Interview With Author Joel Shoemaker
Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’ve had three books published and I’ve written at least three others that may or may not see the light of day. 🙂
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
SILAS ON SUNDAYS is a picture book that follows a gender-nonconforming child to church. My first work, bacon grief, is one of the only works of fiction for teens and tweens to celebrate and affirm BOTH faith and sexuality and I was inspired to try to do something similar in the picture book space.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Not really, except I don’t write every day. I just write when I find that I have something to say and compose it in my mind a lot first, while I’m mowing the lawn or doing something like that. If I do these things like I normally do, then the actual writing happens relatively quickly for me, which I like.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
What are you working on now?
I am trying to revise a murder mystery for teens composed entirely in text messages and other ephemera. I think it works and I think it’s neat but…who really knows!
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I try to promote on all of my social media but honestly probably Instagram has provided the most luck so far!
Do you have any advice for new authors?
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
The same advice we’ve all heard, write what you know, in combination with write the books you want to see on the shelves – someone MUCH more eloquently said this but it’s really true.
What are you reading now?
Tomi Adeyemi’s CHILDREN OF ANARCHY AND ANGUISH and whatever Booklist sends me to review. 🙂
What’s next for you as a writer?
I’m just going to keep writing as I am inspired to do so. I don’t really have a schedule in mind, but I am hoping that my picture book is successful enough to warrant a sequel or two. 🙂
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
FIGHT CLUB and RANT, both by Chuck Palahniuk. Chelsea Cain’s HEARTSICK. And, if I get a fourth, Tomi Adeyemi’s newest, CHILDREN OF ANARCHY AND ANGUISH because I haven’t finished it yet AND I MUST! 😀
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Joel Shoemaker’s Social Media Links
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