A Visit with Maryann Miller

 A diverse writer of columns, feature stores, short fiction, novels, screenplays and stage plays, Maryann Miller has won numerous awards including a semi-finalist at the Sundance Institute for her screenplay, "A Question of Honor." She also placed in the top 15 percent of entries in the Chesterfield Screenwriting Fellowship with the adaptation of her mystery, "Open Season."

Mayann, why do you write police procedurals? Do you have a background in law enforcement?

No I don’t, but I have always been fascinated by police and crimes and law enforcement. Maybe I am a frustrated cop. I fell in love with the genre when I started reading the 87th Precinct series by Ed McBain, Evan Hunter’s alter ego. I liked the ensemble cast and the way he intertwined the personal and social issues with the cases the detectives were working on.

Tell us about Winsboro.com.

It was actually called WinnsboroToday.com and was an online community magazine. It was in operation for ten years, and we just recently suspended publication. It was a one-person operation and it just became too much for me to try to keep up with and write fiction as well. Since I spent so many years as a journalist, it is hard to give it up entirely. As a fellow journalist, you probably understand that, Jean. I love interviewing people and writing feature stories, but I am also really enjoying the fiction now and have been having some small measure of success with it. So it was time to focus on that.

You write in diverse genres. Which writing form brings you the most pleasure and why?

Now that I am concentrating more on fiction, I am remembering how rewarding it is to create characters and then have them take over a story. And nothing can top the high of a really stellar day when the creative juices are flowing and you finish a scene and smile. Between novels and scripts, I really don’t prefer one over the other. I find some of the same creative satisfactions in both. But screenplays and stageplays can be written much faster than a novel once you have the story planned out. One of my greatest thrills was when one of my plays was staged at a community theatre, and I had the pleasure of directing it. It is hard to describe how I felt as I stood in the back on opening night and saw those characters I had created come to life.

Tell us about your latest release Open Season and your new series featuring Dallas police detective Sarah Kingsly.

Open Season, which actually has two lead characters, Sarah and Angel Johnson, started as a film project when I was active in the film community in Dallas. Alan and Cynthia Mondell, documentary filmmakers, were planning to do their first feature film and wanted the story to incorporate some social issue. They asked me to come up with a story for a possible script, so I started interviewing officers on the Dallas force about the problems of the use of deadly force and racism. That was a big problem in the late 80s in Dallas that got national news attention. I thought it would be interesting to explore that from the viewpoints of two women, one white and one black who are thrown together as unwilling partners. As happens so often in the film industry, the film project didn’t progress, but I still had all that research I had done, so I decided to write the first book. After working with the characters of Sarah and Angel for the whole book, I realized they are strong enough characters to sustain a series. I am pleased that the second book in the series, Stalking Season, just went to contract.

How has writing changed your life?

It hasn’t. I was born a writer. LOL. Seriously, this question always stumps me. Writing has been so much of my life for so long that it is my life in many ways. A good friend once said that writing is not just something we do, it is an integral part of us. Perhaps if I ever get rich and famous, that might change my life. I might buy a bigger ranch.

How do you research your work?

I do a lot of interviewing of police officers, forensics psychiatrists, and other experts for the mystery series. That comes naturally to me because of my background in journalism. I also have a number of books about the judicial system, weapons, federal agencies, and forensics that I refer to. And now with the Internet, if I have a question I can go to one of the search engines and type it in. Invariably, I will find the answer. I also like to call an expert to check on a detail. For instance, in Open Season the victims are garroted with piano wire. I needed to find out whether the police forensics team could determine a particular wire came from a specific piano. So I called several piano tuners to find out what I could about piano strings. The character that Sarah talks to in the book was based on one of the tuners I talked to, and it was such fun to finish that conversation in real time, then turn to my computer and write the scene with Sarah.

What’s the most difficult aspect of writing for you?

The hardest part of writing is when I have been away from the story for a while and the characters are no longer talking to me. I’m not much of a plotter, so if the people are not driving the story, I tend to stall out. That problem, however, is not nearly as challenging as the issue of marketing. I really struggle with that as I am definitely one of those writers who wishes she did not have to spend so much time marketing.

Advice to fledgling writers?

Never give up, even if someone says you should. If you were born a writer, you need to write. I had a college professor tell me to take up basket weaving as a creative outlet. I let that hold me back from attempting publication for many years, but I never stopped writing. My other advice is to read, everything, not just the genre you want to write in. We absorb good writing by reading good writing, and you find that in every genre. And finally, those who succeed are those who continue to write and continue to seek publication.

Thanks for stopping by, Maryann.

Your can visit Maryann at her website: http://www.maryannwrites.com/
and her blogsites: It's Not All Gravy: http://its-not-all-gravy.blogspot.com/ and The Blood Red Pencil: http://bloodredpencil.blogspot.com/2010/01/things-that-drive-editor-crazy.html
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Maryannwrites and Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/maryannwrites)