Ep. 223: Janna Ruth on Transforming Trauma into Art

In 2016, Janna Ruth’s plans for the new year was one submission to an agent. By the end of the year, she had won a writing competition with German publisher Ueberreuter and was deep in the throes to publish a second novel with a group of self-publishers. That novel, a modern fairy tale retelling with mental health topics, went on to win the SERAPH Phantastikpreis. Since then, Janna has published more than fifteen books in German and English.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #223 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. So thrilled that you’re here with me today to talk to Janna Ruth, who was a delight to talk to. And we talked about transforming trauma into art, which is something I think we do so often both in fiction and in memoir. So, stick around for that. It’s a good, interesting, deep conversation. I know you’re going to enjoy it.

[00:00:46] What’s been going on around here. What hasn’t been going on around here? Good things. I’m feeling lots, lots better still working on getting diagnoses and stuff and having tests and things like that. But I’m able to be in my chair happily all day, most every day of the week for the last a week and a half or so. So that has been wonderful to feel that energy again. And I must say that my new process that I shared with you last week, so I’ve been doing it two weeks is so cool. It’s so good. Oh my God! For me in my life where it is right now, it works very well for me to designate a day with a large task in it. Instead of trying to do a little bit of, a lot of dark, a lot of heavy time consuming tasks on one day, I’m breaking them up into days. So Mondays and Fridays are for working on my current project, which is right now in novel. Tuesdays are for teaching. Thursdays are for talking, doing stuff like this, making the videos for my classes and Wednesdays are for the creative non-fiction the memoir stuff that I do. And yesterday was a Wednesday and I had the best time. There’s always this sense of guilt. When I am working on non-fiction, when I’m producing episodes for You’re Already Ready, or writing essays for the Patreon, or working on the four different nonfiction books that I’m working on right now.

[00:02:16] There’s always this little voice nagging at me saying, you know, you should be working on one project and it should be the Quincy book, which is the book you’re focused on right now. How dare you do this? And to give myself a full day to do that and to give myself these full days, just to focus on one thing has been truly, truly awesome and liberating and makes me feel so happy. So I can recommend identifying one big task per day and trying to get it done instead of like, I’ve always done before trying to get 73,000 important things done in one day. So I may be the last person to learn this, but, you know, I got there. On Friday, speaking of this Friday, was a working on my current project day, and I finished the book. The tentative working title is Quincy Maddow Wants Her Stuff Back. And I finished the first draft. And what that means for me is I wrote the dark moment and I realized this is such a dark moment. She has lost everything now, and I, it’s a good one. So I can’t easily get her out of it. I don’t know how to get her out of it. It’s so dark that I need to take some time away from it. And for me, that looks like going back and starting my revision process. So it’s, I consider it finishing a draft, even though I always tell everybody to finish their whole draft and then have the satisfaction of writing the end at the end.

[00:03:39] I can’t do it, but I have to kind of cheat myself every time and say, nope, I got as far as I can and now I need to start revision. For me that is a complete draft. If I get to write the full dark moment, which I did. So on Monday I started revising and right now here’s my plan and it’s not conventional, but what my agent would like is for me to write out a full synopsis. So I’m reading the entire book with my revision process. And making a plan of what I want this book actually to be, because right now it is trash mountain. It is a pile of garbage. I am not being, I’m not a belittling myself, it is just not good. It is not readable, but in my revision plan, I come up with what the book actually is going to be. That is my revision plan. From there I can write her a synopsis, after that I’m going to write the first, I don’t know, three to six chapters. I’ll probably get up to the inciting incident and make those goods so I will revise them and then I’ll do some more revision and then I’ll do some more passes, kind of like I would do on a full book, but I don’t want to do that for this.

