Thank you for joining us for our fifth and final installment of our interview with author Linda Paulson Adams. If you missed parts one, two, three, or four, click on these links.
Linda, is there a message or a driving force behind your work, or any common themes that run throughout?
Hmm. I’ve always had an innate need to write. Where it comes from or why I have it, I can’t say exactly, but it seems to be an integrated part of my soul.
I could have recurring themes, I imagine, but that’s more for the literary critics to deconstruct than for me to find and explain.
I’m conscious of one theme throughout the trilogy, which is spiritual preparedness. In my opinion, that will be the critical point, more so than any actual events we live through. I’ve tried to demonstrate, through the lives of my characters, that it’s possible to be close to God and receive personal answers to prayer, without the writing crossing into either pure cheese or preachy didacticism. I hope I’ve achieved that.
If I have an overall message, it would be that God is real, knows each of us intimately, and loves us very much as His children. That’s how I feel in my heart, and I can’t divorce who I am from my work. I hope some of that feeling comes through. But I never want to hit people over the head with a hammer, either. I try to structure my writing so that readers are free to make up their own minds about whatever ideas I present.
How do you keep your creative juices flowing?
Reading good books. Watching (or re-watching) great movies. I’m one of those DVD junkies who will listen to all the commentary tracks they’ll give me. (Give me a break, it’s something to do while I fold laundry!) I enjoy listening to the directors, writers, and actors (read: other creative minds) talk about how they came up with this or that, or solved a problem.
I also participate in several online communities (such as LDStorymakers), where I can tap into that artistic mindset that understands where I’m coming from. Places where artists can share with other artists, and give and receive feedback about their work, are very healthy for my creative energy.
And this may sound weird, but the best overall energy-booster I’ve ever discovered is just singing my guts out. Even if I’m tired from a long day.
I’ve also learned I have to take care of myself, and keep my own cup full, if I’m going to help anyone else–including those most important to me, my husband and children. It’s based on the same theory as putting your oxygen mask on first in an airplane. If you pass out, you can’t help anybody. When I don’t take care of myself, it shows–not just in my appearance, but in the house, my energy level, my attitude, you name it.
So–I don’t feel needless guilt when I do little things to recharge my batteries. My husband knows I’m happiest when I’m writing, and he loves that. Good balance is when I release the daily stress with something creative–write a poem, a chapter, or tinker at the piano for a while. Small, regular doses of creativity. I’m known to write in huge bursts–and get so involved in the world in my head that I forget there’s an outside one! (Another “whoops!”) But it’s the regular, day by day creative outlets that make those bigger projects possible.
Thank you so much for granting us this interview, Linda.
Thanks; it’s been fun!
If you’d like to read more about Linda, visit her website.
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