Jennifer Crusie’s romantic comedy novels have appeared on both the USA Today and New York Times bestseller lists. Her novels include Tell me Lies, Crazy for You, Welcome to Temptation, and Fast Women.
Tayler Bloom: What about the publishing industry has surprised you most? About being a published author?
Jenny Crusie: That it is such a crapshoot and everybody's guessing with fingers crossed. Somebody once said that publishing isn't a business, it's a casino, and that's so true. If you can't take risks, ride the wins and losses and roll the dice again, publishing will make you insane.
Tayler Bloom: How do you create and maintain the furiously fast pace of your romantic comedy novels?
Jenny Crusie: After the first draft, which is completely off the top of my head, I work like crazy on structure, making sure that the acts in my novels grow shorter, that the turning points arc in tension, that each beat of each scene increases in tension, and a dozen other things. The first draft is pure creativity, but after that it's creativity and craft, which is what Bob Mayer and I are doing now at www.crusiemayer.com/workshop (it's free). I'm also talking about a scene on the Dogs and Goddessess blog I'm doing with Anne Stuart and Lani Diane Rich; I posted the scene and then did an analysis, pointing out where I thought the pacing fell apart, and we'll be talking about it there, trying to figure out how to fix the flagging final beat.
Tayler Bloom: What advice would you give writers aiming for a comic tone in their own novels?
Jenny Crusie: You don't aim for a comic tone. You write the stories you need to write in your voice and the voices of your characters. If that turns out to be funny, you've got a comedy. If it doesn't you're writing something else. Embrace that.
Tayler Bloom: What do you do to continue to build your audience?
Jenny Crusie: Write good books. Keep an online presence helps, I think, but the bottom line is, write books people want to read. Word of mouth is the most powerful force in selling anything, and it's doubly powerful for novels.
Tayler Bloom: What attracted you to writing romantic comedy? What do you enjoy most about writing it?
Jenny Crusie: I don't think of my books as romantic comedies. They're the stories I have to tell, and they turn out the way they turn out. Never write to a genre, that's marketing. Write the story the way it needs to be written and then other people can put the labels on if they want. I just write Crusies.
Thank you so much for sharing, Jenny!
Visit Jenny Crusie’s website at www.jennycrusie.com.
Tayler Bloom runs an author interview site that posts fresh interviews on the 15th of each month. The discussions focus on the craft of writing, the business of publishing and the path to success. Come visit at blog.myspace.com/taylerbloom.
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