[00:04:49] I want to send her the synopsis and these first really clean, really good chapters, which she can then try to sell on proposal without the whole book being enhanced. If you’re a first time author, you cannot do this period, you can’t do it for fiction and you generally can’t do it for memoir unless you are, you know, Kardashian famous. So, but once you are established and you’ve already proven that you can finish books to deadline, that’s when you get to do this. It may not work. She may try to sell it and nobody bites and then I have to revise the whole thing and make it fantastic and then make it irresistible that we may end up having to go down that route. I hope not because number one, I like selling books and number two, I like revising to deadline. So that would be awesome. After I send that package to my agent, my next current project on the docket will be to do kind of the same thing for the terribly dark thriller that I told you about. Last week, which I’m not going to tell anybody about, but it is so dark, so horrifying that I want to read it. So I’m going to do the same thing right out of synopsis as best I can because everyone hates us synopsis, people. We hate writing them, editors and agents hate reading them. They’re dry, they’re dull, but you do the best you can. And then I’m going to write out three to six, hopefully fantastic chapters that she can also then try to sell and proposal when there’ll be awesome. Great.

[00:06:14] So those are the things coming up for me on my Monday and Friday writing days. Oh, other news. Let’s see, I had a BookBub, middle of January. I can’t remember exactly what it was. My amazing assistant Ed is a BookBub whisperer. And I just want to say, since the Biden administration came into office, I have sold so many more books. And I know that I personally have had just more bandwidth in my brain to read. Also I have more bandwidth because I’ve taken most of the apps off my phone, which has really helped with quieting some of the noise. So I’m enjoying that. Speaking of noise. I don’t know what’s going on in the streets. Sorry if you hear strange noises. Also in news, I have been getting some of my rights back for older books. I got my rights back for a Lichen Stitches, which is a collection of essays, that like in a memoir form. And that book came out in, I want to say 2012. So it’s been nine years. I’m really excited to get this back. The physical book went out of print maybe six or seven years ago. No one’s been able to buy that, but because they were still selling the digital version, and because I wasn’t diligent about trying to get my rights back, I’ve just been letting them sell the Kindle version, right. So that kind of kept it in print.

[00:07:36] However, now I have all of my rights back. They are going to un-publish Chronicle books is going to un-publish that book, and then I get to buy a new cover. I get to do editing. I get to add, I’m going to add two essays and an introduction, which will make it attractive for even people who bought the book in the past, who loved the book. Now I get to offer them kind of an added bonus value, second edition, which I will be able to offer cheaper than Chronicle books was able to, I think they’re selling it at 9.99 and I’ll probably sell it at 5.99 and I’ll make 70% of that instead of making 25% of net. So that’s exciting, it’s quite a bit of work to do, but I also got back the rights for books, one and three in the Cypress Hollow series, which was my first series. So this is my first book. I just got the rights back for How to Knit a Love Song and the third book. Very exciting, cause there’s five books in that series and I would love to be able to, and the fourth and the fifth book are mine in all countries, except for Australia where they own the rights. I might try to get my rights reverted there too. So then I would own all five outright, but right now I don’t have number two. 

[00:08:52] HarperCollins still has that and they have it because, in their declamation of rights reversion, they said, we will not revert these rights, because there are still books in the warehouse. And apparently as a term of this particular contract rights can’t revert. If they’re still holding onto books in the warehouse, why they have a ten-year-old book with physical copies, still in a warehouse that they haven’t remaindered total mystery to me. But I did something that I’m proud of. I wrote to them, I found out that there were 54 copies sitting in a warehouse somewhere and there’s this thing inside publishers called special sales and special sales will sell the books to the author. Generally, at 50% off, you don’t make any royalty on them, but you can buy them for that. And then you can sell them if you want it to or do what you want. So I wrote to the special sales department and I am requesting to purchase the 54 copies of those books, they are 13.99. So I did the math and if I’m paying half price on those I’ll end up spending $377. $377 to get all five books in under my control so that I can then set the first book to free and have Ed my assistant run BookBub’s on that and get them, get to drive them all the way through a five book series, that I’m proud of. I am super, super excited about doing this and I’ve already heard back from them and that is getting underway. So kind of big stuff happening around me, a lot of stuff. And it feels really good after having more than a month, basically off feeling so badly. 

