Interview
with Jodi Picoult
Interview by RoseEtta Stone
You
never read any of Jodi Picoult's novels? Not even Keeping Faith, Songs
of the Humpback Whale, Picture Perfect, or Mercy? Then
you really have a lot of catching up to do!
Her novels, says Jodi, "straddle genres," and can, therefore, be
labeled legal thrillers, mysteries, romances, and/or plain old fiction.
"I'd like to think that my readers know I'm going to give them something a
little different each time... and that this is part of the appeal of my
books."
Whether you're a reader or a writer, as well, you'll find her books irresistibly
compelling. And possibly appreciate them even more once you realize the
extensive research Jodi does prior to writing each one. After all, you
can't help admiring and being impressed with a novelist who's, for instance,
lived with an Amish dairy farmer and his family for a week and milked cows (for Plain
Truth); observed cardiac surgery (Harvesting the Heart); been
jailed for a day (The Pact); learned Wiccan love spells and DNA testing
procedures (Salem Falls), explored bone marrow transplants (Perfect
Match); gone ghost hunting (Second Glance); and stayed in a flashover
booth at a firefighting academy, so that she could experience what it's like to
have flames blown at her from six different directions at once (for her book due
out in 2004).
I
loved The Pact, which was the first book of yours I read. And I
hope I'm not giving anything away, for those who haven't yet read it, but Salem
Falls' ending destroyed me. Interviewers always ask authors which of
their books is their favorite. Would you mind if I admit Keeping Faith
is my favorite? I couldn't get enough of that book, and wish it had gone
on for 400 some-odd more pages.
What I've found is that everyone has a different "favorite" of my
books. Which I love, because I think all my books are quite different
themselves. So yes, you can say KF is your favorite. As for my own -
I never pick. It's like asking me which of my three kids I love the most!
Which
brings me to a related question: I noticed a curious commonality that all
four of your novels that I read, share - they all contain more than 400 pages.
Which makes me wonder if page length could possibly be something authors, or
could it be editors, strive for? As in: to be worthy, a book must have
300, 400, 600 pages. Yet, if that were the case, editors would never
demand that writers delete hundreds of pages, would they?
I just write until the book is done. If I finish and it's 2000 pages,
that's a problem, and will need cutting. But no one ever tells me how much
to write, nor would I want to be beholden to a Dickensian word count - a story
needs a certain space to tell itself, right?!
Your
court scenes are edge-of-your-seat exciting. You mentioned having, among
others, "a few lawyers" as "on call" professionals you rely
on for assistance. Do they help you write your characters' cross
examinations?
At this point I've gotten much better at writing trial scenes, but I always work
with an attorney to make sure I get it right, since I'm not a lawyer myself.
When we work on the courtroom scenes, we role play: I am the
witness/character; they are the lawyer/D.A. Or vice versa. We do it
on tape, and by the time I get the transcript back much of the scene has already
written itself.
You're
a better mother, you were quoted as saying, "because [you] have [your]
writing... And a better writer because of the experiences of motherhood that
have shaped [you]." All the excellent writers who are childless make
me wonder if you actually wouldn't be as great a writer as you are, had you not
also been a mother? Didn't you, in fact, begin writing before you had
children?
I wrote before I had kids, but my first book coincided its publication with my
son's birth. So my career really started about the same time as my family.
I certainly believe that you don't need kids to be a good writer - like you
said, there are lots of terrific childless writers - but for me, it's an
integral part of my work. I think I turn back to themes of motherhood and
parenthood because I'm still working through it in my head. I think it's
made me understand the utter capacity we have for love, as humans. In this
sense, having children has informed the sort of writer I turned out to be.
Had I NOT had kids, I bet I'd write about different stuff.
I
also asked the above question thinking of the flip side of the coin - a child
saying or thinking: I'm a better daughter or son because my mother's a writer.
