Author Interview with P.D.R. Lindsay

This Week’s Feature Author Interview with

P.D.R. Lindsay

Hi P.D.R. Lindsay, welcome to the Indie Publishing Group website. Introduce yourself to us. Tell everyone who you are, where you’re from, what do you enjoy doing, hobbies and interests.

Who am I? I’m P.D.R. Lindsay. I’m a writer who loves the sea, and wide horizons, the greenness of coastal plains and the openness of moors, and high country tussock land, all the skin and bones of our lovely planet. I need space. I hate cities where there are too many people crowded in ugly buildings, but love the hearts of old cities with Mediaeval buildings, ancient walls, tiny streets.

When did you start writing and why?

Writing was my lifeline. Somewhere I have a red spiral notebook with my first ‘novel’, a pony story, written when I was about seven. Writing allowed me to escape and create worlds and settings I could enjoy. I had work published in my school magazine, university journals and then had to choose. For many of my generation time for husband and family came before time for the wife. We women knew we’d have our time later, perhaps too much of it. So I worked full time, but I wrote plays and poems for Sunday school and school for my children.

Writing for me involves characters who pop into my head and natter until their stories are told. I learned to let them have their say after writing my first publishable novel. I planned. Jacob of Jacob’s Justice was meant to be one of Cromwell’s plain russet coated gentlemen. He insisted on being a cocky little blond, a wealthy merchant’s son. I fought him for about seven starts of the first few chapters but finally gave in. Only then could the novel flow. Tizzie is probably my favourite character, she grew from a nostalgic trip back to the Yorkshire Dales which sparked memories of my maternal grandmother’s stories and grew into Tizzie. Mind you I am always fond of whichever MC I am writing about. I have a soft spot for Bryce in my new novel, Bittersweet.

I write because writing is the only way I can say what I want to say. Try telling someone you know that they are viewing their life through rose tinted glasses. Try telling someone you have proof their prospective husband/wife is a money grubbing monster. You can’t, you are not believed and will be hated. But if I write about people facing problems, and show how they succeed or fail at dealing with those problems, then readers are one step from their own reality and might just see enough to help themselves. Being honest with ourselves is very difficult, if not impossible. Reading about characters who are having to make choices might help readers make choices.

It is hard to begin a novel because by the time I have read, researched, walked miles muttering to myself as I try to set the characters and plot, I end up with perfection in my head which never gets down onto paper. I can plan and make character studies, plot lines and time lines, but the brilliant dialogue and scenes in my head escape my ability with words and I feel I’m failing my characters. I just have to rely on the 3Ds to get the novel finished and my own and my colleagues’ editing skills to make the book work.

Who helped you with the cover? Or did your design it yourself? What was your inspiration for your cover design?

Titles and Covers I leave to experts. I am fortunate in my colleagues in Writer’s Choice who are so good at titles and blurbs and help me out as I help them. We are always too close to our own work to see it clearly. Then we have a wonderful artist who does most of our covers. Her interpretation of the story made the Tizzie cover much commented on. The same seems to be happening for the Bittersweet cover.

Who are some of your favorite authors?      

I’m a fickle reader. My favourites change with every book I read and I read one a day. I have a set of old friends I reread, loving both the writing style and the characters. Patricia McKillip, Rosemary Sutcliff, L. M. Boston, J.K. Rowling, Diana Wynne Jones, Cynthia Voight, are a few of these. I need old favourites, comfortable reads with character friends to send me to sleep or my dreams are full of the terrible things happening in this nightmare time we are currently living through.

Have you got anything you’re working on now?   

Currently I’m working on a novel set in India and New Zealand, and a series of short stories set in Japan. My MC demanding her story be told is a tough little lass called Mellisande by her romantic parents but who is in fact a rather stocky plain Jane. Both the novel and the short stories are historical, I’ve just completed a flash fiction series on bad neighbours which is contemporary. How I wish I could snap my fingers, change time and nip around the centuries. Snap, into 19thC India and Japan again. Snap, making a first visit to 17thC Cambodia and Vietnam. Wouldn’t it be wonderful? I’ve still to visit Scandinavia and Iceland in modern times and hope to be earning enough money to travel in the next five years to do so. The Scandinavians (as some of the Germanican tribes) successfully fought off the Romans and I’m hoping for a few stories from my travels there.

Thanks so much for taking the time to do an author interview. Take a minute and check P.D.R. Lindsay out on the links below. P.D.R. Lindsay’s book, Bittersweet, is available now in paperback on Amazon, and the eBook is available on Smashwords.

P.D.R. Lindsay Author Website

P.D.R. Lindsay Pinterest Page

P.D.R. Lindsay Twitter

P.D.R. Lindsay LinkedIn

P.D.R. Lindsay Google Plus

P.D.R. Lindsay Goodreads Page