[00:10:37] And now to have this motion around me, it’s delicious. I’m loving it. And I’m also trying to, I’m trying to rest before I need rest, which is if you’re a person like me, that does that, you don’t even understand what I just said, but I’m trying to learn how to do it resting before I need rest. And in fact, as soon as I finished this recording, instead of spending the hour that I would have free, that I would normally fill with Slack and email and all of those things that need to get done, because this is a long working day for me. I’ve been working from 8 and I’ll be working till 6:30 tonight because of appointments and coaching stuff. I’m going to go lay on the couch for an hour, even though my brain is saying, think of everything you could get done in an hour. Think of all the things you could catch up on. No, I deserve rest. I am worthy of rest. And even though I don’t feel like resting, it is good for me. So I’m want to do, go do it. Look at me learning. We can still learn people. All right, please enjoy this a wonderful interview with Janna. I know you will. I hope that you’re getting your writing done. If you are not, why not? Why not do 10 minutes today? Just to stick it to the man to show me that you can do it and then come find me on the internet and tell me how it went. Okay my friends we’ll talk soon. 

[00:11:53] Do you wonder why you’re not getting your creative work done? Do you make a plan to write and then fail to follow through? Again? Well, my sweet friend, maybe you’d get a lot out of my Patreon. Each month, I write an essay on living your creative life as a creative person, which is way different than living as a person who’ve been just Netflix 20 hours a week and I have lived both of those ways, so I know. You can get each essay and access to the whole back catalog of them for just a dollar a month. Which is an amount that really truly helps support me at this here writing desk. If you pledge the $3 level, you’ll get motivating texts for me that you can respond to. And if you pledge at the $5 a month level, you get to ask me questions about your creative life, that I’ll answer in the mini episodes. So basically I’m your mini coach. Go to patreon.com/Rachael (R A C H A E L) to get these perks and more and thank you so much.

Rachael Herron: [00:12:57] Okay. Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show Janna Ruth today. Hello, Janna, is it Jenna or Janna? 

Janna Ruth: [00:12:59] Either way.

Rachael Herron: [00:13:00] What do you prefer? 

Janna Ruth: [00:13:04] I’m German. So I originally picked a name that could be read either in English or in German. So it’s German, it’s Jana Ruth and English it’s Janna Ruth. So whatever 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:15] That is very sensible and clever of you. I like that. Okay. Let me give you a little introduction to our listeners. In 2016, Janna Ruth’s plans for the new year was one submission to an agent. By the end of the year, she had won a writing competition with German publisher Ueberreuter? Am I close at all?

Janna Ruth: [00:13:39] You probably top it

Rachael Herron: [00:13:39] And was deep in the throes of publishing a second novel with a group of self-publishers. That novel, a modern fairytale retelling with mental health topics, went on to win the SERAPH Phantastikpreis. Since then, Janna has published more than 15 books in German and English. Since 2016, you have published more than 50 of the books in German and English. That is so exciting. You know, that this podcast is about process and I really want to talk to you about process. How do you publish 15 books in the last four years? Let’s talk about your writing process, when and where and how and all of that. Now, first of all, you live in the country I am moving to, 

Janna Ruth: [00:14:22] Okay 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:23] In New Zealand, I’m a new Zealander as well as an American and we’re moving soon and we are considering Wellington, cause we love Wellington. So you’re there, you’re writing there. And how does it, how does it go? 

Janna Ruth: [00:14:36] Yeah. Well, I have the luck to be able to write full time, not because I can afford it, but because you know, having a husband, bought it and hopefully by the end of this year, I’ll be getting closer to actually contributing to the family money again 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:54] It’s excellent

Janna Ruth: [00:14:55] But until then I can, yeah, I can write until the kids have all the kids at school. So that’s gives me about six hours a day, and then I am a terrible night owl. So as soon as the kids sat in bed, that’s when my creativity hits and I, yeah, I write until midnight or later. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:16] Wow, what time do you get up? 