Oh yeah - in fact, I just went downstairs and my six year old daughter came
running up to me. "I had the best dream, Mommy," she said,
"and guess who the main character was other than me...YOU!" It
took me aback, because what child discusses dreams inside the framework of
"main characters"?! But this happens all the time in my
household. My kids know they come first - but they do share me with a lot
of imaginary people. On the other hand, they tend to be very imaginative
in everything from their playtime to their school assignments. My sons are
natural poets, my daughter tells her first grade teacher she's a good writer
because her mom's one. So maybe being an author is genetic.
And
while we're on the subject of what does or doesn't make a writer a good one, in
reading your responses to interviewers' questions (on your web site), I was
struck by your great sense of humor. Does having one help one be a better
writer? And has having a sense of humor impacted, influenced, or informed
your writing?
People rarely accuse me of having a good sense of humor, based on what I write!
I think that for me, humor is a way to distance myself from characters who
become very needy and traumatic during the nine months it takes me to write a
book. It grounds me. And sometimes, like Shakespeare knew, it
lightens a book where necessary. In the court scenes in Salem Falls, for
example, we truly need muffins. If only to take a deep breath.
We've
already discussed motherhood, and your analogy of equating your favorite book to
the child you love most. Now I can't resist asking you to address the
symbolic or metaphoric significance, if any, of it taking you 9 months to write
each of your books.
The answer is that clearly, creating a book is gestational, and the comparison
has NOT escaped me. You hatch ideas and themes and thoughts just as surely
as you'd give birth to offspring, and then you let it go in the world and hope
like hell you've done the best possible job you can.
Another
thing you've stated was that you "pepper" your books "with
real-life conversations" you've heard or "had [yourself] in different
contexts."
Learning to write convincing dialogue is such an important aspect of writing,
and obviously such a challenging one that aspiring authors take courses and
classes, and practice the "how-tos" of mastering the art. In a
sense it seems almost as though you've redefined fiction, or created a new
genre, based on the way you use and incorporate dialogue into your novels.
On the other hand, aren't you doing exactly what writers are taught to do (?) -
listen to the conversations people around you are having. Hear, really
hear what actual conversation sounds like. Then write it.
I think all writers are students of humanity. We watch and we listen and
we file it away for future use (this also makes us very bad friends and
relatives). When I write, I rarely feel like I'm "creating."
I feel like I'm watching a movie - my characters are playing right on the
computer screen in front of me. And they're so real that naturally, when
they speak, they sound like two ordinary folks having a chat.
The biggest mistake writers make when starting out to write dialogue is
forgetting that there are two people talking - and instead, they work to stuff
information into the lines, which sounds and IS forced. The best example
of dialogue is Hills Like White Elephants by Hemingway, in which two
characters have a several-page conversation about an abortion without EVER
mentioning the word abortion or even alluding to the act. It's brilliant,
because what they say isn't what they mean, and vice versa. If you can
pull that off in dialogue - get across what's NOT said - you're doing your job
right.
How
challenging is it for prolific authors like yourself, who seem to never run out
of stories to write/tell, to make every new book they write as good as, or
better than, their last one? Wouldn't expectations such as these, even if
self-imposed, stifle or inhibit the creative process?
I just don't think about it. Usually when I start a book I'm so excited
about it that I leap in without any performance anxiety. Sometimes when
I'm finished I'll compare it to a predecessor - but since my books tend to be
different from one another I don't worry all that much. I've been very
fortunate in having fans who seem to believe I could publish my grocery list and
they'd still want to read it, which is really a huge gift for a writer.
That said, every time a book is published I go nuts wondering if readers and
critics will like it.
Can
you share with us exactly how you know when you've finally gotten your
manuscript(s) 'right' - how you know exactly when they're ready (are good
enough) to be read by editors, and/or be published?
While writing, there are four folks who read my chapters in progress: my
agent, my mom, my screenwriting partner, and JoAnn Mapson (another novelist).
They give me very different feedback, all of which I use to incorporate it into
the next draft and the next. I know I'm done when I really can't bear to
look at the manuscript anymore, because I've worked it to death. Plus, it
will go through about four more revisions once it's at the publishing company,
so if I have missed anything, I know I'll have a chance to fix it later.
