Featured Interview With Vincent Watson
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
I was raised in Chicago but lefty home when I was 18 and ran all the way to Iowa. I realized upon my arrival that it wasn’t the most exotic of locations to run away to, but since all of my friends were there starting college, I mostly tagged along for the ride and ended up staying there. I have spent the last 20 or so years in Minneapolis having arrived in much the same way I had arrived in Iowa. I came for a weekend and never left. I tend to get bored with where I have been fairly easily, but I am usually thrilled by the challenges of newness. It’s kind of the same way, I absolutely detest moving house, but love the unpacking bit. Its the one time everything is in the exact place you need it to be in.
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
I have experienced the love of a few thousand books and the tragedy of having lost them all at one point and having had to start my collection all over again. I don’t understand people who have twenty thousand books that they have read exactly once. I would rather have a few hundred books that I have read over and over again. When the words take hold of your mind and soul, you discover something new each time.
I have always dreamed in color and remember them vividly and it was probably that that made me want to write. At fifty years old, I have journals that are falling apart having survived my pre-pubecent scribblings. I have letters from old girlfriends and lists of things made many years ago consisting of simple things that I wanted to remember from places I wanted to travel to.
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
I tend to like authors who write in first person, which to me is from the heart. Its easy to tell a story that you made up, but its harder to write down what you are feeling having put yourself in the place of your characters. Scott Spencer is one such author and I feel that Orson Scott Card is another even though his characters are made up. Its obvious he put all of his beliefs into each one. I’m also a science fiction geek. I have seen episodes of Star Trek or Stargate a few million times and I am only slightly exaggerating that number.
My writing habits lean towards letter writing. I sit and write as if I am telling a story. Imagine the feeling in your gut and how you felt when you first told someone that you love them. If you don’t feel that way when you are writing your novel, then no one else will either. I want people to be sick with anxiety when they read my books. I want the story I am telling them to take them back to a certain time, or a certain place. And when they are finished reading it, I want them to pick it up and start all over again.
Tell us a little about your latest book?
I have had this story in the back of my head for about twenty years as it was based on a short story I wrote when I was in college. That story was essentially a letter written to a girl in the form of a short novel. For some reason she showed it to a friend who was a member of the writers workshop. A few days later, I received in invite to join them, which I declined based on the fact that one of my TAs was on the membership panel and I was under the impression that he hated me. In hindsight, I should have, but I was young and stupid and also drunk on cheap beer a lot of the time. Isn’t that what college if for?
The reason it took me so long to actually get past the original story was because it needed a valid reason for Julia’s departure and I needed ending that I was never able to put into words.
When The Stillness of Winter starts out, Samuel returns home one day to find that the love of his life had left leaving only a note on the table. As far as he knew, nothing was wrong with their relationship so he was confused, hurt and angry. He does eventually find out why Julia left but the question he has to answer is how he feels about it and how he feels about her.
What I wanted was an ending that made sense. I wanted an ending that reached right into your soul and began to squeeze. I wanted an ending that made you feel happy and sad at the same time. But mostly I wanted an ending that didn’t fit into the norms of scripted serials where you could guess the ending before the first chapter was over.
I was in a movie theater in London when The English Patient was first out. I looked up at the screen during that first scene with the airplane flying over the desert. I leaned over to a friend and whispered, “This is the end.”
First of all you don’t talk in movie theaters in the UK. Second of all, my friend while being surprised was annoyed. I didn’t really mean to spoil it, but hey, I was right then wasn’t I?
I didn’t want one of those. I wanted surprise. Everyone who has picked up my book is completely taken by surprise when they find out why Julia left Samuel. That’s what I wanted, and that’s what I got. I really think that if you haven’t had it spoiled by someone, you will be genuinely surprised.
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