Janna Ruth: [00:15:18] During school time at 7:30. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:22] How old are the kids? 

Janna Ruth: [00:15:25] They’re between 5 and 10. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:26] How many kids? 

Janna Ruth: [00:15:28] Three. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:29] Okay. You didn’t say five or something. Shocking. Well of course you write at night. The rest of the time you’re probably just insanely busy. So are the kids in school and back in, in New Zealand, they have gone back to school, right?

Janna Ruth: [00:15:46] Not yet. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:47] Not yet.

Janna Ruth: [00:15:48] It’s just, yeah. So it’s pretty much one more week and they’re going to go back next Thursday. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:53] And then when they’re in school, do you write during the day or is it just, are you just a night person?

Janna Ruth: [00:15:57] I do write during the day, but usually I use those day hours to do all the admin stuff and, you know, contacting people or I’m very bad with procrastinating. So I sit down and it takes, sometimes it takes me like three hours to get started. It’s just, 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:14] I feel that 

Janna Ruth: [00:16:15] I could be more effective. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:17] I totally understand that. Okay. So, so this is a question that I’ve wondered before about people who write at night. Because I’m sorry, I’m just, I’m terrible at it. How does it go when you start to feel sleepy and you’re writing? 

Janna Ruth: [00:16:30] I don’t actually

Rachael Herron: [00:16:32] Okay. That’s the answer because I get this feeling like I am going to, like, my head is going to hit the computer.

Janna Ruth: [00:16:38] It’s really weird because usually, I mean, there are days where I’m like, sleep is a whole day and I’m like, okay, I have to go to bed early today. And so, and then 10:00 PM hits and I’m like wide awake and it’s really weird. And, yeah, if it’s writing, I think it depends a lot. Like if I’m in a flow, I can keep writing and pushing past the tiredness, which then probably hits around like one or two or, it very rarely goes past 2:00 AM, but yeah, it has happened this week. So 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:10] is that when you’re in a good flow and things are happening, is that tend to happen?

Janna Ruth: [00:17:13] Yeah. That was a really good chapter and I really wanted to finish it 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:19] And you write primarily speculative fiction, right? Yeah, you have a fantastic covers by the way, too. Okay. So do you write, you’re obviously right at home. Do you have an office or is that where you’re sitting here?  

Janna Ruth: [00:17:33] Yeah, that’s basically my office, in the back, that’s where my husband sits and plays games. So it’s not just for me. Pretty much, especially in winter because you know, New Zealand houses, aren’t the warmest.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:46] My wife is terrified about that. Yeah. So tell us more. 

Janna Ruth: [00:17:52] So, for some reasons the whole family then starts to move into my office. Gosh, it’s the warmest places 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:00] Also all the bodies in one room yeah. 

Janna Ruth: [00:18:03] It has really worked, yeah, it hasn’t really worked with closing myself off to have writing time or something. It’s yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:10] But you do okay

Janna Ruth: [00:18:12] We’ll stay out during the winter. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:13] You’re able to write with that kind of distraction around you. Some people find that it actually helps them. Does it help you or does it distract you?

Janna Ruth: [00:18:20] It does distract me. That’s probably why I’m more productive at night. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:25] Yeah. When they’re, when they’re quiet. What is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing? 

Janna Ruth: [00:18:32] Yeah, I would probably say the procrastination. Like I it’s just like, especially if I’m not really in the flow yet, it’s like a riot, a hundred words and then have to check Facebook again, or my emails and still someone answered me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:49] What, what techniques do you use to combat that? 

