What, Why, How: Kelly Fordon

What:

I write fiction, poetry, book reviews and nonfiction.

How:

Bird by Bird as Anne LaMott says. When I am writing, I just keep forging ahead until I have something I like. In the case of “Garden for the Blind” for years I thought I was writing eleven separate stories about people who had nothing to do with one another, but then one day it occurred to me that they were really the same people with different names. That was a weird moment! I put the stories together and they formed a novel-in-stories and I could not have told you that would happen until eight years into the project. Some people would find that depressing (eight years!), but clearly they are not writers, and they don’t understand how much fun it is to turn the corner and happen upon a Cheshire Cat.

Why:

I write because I enjoy it. If I didn’t enjoy it and need to do it, I would have stopped a long time ago, for the same reason that for years when I had small children, I stopped doing everything else including exercising and eating right and even, for a short time, combing my hair. No matter what disheveled state I was in, I felt compelled to write. It was a solace to me and I would wake up to do it at 5am the way that some people wake up to squeeze in a good workout or go birding before taking on the obligations of the day. There are many good writers out there. I try to stay focused on doing it for myself and then when I receive a rejection it feels like junk mail and I can toss it in the recycling bin and move forward relatively unscathed. Given the ratio of acceptances to rejections one receives, that is a very practical approach!

Bio: