Writing is a passion. Publishing is a business.

ARTEMIS GREY

Interview with ARTEMIS GREY

Artemis Grey was raised on fairytales and the folklore of Appalachia. She’s been devouring books and regurgitating her daydreams into written words since childhood. She can often be found writing by a crackling fire or romping through the woods on horseback, searching the depths of random wardrobes and wriggling into hollow tree trunks. She hopes to make her readers look at the world they’ve always seen, and see the world they’ve always envisioned.

What are you reading right now?

We’ve been on overtime at work for almost two months, and my reading has been happening only in audio from (graciously provided by a coworker who shares his audible account). Recently, I’ve been listening to the LEGEND OF DRIZZT series, by R.A. Salvatore. The books that started everything for me, were the original DRAGONLANCE trilogy, and the CRYSTAL SHARD trilogy. Specifically Raistlin Majere, and Drizzt Do’Urden have always been, and will always be, my two great loves in regard to character romances. Drizzt, in particular, is a comfort for me, and his stories are the ones I go back to again and again. From his character itself, to the fact that that character was actually created on impulse and without any intention of having the character “mean anything” Drizzt represents to me the what-ifs and the indomitableness carried within oneself.

What first sparked your interest in writing?

I accidentally answered part of this with my first answer. Like many writers, I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t telling stories, but it was reading fantasy books like the ones above that started me writing my own stories. That, and the desire to be able to maybe create characters that would mean as much to someone, somewhere, as characters like Drizzt mean to me. In more recent years, writing nonfiction (specifically for the theatre of conservation) has been sparked by the need to educate the public and spread information, to be a voice for the voiceless.

What do you love the most about writing? The least?

What I love most about writing fiction is everything about the process and actual creation. “Meeting” new characters, learning about them, seeing their stories unfold. What I like the least is the need to try and convince members on the commercial side of things that my stories are “worthy” of being put into the public’s reach. In writing nonfiction, what I love most is being able to engage the public and teach them things they didn’t know. I also love, in a warrior’s sense, being able to combat those who would exploit voiceless animals, nature, and public ignorance, to make money, and damage that which they profess to care about. Most people are shocked to realize the truth about some of the most visible “conservationists” they’ve heard of. What I like least in nonfiction is the willful ignorance, and blind devotion that I’ve encountered on widespread levels. The willingness of humanity to warp or destroy principles, or overlook the same, even as they acknowledge it, in exchange for either their own gain, or because it’s more comfortable, or convenient to do so.

Tell us a little about your writing process.

In fiction I’m a panster to the core. A story, or character, or set of characters will blossom inside me, and for a varying amount of time decided by each, I’ll let them grow there, developing and maturing. Then I simply start writing. Most of the time, the greater story arch will already be visible to me. I’ll know the start, at least have an idea of the journey, and where things end up. But my rough drafts are very much that. My second drafts are where hard lines get drawn. I still write long hand in pen, when I’m able, and when that’s happened, it’s the transcription process that stands as my “second draft”. In nonfiction, I do a ton of research for articles. That’s very rewarding in itself. It’s all about taking hard science, and/or verified facts, and then presenting it in a way that reaches out and physically impacts the public, opens their eyes, and permanently alters them afterward, hopefully in all the best ways.

What are your passions?

Writing. Being a voice for those (animal or human) who have none of their own, but doing so in a way that remains true to them. Being alone, surrounded by nature, with as little indication of the presence of humanity as possible. The intangible connection and exchange possible with nature and animals that requires you to step outside yourself and not perceive the world in the manner of how it exists in relation to you, by rather in how it exists without you.

What inspires you?

Everything. Literally everything. From the things I love, to the things I most hate, or fear, it all inspires me in some way.

How was CATSKIN born?

I have always thought humans with albinism to be exceptionally beautiful not just in form, but in the sameness so often denied them by the rest of society. I feel likewise about all other “differences” perceived and maintained by society. At the same time, there were no male characters (that I knew of) which embraced “broken” females as they were, without trying to “fix” them because they saw them as not actually “broken” but simply the same as everyone else in a different way. The parallels of society treating those with albinism as being “different” and society treating those who have suffered a trauma as “different” developed into a story about a boy who was just the same as everyone else in his “differences” falling in love with a girl who likewise was the same in her “differences,” but who had been conditioned to believe she wasn’t “right.”

Do you think you will ever return to write more with Ansel and Catskin?

I sincerely hope so! I actually have outlines for two more books, one which follows Catskin before she met Ansel (which would address some issues like you can’t really walk around in Alaska for months surviving on nothing as it seems like Catskin did before meeting Ansel. I'm looking at you, Erynn) and one which follows them after the events in CATSKIN. Because CATSKIN was released through a very small press (Clean Reads, you’re the best ever) and because my writing is rich in satisfaction and joy, but poor in monetary matters, I have to split my time between a full time job, and my writing efforts. Clean Reads was the only publisher willing to publish CATSKIN (seriously, Clean Reads is a phenomenal group of people) so I’ve been trying to work on other projects which might be more commercially viable in the hopes that subsequent contracts would provide me with more time to write. Still working on that but also still working on CATSKIN related books!

Do you have any advice for aspiring authors?

The best advice I can give aspiring authors is to take the time to learn themselves, to learn their inner beings as far as their writing goes. Learn, accept, and respect what matters the most to you. Do you want to write for the love of writing? Do you want to be commercially and monetarily successful through your writing? Do you want to achieve some functional change in the world with your writing? The answers are vital, because they will guide you, and embracing them will allow you to be happy. Also, there is no wrong answer, and the answer can change dependent upon subject matter and situation. If you want to be a monetarily successful author, if what will make you happy is seeing your name in headlines, then you can shape your writing, what you write, and how you write it, with the goal of achieving those things. Yes, unexpected lightning does strike. But documenting the lifecycle and daily struggles of a hellbender salamander in an Appalachian stream-bed is not likely to gain you red-carpet receptions, or invitations to Dragon-Con panels. However, if what you love most is being able to take something that most of society doesn’t even know about, and turn it into a gripping tale that might mean everything to just a few people, then red-carpets and Cons don’t matter. A writer who wants to make money off their writing, is no less an author than a writer who wants only to document the comings and goings of the field mice in their backyard, and vice versa. Neither are the two exclusive. You can desire monetary success through one type of writing, while wanting only to document something for the sake of that thing with another type of writing.

Is there anything else you would like to tell us about yourself?

Because I took over a month to get these questions answered and sent to Rachel (and I love Rachel immensely and very much appreciate her interest in interviewing me) I think she, and readers, deserve something extra, so I’ll tell you a secret: I have a habit of leaving scraps of paper sort-of hidden in all the places I go (public, or natural) with little things written on them. It might be a little stanza of poetry (I’m not an accomplished poet but I try) or a (hopefully) inspirational quote, or it might just say something like “You are enough in yourself.” Or something like that. But I believe that little unexpected bits of magic, and discovery like that help keep us alive in all the important ways, so I try to help them happen whenever I can.