Janna Ruth: [00:18:54] I guess I have a, like, It’s basically like a level approach. So, most of the time it works to just set a time, like a Pomodoro unit and say, okay, I’m writing for 25 minutes and have a 5-minute break or something, if that doesn’t work, I love to use word crawls, which are like this, it comes from the NaNoWriMo page and it’s like this, these amazing they work with every kind of story. Like there’s a Harry Potter word crawl, or a supernatural word crawl or something, and it basically follows the story, but it gives you like little lighting tasks, like write a hundred words or throw a dice and multiply as a number by a hundred and write that amount, or write 20 minutes to the next sound or something like, that caught, that sort of diversity really helps. It’s like a small tasks, but so you can do them rather quickly. And, but it’s like always changing. You don’t get bored by doing the same thing all the time. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:55] And it is, and it is still NaNoWriMo, so that if people are listening and this is the first time I’ve heard of it, that’s National Novel Writing Month. cAnd is it on their page? Is that where you find the word crawl? 

Janna Ruth: [00:20:06] It’s in that forum. There’s one section and a forum. I think it’s a reaching 50K and they have a sub forum, which just word crawls and 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:16] So smart 

Janna Ruth: [00:20:17] And it’s, yeah. And it really helps because of the, all the constantly changing tasks and they also like these little tasks. So it’s basically, it’s like, like eating sweets. It’s like, I’ll just one more, one more, 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:30] Just a little bit more. I love that idea and I’m going to look it up. That is brand new to me. And I’m a huge NaNoWriMo fan. So what is your biggest joy when it comes to writing? 

Janna Ruth: [00:20:40] This will probably surprise many writers, but I love editing 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:46] Me too. What do you love about it?

Janna Ruth: [00:20:50] I just love that moment when everything starts to click together. And it’s really feels like puzzle pieces that are suddenly slipping into place and making this good book into a great book. And you can really feel how it’s getting better. And, Oh, you’re like, yes, this was my part, because this is a book now this is not just a story. This is a book, you know. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:09] So let me, let me ask you, because I feel like most people come to that realization that they love revision. Like, it’s one of the last things we realized. Did you, when did you realize that revision was good? For me, it took a book or two to realize that revision was my sweet spot.

Janna Ruth: [00:21:28] Pretty much miss the first novel that I did in my novelling part of my life, because I did have a long time where it didn’t write or when I just wrote my series. And for that, I didn’t really do much revision of, I was basically just drafting, drafting, drafting, and then in 2014, that was the first time I did NaNoWriMo. And I brought my first novel and then I stuck with a page and it started these revision months and I was like, okay. Yeah, let’s do them, 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:01] Did you have any fear about revision or were you just a jump in kind of person 

Janna Ruth: [00:22:06] No, I jump in and read all the tips and stuff and then started working on my novel and it was really fun.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:14] That is, I love hearing that. I just think that revision is magical. It’s really where the fun is for me, for me. And for a lot of other writers. Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us? 

Janna Ruth: [00:22:28] Yeah. So my mind is probably a bit out there. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:32] Oh good

Janna Ruth: [00:22:33] So as I said, I’ve been writing my series for a long time and this series is not improv, but a drama basically it’s a TV script. That’s anyone that’s doing them, TV series for it, but 

Janna Ruth: [00:22:46] Not yet. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:47] Not yet. We’ll see about that, but it has really helped me like, so it’s just this dialogue and just action points and just telling a story by a dialogue. So it has taught me so much about first writing my dialogues in novels and making them sound natural and have subtexts and all these kinds of things. It also taught me about pacing, because you have like these short scenes you don’t ever have like long winded cutoffs that go on and on, you know, you have like cut, cut, cut, basically. And it also taught me how to do good hooks at the end of chapters, because each scene has to and on something, it has to be a witty one line out, or it has to be a cliff hanger, or it has to be something that hooks you onto the next scene. And that has a, I’ve just transported that to my novel writing as well. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:36] How does it, how does that work for you when you’re in a first draft, are you doing it more like dialogue and the action points and then you fill it out in revision? Because that’s how you work or how does it work for you?

