How would you characterize the influence of your YWW experience in your life?
Fairly huge. Aside from meeting some lifelong friends there, it made me feel like less of a weirdo for being a writer by putting me in close proximity to so many other creative, interesting people who wanted to do the same thing I did. It made having a career as a writer seem possible.
What’s the best advice you can give a Young Writer (in general or in your specific genre)?
Write every day. Show your work to other people and take criticism gracefully. Don’t worry about getting published yet. Don’t worry about whether your writing sucks; everyone worries about that, even professionals. It will get better!
What do you find yourself most often reading or listening to lately and why?
A lot of non-fiction, because I’m writing something that takes place in the past and I want to give it a realistic texture, and also quite a bit of young adult lit, because apparently I am a young adult writer now – that’s where barnes and noble decided to shelve my first novel, and thus I became a YA writer – but luckily I like the genre a lot, and the other YA writers I’ve met are all absolutely charming, intelligent, and unpretentious people.