Anna's Goodreads Q&A

You can ask Anna questions about Learning Not to Drown on Goodreads here. There are two questions on there so far:



Your book was really great! Will you write an another book ? 

Anna Shinoda: Thank you! I am currently working on another young adult novel. I don't like to rush the creative process, so it may take me a while to complete a draft that I am happy enough with to show my agent. For now, I am slowly working away at it. Don't worry - I promise it won't take me ten years to write this book!

While writing your book did you ever sketch or draw your characters to help visualize or describe them?

Anna Shinoda: I did not. I can draw decently when I have a model to look at, but I'm not that great at sketching things from my imagination.

I had a vivid visual in my mind as to what each of my characters looked like, but since incarceration can affect families regardless of their race or economic status, I wanted to leave room for the readers to fill in some of those details. Of course, some visual clues are necessary.

Sometimes from draft to draft, these visuals need to change. For example: blond hair on Mandy was too stereotypical. When I decided to change it, I realized making her a brunette would be potentially too similar to Clare, so I went with auburn hair. With enough of those types of little tweaks, I was having a hard time remembering what had changed draft to draft. I had to read through the entire novel in order to create a cheat sheet, with the characters' names, descriptions, hobbies, etc. Now when I'm writing I add that information in a notebook as I work.