Janna Ruth: [00:23:50] I mean; I sometimes do that in plotting. Like when I have like an idea for a scene, sometimes the dialogue comes immediately to me. So I just write down the dialogue without any insertions or so. But when I’m drafting, it’s pretty full. I mean, my weak point is probably description. So that can be a bit thin during the first draft. So it’s usually something that I, you know, it’s two or three sentences, more so when I edit, but mostly it’s actually quite readable. I would say the first draft is quite readable. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:22] If somebody wants to get better at doing dialogue, what would you suggest that they do, 

Janna Ruth: [00:24:28] Speak it out loud? Like really talk it through because that’s something that we did at the beginning of the series was basically role play the dialogue, because that will tell you whether your dialogue is actually natural and not stilted or anything. And cause a lot of dialogue is, isn’t just like, you know, we don’t speak complete sentences. We constantly interrupt each other and, you know, 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:54] We don’t answer the questions that people are asking us. 

Janna Ruth: [00:24:56] No

Rachael Herron: [00:24:57] We avoid- that’s one of those things that, that I used to think, like if somebody answered, asked a question that the other character would have to answer it half the time we don’t in real life, especially when we’re in a relationship with somebody where you, we avoid questions.

Janna Ruth: [00:25:11] And now you still have to edit it. But because, cause really natural dialogue, you don’t want to read that in a book because that’s a lot of –

Rachael Herron: [00:25:22] Yes. You said we, when we were working on it, were you working with a team or?

Janna Ruth: [00:25:27] So that series, I’ve been writing since I was 17 and was basically born out of my best friends and my left foot Buffy back then. I wanted to write our own version of it. And she, since then she has dropped out, but she’s actually now my editor for it. So now I’ve been rewriting and publishing it in German. As a script version. So 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:54] I will mention too, that you are also an editor as well as a writer. Isn’t that right? You edit, or do you translate into German or do you do both? 

Janna Ruth: [00:26:05] I do both. So, I only started my page last year, which was Kibby Barry Editing. And I do editing. I’m personally, I have to say I do copy editing, but I really love developmental editing. I’m really good at that. So, and then of course I do translation from English to German and my favorite, my love child of the service, which is probably not being used enough, but please, if you have a fantasy map, come to me, I’m a geologist. And I will check your fantasy map and we’ll check whether your rivers are actually flowing downhill because in about 80% of authenticity maps, they don’t. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:45] Oh, my goodness. Okay. So tell me about a fantasy map. It is actually a drawn out map. Is that right? I don’t really know what one is.

Janna Ruth: [00:26:53] Oh yeah. It’s just a lot of fantasy books, like high fantasy books they have a map in front and we love maps, maps are beautiful. And it helps you orient yourself. Like where are they going? Like a lot of the rings, for example, where it’s going

Rachael Herron: [00:27:06] Right, that’s what I’m picturing. Yeah. 

Janna Ruth: [00:27:08] Yeah. And, yeah, but a lot of them actually have uphill flowing rivers and very weird mountains. And especially like climate sounds like there’s like deserts next to forests, which is like that that’s not happening.

Rachael Herron: [00:27:25] That is magic. Right? And then perhaps your rivers could flow uphill, but, that is fascinating. And I’ve never thought of somebody doing that and what a great service to offer. Also super fun. So geologist is your other, your other 

Janna Ruth: [00:27:41] it’s my previous career. Yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:46] Oh, that’s so cool. Okay. So what thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way?

Janna Ruth: [00:27:54] Yeah, that’s really hard to answer. I thought about that question. I probably would have to say it’s my kids. Like I, my oldest he’s 10 and he’s a storyteller as well. He doesn’t know it yet.

Rachael Herron: [00:28:10] He’s like, no mom. It’s not me.

Janna Ruth: [00:28:12] Exactly. But no, he’s been basically been plotting with me since he was five. And, and he has just this amazing insight. Like I’ve been thinking about that, middle-grade story, which I still haven’t written for like the last eight years, but it’s always on my list and I’ve been telling him about it. And it’s a little bit about science communication. So it’s, there are kids there, they have like oneself, like, so a little bit like Digimon, Pokemon, but it’s also supposed to explain geology to you. So my whole exciting bit was, Oh, that’s going to be an earthquake and there’s going to be volcano. And then he’s like, what am I going to fight monsters? I was like, no, but it’s actually a good idea. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:00] It’s a great idea. 

