INTERVIEW: Author Megan Crewe

Today I have the wonderful pleasure of welcoming author Megan Crewe. She is the author of Give Up The Ghost.  Let's give her a warm, huge welcome and see what she had to say!

To start off, welcome and can you tell the readers a little about yourself?

I'm Canadian, and have lived here in Toronto all of my life.  My parents are both avid readers, so I thank them for my love of books and story-telling.  I'm also an animal-lover: right now I have three cats (just got a new kitten!) and in the past I've owned ferrets, mice, hamsters, and fish.

Can you tell us a little about your upcoming or latest release?

GIVE UP THE GHOST is about a high school outcast who can talk to the dead, and uses the secrets her ghostly friends dig up to expose her fellow students' wrong-doings. But then the popular student council V.P. discovers *her* secret, and, to her surprise, asks her for help...

I am a fly on your wall.  What would I report back to my master of the daily grind of Megan Crewe?

I don't have to leave the house for my day job until mid-afternoon, so I'm generally in pajamas all morning.  And I'm not "allowed" to turn on my desktop computer to get online until after I've done my morning's writing on the computer.  :)

When you are not writing, what kind of books do you like to read? Do you have any favorite authors that are must reads?

I try to read a variety of genres, both because I enjoy lots of different types of stories, and because I think it's useful as a writer to see techniques and get ideas from books that are different from what I usually write.  I read a lot of young adult fiction, of course--mostly paranormal, fantasy, and SF, but some realistic stuff as well; some adult fiction of all sorts; and the occasional book for younger readers.  What's most important to me is a story that pulls me in and characters I care about, and as long as a book has those things, I'm happy regardless of genre!

A few of my favorite YA authors are E. Lockhart, Megan Whalen Turner, Diana Wynne Jones, and Monica Hughes.  Adult faves include Connie Willis, Lois McMaster Bujold, Terry Pratchett, and Daphne du Maurier.

What are 3 things that are "must haves" for you when you sit down to write a new book?

I must have an outline, to give me a sense of where I'm going and how I'm going to get there (though I always veer off here and there).  I must have my laptop, because for some reason I find it much easier to write on that than on my desktop computer.  Because it feels more like a notebook, I think.  And I must have a sense of why this story is important to me.  If I haven't found the heart of the story, I can't write it properly, no matter how exciting the idea might be.

Do you have a blog or website that your readers can keep up with you and your books?  Twitter?

I do!  My website is megancrewe.com, and you can find my blog at megancrewe.com/blog.  My twitter username is megancrewe, which makes me easy to find.  :)

Now for some fun stuff:

1. What came first--the chicken or the egg?
The egg--fish were laying them before there were any chickens!

2. Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?
It does, there's just so much of it it can't all stick.

3. If you choke a Smurf, what color do they turn?
Purple!

4. If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a song about him?
Maybe he wrote it?

Favorite perfume: Tulzscha by Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab
Favorite TV show: Monty Python's Flying Circus
Favorite Movie: The Princess Bride
Favorite Drink: Dr. Pepper
Favorite Dessert: Black Forest Cake

Thanks for joining us on My Overstuffed Bookshelf!!

Thank you for having me!