that every single time I start a novel I think, I can’t do this.” (Source)

“Asking myself ‘Is this any good?’ is pointless. It just slows down my writing and I can’t tell anyway. It’s always the paragraphs I loved most, the ones I tenderly polished and re-read with pride, that my editor will suggest cutting.” (Source)

On her writing routine:
“It’s now driven by when I have child-free time. In a way I’ve found that’s really good for me. I’m a more productive writer than when I had whole days to mess about and put it off. The only other things I do—I use that program Freedom that turns off the Internet. I love that! It’s become part of my ritual, to set it for a period of time. It’s almost like that makes me write. It’s crazy because it’s only $10, and it stopped working for a while. I thought, I’m not going to pay again for this program, I’ll try to live without it and just turn off the Internet myself. But I couldn’t! I had to pay again to get the program!” (Source)

“I write in my home office when my children are at school or pre-school or when they’re playing outside my door with their lovely babysitter.” (Source)

“Every time I sit down to write I need to commit to a word count goal, otherwise I waste too much time editing and re-editing my previous work, staring dreamily off into space, pretending that I’m thinking profound, poetic thoughts when really I’m just thinking, ‘Look at me being a writer! I’m so happy I’m a writer!’ My real thinking and planning gets done when I’m doing something else like driving or walking or taking the shower. When I’m at the computer, I need to write.” (Source)

On research:
“Google is my best friend and my worst enemy. It’s fabulous for research but then it becomes addictive. I’ll have a character eating an orange, and next thing I’m googling types of oranges, I’m visiting chat rooms about oranges, I’m learning the history of the orange. It’s bad for my word count.” (Source)

On writer’s block:
“Sometimes when I’m stuck, I really do need that cup of tea, or that chocolate, or a break, or a walk, but in most cases what I actually need to do is make myself keep writing until it flows again. I’ve always found this hard to accept because it’s counter-intuitive, like when people say you should exercise harder to cure a stitch. (Although, I don’t believe that at all. Stop! Rest!)” (Source)

On advice for aspiring writers:
“Think of nothing else but the story – not the world of publishing, or what makes a best-seller, or should you self-publish or not, or should it be double-spaced (yes), or should you make it more erotic (probably, if you can! Wish I could) or how will you make sure nobody else steals your ideas (they won’t) – just lose yourself in the pleasure of writing your story. Then edit, edit, edit.  THEN and only then should you think about all that other stuff.” (Source)

Fun facts:

• Her name is pronounced Li-arn
• She’s 49; published her first novel at 38
• She was born in Sydney and still lives there
• She’s the oldest of 6 children
• Her parents aren’t writers, but she says they are natural storytellers: “When we were growing up Dad would spin tall tales for us. (His mantra is, ‘Never spoil a good story with the facts.’) Mum can turn a five-minute trip to the shops into a saga complete with tragedy, pathos and unexpected twists that leave you saying, ‘Uh . . . what?'” (Source)
• She has 2 kids: a 6-year-old son and a 4-year-old daughter. She says, “I came quite late to motherhood and as a result I tend to look at the world of parenting with the wide eyes of a tourist” (Source)
• Like me, her career began in advertising and marketing. According to her website, “she became quite corporate for a while and wore suits and worried a lot about the size of her office.” She eventually left her position as a marketing manager to run her own business (The Little Ad Agency). And then she became a freelance advertising copywriter, where she “was writing copy that ended up on the back of packets of Sultana Bran” (Source)
• Some of her favorite authors: Anne Tyler, Carol Shields, Elizabeth Berg, Anna Quindlen, Maggie O’Farrell
• She was motivated to write novels after her older sister Jacyln published a book: “If my sister hadn’t been published first, I’m quite sure I would have never pushed myself to finish that. It was pure envy that drove me to finish that first novel” (Source)
• She’s thinking her next book should take place on a tropical island: “which will obviously require days, even weeks of meticulous research but I’m prepared to make that sacrifice. That’s just the sort of dedicated writer I am.” (Source)
• Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon have optioned the rights to Big Little Lies
• She’s actually not that popular in her native Australia, despite her success around the world