Janna Ruth: [00:29:02] Yeah. So now they have like these entropies, which entropy of monsters. And then of course the kids’ monsters they have of course have to have powers and stuff and it’s, it just makes it more colorful and it’s. Yeah. It’s like surprising, but good addition.

Rachael Herron: [00:29:21] How, I just want to take a moment and appreciate, because not everybody has this, but I have great in-house counsel. Like my wife is just so good with story. And for those of us who have that in-house counsel, who, who have people who love us, who want to talk about our stories, we’re really lucky. If we want that, there are some people who really keep their stories close to their chest and don’t talk about these things. But for me, I always get to a sticking point and it’s really nice to be able to go to somebody in the house and say, well, what do you think would happen here? 

Janna Ruth: [00:29:49] Yeah, I kind of, I mean, it works really well with my oldest and my oldest is always eager, especially if he doesn’t have to sleep and can talk through a story instead. My husband is more like just this one thing and being like, okay, are you done now, but it’s helps. It’s still help. I still have some talk. Tell them all about necessity. I get the idea. And so he’s, I always called him my soundboard. Like he doesn’t have to reply. It’s just, I need to be able to talk to him.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:18] Just make your face, look like a pretend. You’re pretend listening. That’s all I need. 

Janna Ruth: [00:30:24] I mean, sometimes he actually does have good ideas, but most of the time I’m properly annoying him. 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:30] Hilarious. I love that about your son. That’s so cool. Okay. So what is the best book that you’ve read recently? And why did you love it?

Janna Ruth: [00:30:38] So I would have to say, I really love the Sebastian De Castell’s, Spellslinger. I think it’s the Spellslinger series. So I read the final book of episodes. Pretty much the last best book I read and I just really love his voice. So he always does like this first person narrator, and it’s just really snarky. And even though there’s lots of action, there’s even drama. It’s like, it gets really dark, but there’s still like this humor in it. And that makes it read so enjoyable. It’s just, it’s just really fun to read. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:09] I love that. I love that kind of humor. And that’s the Spellslinger series. That’s very hard to say.

Janna Ruth: [00:31:16] Yeah. He also has The Greatcoats series, which I actually loved a little bit better. And it’s, and that’s basically like the three Musketeers and fantasy and it has like all of this action it has romance, it has darkness, it has humor. Like I said, most importantly humor, but it really, it has this really action fantasy plot and it just has everything. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:39] Now, what is his name again? 

Janna Ruth: [00:31:40] Sebastian De Castell. I think he’s a, he’s a Montreal. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:45] Okay. I don’t know him at all. Fantastic. Thank you for that. And now, will you tell us a little bit about your latest, most recent book? What do you want to tell us about it? 

Janna Ruth: [00:31:59] Okay. I’ve got this prepared. So my

Rachael Herron: [00:32:00] Gorgeous

Janna Ruth: [00:32:01] It’s going to be published next month on the 25th. And it’s contrary to what we talked about, it’s not a fantasy

Rachael Herron: [00:32:10] And it’s called Time to Remember 

Janna Ruth: [00:32:12] Time to Remember. Exactly. And it’s about the Canterbury earthquakes, which I experienced

Rachael Herron: [00:32:21] So my family is from Christchurch and that’s where my people are. You were there?

Janna Ruth: [00:32:26] I was studying geology in Christchurch at that time.

Rachael Herron: [00:32:28] Holy cow

Janna Ruth: [00:32:31] So it’s by probably my most personal book yet. It’s fiction, it’s more in my other love, which is coming of age stories. So this is about students. So that’s a group of people that have been about 10 years old during the earthquake and how it affects them to the state and it comes out next month and that’ll be really, really personal to me.

