#WriterWednesday Interview with Ann Charles
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I’d like to welcome Ann Charles back to the blog for #WriterWednesday!
Things you never want to run out of: Ha! That’s an easy one: coffee. Wait! Maybe dark chocolate. It’s a tie.
Things you wish you’d never bought: All of the clothes I think will look good on me and didn’t try on before buying them (many are still hanging in my closet because I can’t bring myself to get rid of them).
Hardest thing about being a writer: The constant marketing work—and the never-ending bookkeeping.
Easiest thing about being a writer: Signing an autograph
Favorite music or song: I don’t have a favorite type. I enjoy various songs from over the years from genres like classic rock, country, pop, alternative, old time classics and soundtracks from the 1940-1960s, disco tunes, and more. I think this comes from being the youngest kid in a big family where I often listened to my parents’ and siblings’ music. When I write, I like to listen to old songs in the background with a rain sound playing over them. Something about that is calming and allows me to focus.
Music that drives you crazy: Anything with screeching or loud screaming instead of singing. Also, anything with too much saxophone.
Favorite smell: Baking bread
Something that makes you hold your nose: Red Onions
Last best thing you ate: A fresh, breaded halibut sandwich at Mo’s restaurant in Yachats, Oregon.
Last thing you regret eating: Bad crab meat in Mazatlán, Mexico.
The last thing you ordered online: Books—author copies of my own books that I sell out of our online store. Oh, and cat treats. Our cats threatened to smother me in the night if I didn’t.
The last thing you regret buying: Cat treats—they eat them so fast I just know they don’t appreciate them.
Things to say to an author: Thank you for writing such a great story. It made me love reading and I didn’t want the book to end.
Things to say to an author if you want to be fictionally killed off in their next book: “Do better.”
People you’d like to invite to dinner: Anyone who is quick to laugh, loves to read books or to watch fiction movies/tv shows, and has crazy real-life stories to share.
People you’d cancel dinner on: Anyone who is going to REQUIRE me to dress in formal attire.
Favorite things to do: Take back roads while traveling, explore new-to-me places, laugh while reading, eat soft pretzels, drink frozen Coke Slushees.
Things you’d run through a fire or eat bugs to get out of doing: Bookkeeping work
The coolest person you’ve ever met: A fun old guy named George who taught me how to play horseshoes and kept me laughing the whole time.
The celebrity who didn’t look like he/she did in pictures/video: Louie Anderson, the comedian, looked like he did in videos, but he was even funnier in real life when we went to see him in Las Vegas. The way he worked with the audience to make the show more hilarious was amazing.
Some real-life story that made it to one of your books: My family and I once stumbled upon a real-life sword swallower in Uranus, Missouri at a circus museum. We were in the museum alone and she was happy to shock us with various swords that she slid way down her throat. I’ll never forget that day, nor worrying with my husband if we’d need to rush her to the emergency room if something went sideways.
Something in your story that readers think is about you, but it’s not: Readers often think that I based Violet Parker, the heroine in my Deadwood Mystery series, on me and my life. She may share a sense of humor with me and have two kids, same as me, but she is far more daring than I am. I often advise her not to chase after supernatural troublemakers, but she rarely listens to me.
About Ann:
Ann Charles is a USA Today Best-Selling author who writes spicy, award-winning mysteries full of mayhem, adventure, comedy, and suspense. She writes the Deadwood Mystery Series, Jackrabbit Junction Mystery Series, Dig Site Mystery Series, Deadwood Undertaker Series (with her husband, Sam Lucky), and AC Silly Circus Mystery Series. Her Deadwood Mystery Series has won multiple national awards, including the Daphne du Maurier for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense. Ann has a B.A. in English with an emphasis on creative writing from the University of Washington and is a member of Sisters in Crime and Western Writers of America. She is currently toiling away on her next book, wishing she was on a Mexican beach with an ice-cold Corona in one hand and a book in the other. When she is not dabbling in fiction, she is arm wrestling with her two kids, attempting to seduce her husband, and arguing with her sassy cats.