Wasn't
"write what you know" the advice always given to all wannabe writers?
Now, and I'm not sure how long that's been the case, even fiction requires
research. When and why did novels often become more factual than
fictional?
Novels have always been based on truth and fact, or readers wouldn't identify
enough with the characters and situations to want to follow them.
"Write what you know" is the worst advice I ever got in creative
writing class. I write what I want to learn - which means I'm energized
about what I'm doing when I sit down to do it. A lot of fiction writers
DON'T do research; I just happen to be one who loves that process because I
learn so much... and then can pass the knowledge along to the reader. But
I think you can tell when someone's done their homework, and when they haven't.
I hate reading books and catching the writer in an inaccuracy... I wouldn't want
to know a reader could do the same with one of my novels.
Another
really interesting thing about your creative process is that, as you've written,
your books eventually write themselves. That, and I'm paraphrasing you
now, the characters become so real to you that they act on their own. And
their behavior surprises you, the author. That being the case, is it then,
as in the chicken or the egg dilemma - that writers actually create characters
and stories, or that characters and stories create writers?
GREAT question! I think that you've hit the nail on the head.
Characters and stories choose ME, instead of the other way around. I would
write if no one read what I wrote... I need to, because of all these stories and
voices batting around in my head. In that sense, they are already there,
clamoring to get out (my goodness, I'm sounding schizophrenic, aren't I???).
Seriously, though, I think that what I write defines me as a writer, instead of
the other way around.
To
quote you again regarding this matter, you "love the moments when [your]
characters get up and walk off on their own two feet." What
significance does that have for you, as a writer?
Well, it means I've succeeded, because they're three dimensional enough to carry
through with their own lives. It means that my book is a viable world
where they can live.
And
in relation to the autobiographical/biographical nature of fiction, and the
characters you create, could your novels' female protagonists possibly all be
composites of you? Does your mother, for example, bear any resemblance
whatsoever to Millie Epstein in Keeping Faith?
(Laughs.)
My mom and grandma are still arguing over who is more like Millie in KF, (it's a
composite, but don't tell them). Really, none of my characters are like
me. Many of my women are milquetoasts, which I'm not, and the other
extreme - people like Nina Frost in Perfect Match - have their own fatal flaw of
thinking they know EVERYTHING. Of all of my characters, I'm probably most
like Ellie, because she's smart, she's determined, and she's relatively normal!
There is a writer named Ernest Hebert, a friend of mine, who said writing a
novel is like telling one big long lie to a psychiatrist. I loved that -
he's right - because we aren't the people in our novels, but there is definitely
still something in these characters that was born of a germ inside us... a
fault, a habit, a triumph... and we cloak that personal information in the body
and voice of someone fictional, to the point where sometimes we even forget that
they were born of us.
Backtracking
for a moment, did you have much difficulty getting your first book published?
It took me longer to find an agent (two years) than it did for her to get a book
published (three months). But yes, like the rest of all hopeful writers, I
got a thousand rejection letters from agents who didn't want to represent me.
Then
there's publicizing and promoting your books, about which you complained that
"a bizarre fascination with Hollywood makes the publishing world a very
difficult place to forge a career," because "promotional dollars"
are spent on "books that aren't selling (they say it's a last ditch effort)
but they completely ignore some wonderful books by writers who are just starting
out and could use the boost." Can you share with us what experience
has taught you an author should or could do about this?
Run! No, just kidding. The publishing business is pretty awful in
America, because we are not a country of readers. I just got back from a
book tour in Australia, which is like Oz, because you literally feel like a rock
star there. For the first time in ten years I had a clerk at a hotel blush
when I signed in and say, "Oh, I love your books." I had people
stop me on the street. I read to crowds of 350 folks, who PAID to attend
the reading.
In America we have free readings and still people don't come! The
difference is, of course, that we're movie obsessed, not book obsessed.