Rachael Herron: [00:32:55] That is wonderful. And actually, I think I’ve got a bunch of interviews preplan. So this, when this goes live, we’ll probably, your book will probably be live. So it’s called Time to Remember by Janna Ruth and so, can we, can you tell me a little bit more about being there during it? When I, so I, I had been gone from Christchurch for a long time and we went back probably about five years ago, I would say. And I did not recognize the city. 80% of the buildings 

Janna Ruth: [00:33:26] I know

Rachael Herron: [00:33:27] Are gone or red zoned or, you know, taken out and I got a migraine from the grief of just driving through the city that I didn’t know anymore. What was, what was it like being there? 

Janna Ruth: [00:33:36] I know that feeling because I think it was like two years off after the earthquake when they just opened up the red zone and I was driving through there the first time and it was just like, you don’t know anywhere where you are, you don’t know where you are. It’s like, which street am I on, it’s like it’s so weird it’s. Yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:33:59] Where were when it hit? 

Janna Ruth: [00:34:01] Okay, so I was at home with my oldest who was three months old at that point. I know. And I mean, we were incredibly lucky as nothing happened. We didn’t lose anyone, we didn’t lose anything. Our home was okay. We’ve also moved at the beginning of March and the new home that we moved into, which was lucky that it was already, you know, all settled and done, was fine as well. But still that day, I mean even 10 years later, I mean, that book, I cried during writing it. I cried during editing. I even cried during type setting it and like it is just such a personal moving thing. And that day, because I was at home with my boy and my husband was working at university in the Rutherford building, which is one of the highest ones in Christchurch, and he didn’t make it home until like four hours later. And there was four hours where you’re just like home alone. You don’t, you can’t contact anyone. You’re just like sitting and waiting and hoping it it’ll all be good. 

Rachael Herron: [00:35:13] the baby in your arms. 

Janna Ruth: [00:34:15] Yeah. That baby that’s the other story. It’s because he was a really bad sleeper. So we usually went out with a stroller until he was falling asleep. And then I left him in the living room, just in his stroller. I’m not there to move him. And then I was in the office working on my master’s thesis. And so when the earthquake hit, I ran from the office to the living room and just threw myself on top of that stroller because there was no time to, you know, go under the table or anything. It was just like, get to that baby. And hopefully if something happens, you know,

Rachael Herron: [00:35:51] The baby’s okay.

Janna Ruth: [00:35:52] The baby’s okay. Yeah. That was all that was going on. He was of course, crying like, why are you holding onto me? 

Rachael Herron: [00:35:58] Because like I was getting rocked well. Oh, my goodness. Well, I’m sorry that you went through that and I am, as soon as we hang up, I’m going to go pre-order that book because I want to read that. So 

Janna Ruth: [00:35:11] Oh thank you. 

Rachael Herron: [00:35:12] Oh, that is so exciting. Okay. So tell us where you can be found online. 

Janna Ruth: [00:36:16] Okay. So I’ve got a webpage, which is Janna-Ruth.com and you can also find me on Facebook (authorjannaruth) where I am very active. I also have an Instagram (janna_ruth) and a Twitter, which the Twitter is somehow just Janna_Mobs. Well, that’s because then our resource was gone. You’ll still find me if you look that up. I can’t promise I post a lot on there, there, because I have this love-hate relationship with Twitter, which is like, sometimes I post a lot, and then I’m gone for months. 

Rachael Herron: [00:36:45] Me too, I’m gone right now. I just

Janna Ruth: [00:36:47] Yeah, at the moment, I’m like, I’m trying to get back into it, but it’s getting slow and yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:36:57] Well, it has been a delight talking to you. Please enjoy the city to which I might be moving and maybe we’ll reach out at that point and have a coffee or something. 

Janna Ruth: [00:37:06] Yes. Yes. I would love it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:37:07] Thank you so much for being on the show and for doing all the work you’re doing. And I can’t wait to read your book. 

Janna Ruth: [00:37:13] Thank you so much for having me

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.