Author Profile: Jude Willhoff
Article in PikeSpeak Romance
Writers Newsmagazine
by Michelle Major
1. Where
are you from?
I grew up on a farm near Waynesville,
Missouri, a small town in the Ozarks. However,
I am a Colorado transplant. I've lived
somewhere in the state for the past thirty-three years.
Colorado is home!
2. When
did your passion for writing begin?
The day I learned to print my
name. There was just something about those
fresh clean sheets of paper in my Big Chief writing tablet.
When I was younger, I always kept a diary.
Then in high school I was a cheerleader and my journalism teacher assigned
me the task of writing for the school newspaper—covering sports and I loved it.
3. Tell us
your latest news/current projects.
My latest news: I've been asked by a nonprofit
organization—Connections for the Human Spirit—to go on an International book
tour, all expenses paid, with them to Sweden, Yugoslavia, and Europe telling my story
about living with chronic pain, arachnoiditis and a spinal cord implant, and selling my
book, Living Well with Chronic Pain. Also,
I have three TV talk shows, two radio interviews and 15 booksignings set for 2005 and
that's just the beginning. It's been quite an
exciting time since the Tattered Cover picked up my books last month.
Currently, I'm promoting my two
nonfiction books, Living Well with Chronic Pain and Interviews with Your
Favorite Romance Authors, doing booksignings, TV talk shows, radio interviews, all
while working on three other writing projects. Thank
goodness I've always been good at multitasking. Here
are my current projects:
1.) Contemporary romance: No Place Like Home, working on requested
revisions for Victoria Curran, a Harlequin Superromance editor.
2.) Contemporary Romance: Happily Ever After—Interrupted, work
in progress for third book in series.
3.) Nonfiction work in progress: Networking...you never know where it will take you.
4.) What is
your work schedule like when you're writing? Do you have certain tricks you use so
you don't stray from your writing?
When
I'm not working with my husband and our real estate investments (my other life), I like to
write in the early morning or until about noon. I
do promotion/marketing stuff in the afternoons. My
trick is that I reward myself with checking my email after I've written. I'm usually a very focused, organized, goal
oriented person when it comes to my writing career and don't tend to stray.
5.) How do
you come up with ideas for your writing and why do you choose some over others?
Ideas are everywhere, all around
us when you open up your ears and listen. I
like to write about things that touch my heart and have happy endings.
6.) If you
get rejection letters or struggle with writer's block, what inspires you to keep writing?
I don't believe in writer's
block. You can't wait for inspiration, you
have to go out and beat it with a club. Keep
writing on a daily schedule, even if it's only one page a day. Even if it's trash.
Rejection letters??? LOL. I'm the queen of rejection letters. It took me 127 rejection letters to get my first
agent. Currently, I'm looking for another
agent, but you have to remember rejection letters are just a stepping stone to a yes, like
in sales, you have to go through so many no's to get to a YES. Persistence is the name of the game!
7.) What, in
your opinion, are the most important elements of a good story?
It
depends on the story. Sometimes it's plot and
sometimes it's the characters. I like
characters that are three dimensional. The
challenge is coming up with some dynamite situation—terrible trouble—for the
character, so readers will stay with him or her throughout the book. There's nothing
that feels quite as good as settling in and getting lost in a page turner.
8.) Where do you
hope to take your writing in the future?
Right
now my nonfiction writing is taking me places I never dreamed I'd be going. I never imagined people would be contacting me to
be on TV talk shows or going on an International book tour.
I plan to keep writing fiction and nonfiction and where ever these books
take me, I will be thankful and enjoy the ride because I'm doing what I love—writing.
9.) Would
you share one of your interesting writing quirks?
The
muse keeps waking me up at two a.m. and won't let me go back to sleep until I get up and
write what's running through my mind. And
these days I have lots going on in my head on all three projects. Lately, I've been writing from two to four and
going back to bed. I think I need to get a new
internal clock. My husband thinks I've lost my
mind, but he loves me anyway. I just tell him
it's the muse and he says to tell it to come during the day...if only.
10.) What are
you reading now?
A Superromance titled The
Unknown Daughter by Anna Destefano, a 2003 Golden Heart winner. My goal is to one day write for Superromance so I
read as many of these as I can get my hands on.
11.) Who
are your favorite authors, and why do they inspire you?
There
are so many. Jennifer Crusie, Debbie Macomber,
Sandra Brown, Suzanne Brockmann, Deb Stover, Nora Roberts, Pam McCutcheon, Joan Johnston,
Stephanie Bond and Judith Arnold just to name a few. I
read lots of authors. However, these authors
inspire me because they are smart, savvy, talented women who take the time to give back to
those of us coming up through the ranks. They
aren't afraid to share their knowledge and are always there for me. I want to be like them when I grow up!
12.)
When you're not writing or working, what are your favorite ways to have fun
and relax?
Doing
things with my honey and I love taking my three granddaughters, age 6,7, 8, to the movies. They have a movie night with Nana (me) once a
month. And now they want to be authors, too. They write me books with a beginning, middle and an
end in the proper format and I pay them $1 per book.
They cut two pages of paper into eight pieces, staple the edges and
have a blank book. Then they write the front
cover, story and back cover. They draw
pictures, color them and tell their stories and these little books are treasures to me. And they have fun and all three tell me they want
to be writers when they grow up. Who knows,
but it's good for their creative mind and they enjoy it.
13.) What
do you find romantic in real life?
My
honey! We've been married for over
thirty-three years and we still hold hands and laugh at the crazy things in life. When funny things happen in a mall, movie or
anywhere, we don't even have to talk, because we know what the other is thinking. It's a good thing.
14.) If
you had the opportunity to meet and talk to any single person, just once (past or
present), who would it be, and why?
Our lives have all been touched
and challenged by various people and it's hard to narrow it down to just one, but I would
like to meet Bob Dylan. I've listened to his
music for a long time and the man paints such vivid pictures with the words in his songs. He fascinates me.
However, most of the time, if there's someone I want to meet in the romance
writing industry, I arrange a way through networking to meet them. I've learned not to be shy in this business. As a little old lady once told me, the squeaky
wheel gets the grease so I usually squeak a lot. ..just ask my critique group.
15.) What
words of wisdom would you offer to other writers?
Believe
in yourself and never give up! Learn the craft
and keep learning the craft, network with other writers and be persistent. And remember writers get only what they deserve so
celebrate every single success! Publishing
houses aren't motivated by friendship or favoritism. They
are motivated by who can make them the most money, period.
Write the best book you can write and keep at it until you are where you
want to be in the industry. The quotes I have
by my computer: "Detach and
Trust—The Universe is Just" and "Never, Never, Never Quit" —
Winston Churchill |
