Grabbing Attention
J.A. Jance
9:00-9:45am
(Masters of Education in Library Science)
- “Edge of Evil” written with a lot of blog posts
- Wizard of Oz books in school
- Wanted to be a writer so she signed up as an English major
- “you’re a girl” so wasn’t let into the creative writing class
- Girls who wanted to be doctor’s grew up to be nurses
- Married a guy in the creative writing class
- Husband: “there’s only going to be one writer in our family and it’s me”
- He was a chronic alcholholic
- 18 years of loving him hadnt fixed him
- Divorced him
- He wanted her back
- Left Phoenix for Seattle in 1981
- Kept her fear from the kids
- Sold life insurance for 10 years
- Took Dale Carnegie course
- Class about giving a talk on something that changed the course of your life
- Previously her life crossed the path of a serial killer
- Her family was scheduled to be the next victim but he was caught
- That had sown the seeds of her divorce
- After talk classmate said that the story should be written as a book
- Started the book in March 1982
- 4am-7am every morning was the only time she had to write
- Writing felt comforatble and what she was always meant to do
- Finished in three months
- Referred to an agent
- Brought first mms which was 1200 pages long
- “Cut it in half”
- Fiction was fine, real stuff was unbeliveable
- Suggested she write something completely fictional
- Still has the same agent 35 books later
- Got life insrance from husband’s death
- Used 10% of insurance to buy and computer
- dual floppies
- 128k RAM
- Daisy wheel printer
- Now has a Porsche and a private jet
- Where do I get my ideas
- Gather them as I travel around
- Read UofA alumni magazine from cover to cover to get past writer’s block
- Newly reconsitituted creative writing program
- Could she come be the writer in residence?
- “We don’t do anything with genre fiction, only literary fiction”
- Healed of writer’s block instantly!
- In 2000 they gave her an honorary doctorate
- UofA just got her archive (including the computer)
- What does the Internet do for me?
- Allows her to hear from people in an immediate way
- Even the people who think she’s ugly and feels she should know their opinion
- Wrote that person into her book
- “87 words I didnt’ have to write.”
- 6ft tall by the time she was in 7th grade
- Also wore thick glasses and was smart
- Jr. High and Highschool were not her favorite years
- Moving from one series to another helps her stay fresh
- Write whatever you want in fiction because no one will ever recoginze themselves
