My Interview with K. M. Weiland

K.M. Weiland lives in make-believe worlds, talks to imaginary friends, and survives primarily on chocolate truffles and espresso. She is the award-winning and internationally-published author of Outlining Your Novel, Structuring Your Novel, and Creating Character Arcs. A native of western Nebraska, she writes historical and speculative fiction and mentors authors on her award-winning website Helping Writers Become Authors.

K. M. Weiland answered five questions for me. Here they are:

1. You have written both nonfiction and fiction. Does your success with nonfiction books like Outlining your Novel and Structuring Your Novel help you as a fiction writer? Does it carry some cons, too?

Definitely helps. My teachings on writing have all grown out of my own journey of developing and deepening my technique for writing my own novels. Writing articles and books about those techniques has forced me to solidify my understanding of concepts in ways I doubt I would have done without the opportunity of teaching others. If it creates any cons, it’s probably just the pressure of trying to live up to my advice!

2. How do you balance personal life with your consistent social media presence  and writing? Let me elaborate. Social media and writing are addicting. (especially for moms like me–I have three little ones at home), how do you compartmentalize your life?

I am adamant about not allowing technology—specifically, the Internet—to rule my life. It’s a necessary, and often wonderful tool, but it can easily become a harsh master. Still, that’s easier said than done.

I start by scheduling the time I spend reading or communicating on social media. Then two particular tricks I use to control how much I’m on the Internet are:

• I turn the Internet off at night and leave it off throughout the morning, which is my writing time.
• I keep my phone in a different room and turn it off when I’m trying to concentrate.

3. What about writing do you find as most challenging?

Uh, everything? 🙂 But, seriously, a major Achilles’ heel I continually struggle with is creating authentic antagonistic motivations. Since this is what drives the conflict and the plot, it can cause me no end of trouble. I’ve gotten much better at it, but feel like I have a long way to go.

4. In your experience, what’s the most common mistake new authors make?

I hesitate to call it a mistake, since I think it’s something we all have to learn as we go, but I’d say not recognizing that sound story structure is what makes a story run—especially when you use it to not just construct your plot, but to harmonize character arcs and theme.

5. What’s the coolest thing about calling Nebraska a home? 🙂

I’m actually in Missouri right now. But I miss the West a lot. Right now, what I miss the most, is probably the summers with no humidity. 🙂

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