And because of that, many Americans rely on marketing to be told "what they
should be reading." There are books that were "made" by
critics (Cold Mountain, for example), books that were "made" by
advertising dollars (anything by James Patterson), books that were
"made" by movie versions (The English Patient). I don't
know why Americans, unlike the Aussies, don't judge a book by what's between its
covers, but allow others to judge for them, but it makes it a very frustrating
place to be a writer.
You literally have to wait for your publishing company to notice you and your
sales, you have to stump to promote your own books, you have to sell yourself -
and one day, if you're lucky, you will be gifted with advertising money and a
budget for a book tour. I learned about five books into the process to
hire an outside PR firm to work with the in-house one (which is grossly
underpaid and overworked), and that has made a great difference in sales for me.
Of course, it also costs as much as a small compact car...
A
few months ago I saw your picture in an ad for your latest novel in the Sunday
NY Times Book Review. And I remember a full-page ad for The Pact
there once. Are single ads spaced years apart much help, or a start in the
right direction?
Ads in any capacity are a good thing, but the reason they are one-timers is
because a NYTBR ad can cost between $5K and $10K for one single run.
Getting
back to Hollywood - you've written screenplays for some of your books that are
supposed to be adapted into films. If they change the movie's ending, as
usually happens when books become films, or added material of their own, how
would that make you feel?
There's a difference between being asked to write an original screenplay and
being asked to adapt your novel. When I did that for THE PACT and was
asked to change the ending, it was devastating to me. Luckily, Lifetime
bought the rights to the book and it's being filmed there from a different
script, one that I hope is closer to the original book's ending. But when
you sell off rights to a movie, it's like giving a baby up for adoption.
You hope it's in good hands, but you're not allowed to call every day and ask
what they've fed her for breakfast.
And
my last few questions: Now that Oprah's book club's ended and a number of others
have replaced it, do you think more authors have a better chance of having their
books become instantaneous bestsellers?
No. Oprah's book club can't be replaced; it was an entire demographic in
one spot. None of the early morning show book clubs can boast that.
(And here's a word to the Today show: Asking a best-selling author to pick the
work of an unknown won't fly. The bestseller gets nothing out of it; the
publishing company will pressure him to pick a book that's one of their own.
They need to ask book clubs and independent booksellers to choose.) To get
back to Oprah, though - she never picked me, and that's okay. Because she
almost single-handedly got a country reading again, period, and that's helped my
career by default.
"Talent,"
you've said in another interview, "is the smallest part" of being a
writer, "(One need only read some of the titles on the NYT Bestseller list
to see that)." I'm sure that many, if not most, writers - referring
to the dumbing-down of America, feel that the majority of books on the list
don't deserve to be there. Yet, don't all writers including you, yourself,
Jodi, want to make that list?
You bet. I may not like James Patterson's stuff, but you can bet his kids
don't need loans to get through college.
Finally,
if I have my facts right, Second Glance is coming out next April.
And you're currently doing research for one novel and working on another - about
"a 13-year-old girl who sues her parents for medical emancipation."
How many books do you work on simultaneously? And what is "medical
emancipation?" Is she being kept in some sort of facility against her will?
I can write one book and edit another simultaneously; I can't write two at once.
So that's sort of where I am right now - editing Second Glance and
writing the next book (which is still untitled).
Medical emancipation is the legal right to make medical decisions independent of
your parents when you're a minor. In Ann's case, she was conceived as a
genetic match to her sister, who has leukemia. Thirteen years later, after
giving blood and marrow and tissue and everything under the sun to keep her
sister alive, she walks into a lawyer's office and sues her parents for the
right to her own body.
Visit Jodi's website at http://www.jodipicoult.com/.
RoseEtta Stone is the Editor/Publisher of (the) X - RATED
CHILDREN'S BOOKS NEWSLETTER: Book Reviews and Interviews with Banned,
Censored, Challenged Authors of Banned, Censored, Challenged and Burned
Childrens' Books. Visit by clicking here: X-RatedChildrensBooks.
