How long have you been a member of NOWW?

I’ve been a member for about fifteen years.
 
What do you normally write?

 I try to write in all genres – everything from standard prose and poetry to experimental forms, to theatrical modes, to song.

Do you have a favourite book or favourite author?

No favourite author. Favourites always get in my way when I want to write. They’re like Facebook and Twitter.

Let’s get to know you a bit better. Tell us a bit about yourself and how you found your way to writing:

I began writing seriously in grade three when I wrote a story about Peter Parrot who flew through a window of the Empire State Building. In grades six through seven I was the class reader – the kid who read novels to the other students for half an hour each Friday so that the teacher could get her grading done. Ideas don’t really come to me; I have to go get them, but that’s more than half the fun. Words of wisdom: ask yourself who your reader is, what’s new about the story you’re telling, and when you’ve finished a piece . . . recognize that you’ve not.

Tell us a bit about your writing and your writing style.

I don’t do one thing at a time. The major emphasis this month has been the editing of a novel, proofing and improving a ten-minute play, assembling poetry for a possible submission, and thinking about new places to send stuff out. I’m constantly googling and doing research on things that interest me (Oh, look! Something shiny!)

Who has inspired and impacted your writing?

I don’t get inspired. I do get competitive. Favourite book? Right now it’s the Swedish/English dictionary, but after I blink, it’ll be something else. I also don’t have favourite writers. Before I start to write, though, I find myself always wondering what people like to read about.

Can we see you at any upcoming NOWW events?

I’ll be at some of the events. Not sure which.

Where can we learn more about you and your writing?

I do have a website, but it’s out of date and goofy.  It was set up to test out a new way of handling high school English education. The best way to find out about me is to say hello.

And to end things off, tell us something surprising about yourself!

I play recorder, banjo, and violin – all of them badly (not so surprising to those who have heard me play) – and I sing.

How long have you been a member of NOWW?
 
I joined NOWW about 3 years ago.
 
What do you normally write?

I’m a speculative fiction writer. That includes science fiction, fantasy, steampunk, sword and sorcery, etc. Anything that involves a great deal of imagination!

Do you have a favourite book or favourite author?
 
Oh, that’s easy. Canadian speculative fiction author Guy Gavriel Kay is my favourite author, and his novel, Lions of al Rassan is my favourite novel of all time.
 
Let’s get to know you a bit better. Tell us a bit about yourself:

I grew up here in Thunder Bay as a quiet, shy, nerdy kid who would rather spend time with books and animals than with people. I studied Zoology at the University of Guelph and worked in the Edinburgh Zoological Gardens in Scotland with lions, tigers and bears (oh my.) I have three dogs, three cats, three kids, one horse and one husband, and while I am still nerdy, I’m not nearly so shy or quiet anymore. And while I still enjoy spending time with animals, now the friends I do prefer are all Foxes!

Tell us a bit about your writing:
 
I have been writing since I was in kindergarten and actually finished my first novel at the age of 11. I’m also an artist and I pencilled my way through university with the help of DC Comics. While I have had a New York agent and a book contract, I prefer the life of an indie author. I think it must be the freedom and self-control that I find in that field and if you look for it, you will find freedom is a recurring theme in my work. Whether it’s freedom from prejudice or freedom from societal rules, or simply freedom to be oneself, I think all of my characters are searching for freedom in some form or another.
 
What are your favourite things or some of your inspirations?

I love classical music, and I’ll often find myself turning to music when I’m stuck writing a scene, or missing a crucial character point. I also read the works of Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Arthur Conan Doyle, etc. when I was quite young, and I think their influence is evident in my work. For me, it is always about the ‘what if’, so I find inspiration in almost everything, as long as I can take it and turn it on its head. ‘What if insanity was simply seeing into other dimensions?’ or ‘What if scientists spliced the DNA of humans with that of big cats?’ or ‘What if Black Beauty was a War Dragon?’ That kind of thing.

Can we see you at any upcoming NOWW events?
 
My friend Jean E. Pendziwol and I will be running a NOWW workshop on April 29 called “The Business of Writing” and we’ll also be taking that same workshop to Dryden in May. I do love the Write NOWW events – informal, social yet informative at the same time.
 
How can others learn more about you?
 
I’ve written seven books to date and I’m working hard now on the eighth. The books are available at Chapters/Coles and on Amazon. I do have a fun website – www.hleightondickson.com, am very active on Facebook at www.facebook.com/HLeightonDickson and I do tweet, but I don’t understand why.;
@hdickson62. I’m not a terribly prolific blogger. I prefer to write epic novels with fantastical word counts.
 
And to end things off, tell us something surprising about yourself!
 
I have been chased by a lion. True story.

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As a re-emerging writer with a day job, I have never considered writing as an industry. Writing has always been for me a necessary form of self-expression, an exploration of self and other, a way of understanding and placing myself in the world.  I had signed up for the Northern Ontario Writers Workshop event entitled, the “Business of Writing” more out of curiosity than a burning intention to earn a living from or even to publish the products of my imagination (read: in-progress).  As I battled my way through the remnants of Friday’s snow storm toward the Mary J. Black library, I second guessed my reasons for attending the event.  But upon arrival, I quickly found a welcoming group of self-proclaimed introverts, who I later learned meet writer-type crises with supportive conversation over glasses of wine and hot-tubbing. Suffice it to say, I felt I had found my place in the world!

Quite beyond the quiet satisfaction of finding myself among a group of peers with a common interest in writing (and maybe more importantly, reading), the workshop itself was a welcome surprise. It was facilitated by two local authors – Jean E. Pendziwol and H. Leighton Dickson – one a renowned children’s author turned “upmarket” novelist, the other a former zoologist turned fantasy writer, and each with a distinct journey to becoming published authors.

The title, “The Business of Writing” could be construed as a controversial one. After all, isn’t writing an act of pure creativity, an art form born of the desire or necessity to communicate? To quote Virginia Woolf, “Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind, is written large in his works”. Does that sound like a business to you?