The 7Q Interview: CW Hawes
AUTHOR BIO
CW Hawes is a multi-genre author and award winning poet. He’s the author of, among others, the Pierce Mostyn Paranormal Investigations series, and several horror shorts. He lives in Houston, TX with his wife and their cat.
QUESTIONS
#1. Looking back, what’s one fiction book that you feel truly made an impact on your writing? Do you still gravitate towards that author?
#1. The one novel that made the greatest impact on my writing was The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro.
I hate outlining. Yet ever since I can remember, all the writing wonks have told us we need to outline. We need to have plot points and we need to have this and we need to have that and the other thing. We needthem to write our novels and stories. Otherwise we’ll just end up with a jumbled up mess. But every time I tried to follow that crap, I ended up throwing away reams of paper. I ended up at the point where I very nearly quit writing.
What I learned from reading Ishiguro is that plotting is not the thing. Storytelling is. His books are essentially plotless. Not much action takes place. They are more like in-depth character studies. Once I learned that all the writing wonks were wrong for me, I was free to write. And write I did, and continue to do so. Which means there is no right way to write. Write your story your way. Forget the wonks. Besides, they don’t make their living by writing. Fiction, at least. Which I think says something.
I still enjoy Ishiguro, but I have to be in the right mood to read him. His books aren’t light reading.
#2. How do you feel about the use of sub-genres in the industry? How do you describe your work overall?
#2.I don’t pay much attention to sub-genres. I think categories are more important because that is what the booksellers focus on. As a whole, I think they can be helpful as long as they are descriptive of book content.
Horror encompasses a wide array of genres and categories. Overall, I’d say my focus is on the supernatural and occult. Or paranormal as it tends to be called today. And tends to straddle science fiction or fantasy. I may also toss in a healthy dollop of the psychological, philosophy, and action/adventure.
#3. What about your writing process do you think is unique or quirky? What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever received?
#3.Nothing about my writing process is unique. I simply sit in a chair and write. However, many would probably find it quirky. I write by hand. My preferred writing instruments are the pencil, fountain pen, and dip pen.
Let me also add that I do very little revision. Some might find that odd, I suppose. What ends up on the paper for my first (and only) draft is probably about 95% of what the published book will look like. It’s a writing process that started in high school and continued in college when I’d write my paper by hand, and edit while typing the only typescript, which was turned in the next day. I didn’t have time for multiple drafts or for agonising over the blank sheet of paper. My daily word count is pretty much my finished word count.
#4. How does music and media factor into your writing? Do you feel it plays as much an inspirational role as literature?
#4.Music doesn’t provide any inspiration for my writing. In fact, I’ve gotten away from listening to music while writing. I prefer silence. TV and movies don’t provide much inspiration either. While I’ve watched plenty of TV and seen plenty of movies in my day, I don’t care overly much for either. I’d rather read a good book.
#5. As an author, how much do you engage in social media? Do you feel it is more for your own entertainment, or for marketing and networking?
#5. I don’t like social media. I see most of the interaction as a waste of time. And being in my 60s, wasting time isn’t something I feel I can afford to do.
However, I have met some great people via social media. People I would probably have never met otherwise. After all, I don’t travel to England or Australia or Germany or even Canada all that often. Or even to other parts of the US.
I see the primary value of social media in getting to know other authors and in networking. I see it as being less useful for marketing.
#6. Where do you see the future of horror fiction heading? In turn, what changes would you love to see, either socially or technologically?
#6. I can remember the publishing industry saying, “Horror is dead!” Then along came Mr King. What I’ve noticed in my 50 plus years of observing the publishing industry is that they are very poor prophets.
The indie movement has shown horror to be, in all of its forms, very resilient and popular. Not as popular as romance to be sure (then again nothing is), but horror does have a definite market. We can see this with the horror series that Netflix is creating. They wouldn’t be making them if there wasn’t money to be made there.
In this visual media and gaming age, I think our task as writers is to make reading as attractive to people as TV, movies, and gaming is. And I think the way to do this is to get the readers while they’re young. Poe, Saki, Aiken, Doyle impressed me when I was in elementary school. Boys especially need to see reading as manly. I know that may come across as sexist, but studies have shown that boys will shy away from anything that might end up making them look like a sissy. That’s one reason why I have nothing against comic books. They can be a tremendous gateway to get boys to read. My first exposure to Jules Verne was by a comic book. I then went on to read his books. I focus on boys, because girls don’t seemingly need the incentive. They take to reading far more quickly than boys do, as a rule.
I’ve always been a reader and I cringe when I hear things like “Men don’t read”, or “Men don’t read fiction”. I think they do. They just aren’t as vocal about it as women.
And since men tend to read horror in a larger percentage than women, writers of horror need to keep this in mind when crafting their tales of terror.
#7. What can you tell us about any forthcoming projects? What titles would you like to promote now?
#7. I’m serializing on my blog The Medusa Ritual, which is the fifth Pierce Mostyn Paranormal Investigation. You can find the first installment here: https://www.cwhawes.com/the-medusa-ritual-installment-1/
I’m currently at work on the eighth Pierce Mostyn tale. When the serialization ends in May, I’ll put The Medusa Ritual out in book form sometime in June or July. I’ll then follow that with publishing one Pierce Mostyn book each month for the next 3 months.
I also have an occult detective series in the works. My plans are to bring that out next year.
You can find all of my books on my Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/CW-Hawes/e/B00PGAIQ2S/
And you can connect with me on
Twitter:https://twitter.com/cw_hawes
Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/CWHawes1
AUTHOR PIC
