Author Spotlight: Joanna Marple

We are delighted to introduce author Joanna Marple to the KIDLIT411 community!

Hi Joanna, thank you for agreeing to this interview and for being featured in our AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT!  We've got some really great questions for you, so let's begin!

Were you good at English?

I was good at English, and French, and German, and Spanish, but not very good at Latin! I enjoy language(s) and always have. We had English grammar classes at school and I loved them as much as I loved our creative writing classes. Words - I can’t get enough of them.

When did you decide to become a writer?

During my globetrotting years doing humanitarian work post-college, my monthly hand-written newsletters, sent snail mail, received rave reviews from followers. I thought that I would eventually transform these scribbles into travelogues a la Theroux. But life transported me to a new setting and inspiration. Based on my teaching qualifications, a love of books, and a gift of the gab (as my Irish relatives would say), I talked my way into a job setting up a bilingual K-12 school library at an international school in southern France, and fell soundly in love with picture books again. It was this immersion that catapulted me three years ago into signing up for Emma Walton Hamilton’s Just Write for Kids course, which set me on this fabulous journey.

What are you working on at the moment?

I am working on a contemporary young adult novel about a teen struggling with family addiction and abuse and trying to find his identity and responsibilities in this mess. I am always working on picture books. I have just written one for the very young, where I am playing with internal rhyme and repetition.

For your own reading, do you prefer ebooks or traditional paper/hard back books?

I won a Kindle a year ago and am a happy convert to ebooks. I read novels in all forms, and while if given the choice, I would pick a paperback, as long as I have a book, I really don’t mind. Picture books, however, I still much prefer in hardback format.

Do you let the book stew – leave it for a month and then come back to it to edit?

Yes. I always leave time after completing a manuscript before picking it up again to start the revision process. The longer the book, the longer I leave it.

How do you relax?

Hiking, snowshoeing, kayaking, eating pizza and watching movies with friends, cooking, traveling….

What is your favorite motivational phrase?

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

-Mark Twain

Thank you so much for inviting me on Kidlit411, and I wish you all success with this great new website and resource for writers!

Thank you so much, Joanna for a fascinating interview! 

SNOW GAMES

Joanna's book SNOW GAMES is a beautiful rhyming picture book is available by following the link above.

About Joanna:

After graduating college, Joanna took her guitar and a rucksack of books and t-shirts (to barter for more books) and roved the continents, getting involved with some wonderful people, projects and stories. She never knows where the next adventure will take her. Now she writes to give children the same wings to escape into adventure that she still uses. She is currently living in her eighth nation and on her third continent, in New York City, where she is studying for an MFA in Creative Writing and Literature.