Hanna Jameson Q&A

Hanna Jameson is an author I discovered by accident, getting sent a copy of her novel Road Kill by one of the review services I use. I loved the book (you can read my review here: https://bit.ly/2HAUu6d) and quickly ordered the previous two titles in the series. Her latest novel The Last (which I review here:https://bit.ly/2UlBmdD) is a standalone, a post-apocalypse novel set in a Swiss hotel. Having been impressed by everything she’s written, I was keen to get her takeon the craft of writing.

How do you get your ideas? What’s the process and how do they go from vague inspiration to fully fleshed out notions?

I usually get an idea for either a scene or a character. I mull it over for weeks, sometimes months, letting it fill my head like a movie trailer, letting scenes come to me, moments of drama. I think about it before I go to sleep, when I listen to music, all the time. Eventually, something happens - I couldn’t tell you what, it can be anything - that causes the entire framework of a novel to fall into place, and suddenly I know exactly what I’m writing. Then I start. I can’t tell you the specifics of anything. It’s a process that I have to trust but it’s all intangible and emotional.

With The Last, what originally led you to want to write a post-apocalypse/dystopian novel? 

Our current political scape, nuclear war jokes on Twitter, a way to process my own feelings about where humanity is headed. I have also always loved JG Ballard, and his influence weighs heavily upon The Last. I love how he explores the idea of disaster as a catalyst for personal liberation and renewal, as well as chaos and collapse.

Tell me about the research that goes into your writing?

The level of research obviously depends on the project. I did some research into the effects of nuclear war for The Last, but the main disclaimer was that it had never happened before, so nothing could be certain. Contrast that with the research I’ve been doing for a TV project (historical drama), which has taken years of reading, a lot of help from an actual historian, and a few forays into archives.

Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I like to know the main beats of a scene, or a story, but if I plan too much or know too much in advance I get bored of the whole process and it doesn’t allow for that magic that sometimes happens at the page when you let characters run with it. I’m a pantser, I guess.

How do you make sure you don’t go off on wild tangents? 

The wild tangents are often what turns a story I like into a story I love, in what I watch, read, and write. The tangents are often what makes me care.

Tell me about your writing, do you write full time?

I do now, but it took me four books and over five years. I’m very lucky.

When is your most productive period of the day?

Annoyingly, between about 10pm and 2am. It can vary. But I am definitely not a morning person. I am barely functional before midday.

Is any part of your writing biographical or are any of that characters inspired by real people? 

I have experience in basing characters on real people for screen. It’s extremely challenging, and can easily result in that character becoming 2D, or a caricature. For characters in my novelsIoften borrow mannerisms, comments, outlines, even cool names, from everything and everyone I see around me. But in the context of the book, they have to be their own people or they don’t feel real to me.

The Last is a step change from your Underground series of novels. Road Kill ended with kind of a cliff hanger and I certainly could imagine the story continuing. Do you plan on returning to the series?

I loved those characters and originally saw the series as being five or six novels, so we’ll see.

One thing I like about your writing is how urban myth and hints of the supernatural are intertwined within the narratives, what attracts you to these types of stories?

I’m a collector of weird occurrences, paranormal incidents, ghost stories, folklore. I’m obsessed with them. If anyone were to meet me and tell me a weird story that happened to them, I’ll talk to them about it all evening. There is so much more to the world and to life than we can ever know or understand, and I love to explore that.

What other writing projects are you currently working on or have planned? 

I’m working on a TV show, which is a historical drama. I’m also working on another novel of a similar mix of genres.

Some writers get published with their first attempt at a novel (even if it takes years of changes) others have aborted previous attempts. Was Something You Are the first novel you tried to write?

No. I wrote my first full-length manuscript when I was 15. The concept was good but the execution - obviously - was not. I never sent it out. It was a crime-thriller though, like my first published novel. That first draft I wrote at 17, a couple of years later.

Tell me a little about your journey to success, how did you secure that all important agent and first publishing deal?

A lot of hard work and then a few quite stunning interventions from luck. I didn’t go to uni at first, resolving to work full-time out of college and focus on getting published instead. I spent three years sending that novel out and it was rejected by everyone. I redrafted it just before I applied to uni, but had given up on sending it out. I went to a gig in London (The Darkness) with a guy, and then to the aftershow party. The guy I was with got too drunk, so I took him for a sit down in the corner. We ended up sitting next to a friend of his, who worked at a literary agency. We talked for about five minutes. I sent a submission to her but - PLOT TWIST - she was on holiday when it arrived and it went into the slush pile, where - ANOTHER PLOT TWIST - a work experience student picked it out. I received a call from my first agent a few days later. An absurd story.

Finally, I’m going to shamelessly poach two questions the author Mark Hill (author of His First Lie and It Was Her) used to put to writers on his blog. Like me, Mark was a book blogger before he became a successful author and I like to think that the answers to these questions helped him glean valuable insight for his own writing. Certainly, reading them on his blog helped me. So here goes:

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

I don’t think I’ve ever been asked this question before. Cool! It doesn’t get easier. You can learn to be more disciplined with your routine and you can get better at self-editing and stretching and remembering to exercise but the writing itself doesn’t get easier. With every new book, I think (delude myself) that it will. Then I have my regularly scheduled meltdown at 10,000 words, and then I continue to have them approximately every 20,000 words after that. I think I’ll never write again. I’ll think I’ve had my last idea. I’ll cry, a lot, and then turn up at the page the next day to put words down. It’s the same every time. It doesn’t get easier. It’s always so, so hard. There are no instant gratifications with writing books. Books hate you.

Give me some advice about writing?

Finish your shit. Sit down and finish it. There is no workaround, there are no writing tips, no hacks that are gonna help you avoid this. Just sit down, start it, and finish it. Also, coffee.

Also, befriend other writers to talk about writing with. No one else gets it.