Author Interview: M.D. Waters
Happy Tuesday, folks! I hope you are having a fantastic week, like I am! Someone may, or may not, have gotten their tax monies back. If said someone DID get said monies; they may, or may not, be fighting a losing battle against a book binge. Allegedly. #ThatsAllImSayin 
Today is not about my, err… “someone’s” fantastical shopping excursions, no no… I am here today to share an interview with you! I got to interview author M.D. Waters about her new book, Archetype! This is so exciting for me! I love talking to authors, and seeing how their minds work!
On to the show! (I mean interview….)
What inspired you to write ARCHETYPE?
The idea for Archetype came from an episodic story I used to tell myself so I could get to sleep at night. I’d forgotten all about it until I woke out of a dead sleep in September of 2011 with lines that eventually became part of my cover blurb and pitch. It was like I literally had this voice in my head yelling these lines at me.
I ran to my computer and typed a couple of pages as the original story came back to me. Unfortunately, that story was better suited for a soap opera, so I made a ton of alterations to the storyline, changed the character names, and presto! I had an interesting story to write.
ARCHETYPE is science-fiction… Do you ever see yourself writing other genres?
Hahaha, funny thing is, I was never a “science-fiction” writer before. All the novels I’ve attempted over the years have been urban or paranormal fantasy. Archetype was a happy accident, and a breath of fresh air.
Who is your favorite author & what do you think draws you to their work?
I couldn’t by any means narrow this answer down to one. I have three that I always turn back to. Karen Marie Moning, because she’s seriously amazing at world building. I’m in awe of her Fever Series. Next is Richelle Mead. I love her ability to make you fall in love with her characters then turn around and do the most unthinkable, heart-wrenching thing you can imagine to them. But in the end, she still manages to make it all better. And finally, my most recent favorite is Margaret Atwood. She writes the most incredible, emotive lines.
It has got to be exciting getting published! What was that journey like for you? Was there a lot of rejection, etc?
The journey was long. So long. I wasted probably 8-9 years winging it before I finally broke down and took some online workshops. I say “took some,” but in truth, I binged. My friends thought I was crazy, but I took probably 3-5 a month for a little over a year.
I wrote Archetype somewhere near the end of that cycle. It took me five weeks to get the story down on paper, and then I did what I wish I’d done all along. I took my time. I spent a month editing and polishing, and then I spent the money on submission coaching with Cathy Yardley. This was truly money well spent.
Five months after I completed my first draft, I was querying agents, and let me tell you, that part did not change for me. I was rejected twenty-eight out of thirty times, and that was pretty near all there was in the list of agents accepting sci-fi submissions (that I was interested in). By the time I was rescued from the JVNLA slush pile three months later, I was contemplating a return to other projects…and trying not to feel discouraged. I knew my novel was worth something, and thanks to the submission coaching, I knew my pitch was good. But timing is everything.
The good news is that I ended up a client of Jennifer Weltz by October, eight months after I finished Archetype, and she sold a two-book deal to Dutton in early December. It’s been nothing but hard work and waiting every since, but I’m loving every second.
Is there a message in your novel that you hope your readers come away with?
I can’t honestly say I intended for there to be a message, but it appears almost everyone turns that last page with something that resonated. As long as everyone closes the book feeling just one strong emotion, any emotion, I’m happy.
What was the hardest part of writing your book? What was the hardest part of getting published?
The hardest part of writing Archetype was keeping the story straight. Looking at it now, it seems to be laid out so seamlessly, but in reality, it was the biggest headache I’ve ever dealt with. It was hard to have Emma in scenes with characters that knew the truth about her past without having them spill everything to her. I needed a motivation down to the smallest of details for multiple characters, and that alone was hard to keep straight. After that, it was hard to keep straight what Emma had learned already versus what I knew as the writer. I’m telling you, it was a crazy-farm up in my head for weeks.
There was no hard part when it came to the publishing part, though. My agent and editor seriously make my life easy. They saw what was missing in my stories (we’ve worked on both Archetype and Prototype now), and they knew just how to spin my wheels so I could make it work. I swear it feels like we’ve been working together for years, it’s that well-oiled.
Do you have any advice for other writers?
Only what they’ve probably heard a million times before. Be patient. Breathe. Don’t give up. If you want it, you can have it, but it takes a lot of dedication, and a lot of hard work. And don’t do it alone. Find other writers, because you’ll need their help and support. Take workshops, because the learning never ends. And be brave enough to claim the title “Writer.”
What are you working on now / what’s next for you?
Next is the long wait for Prototype’s release. I’m lucky to have a 6-month period between releases, otherwise I’d have no idea how I’d survive the wait. I already know what the finished product looks like, but I’m as anxious as everyone else.
But while I wait, I’m still exploring the world I began in Archetype, but with a new heroine. It’s a relief to work with a character who has all of her memories!
And because our readers would LOVE to know: What book are YOU reading right now?
I am slowly making my way through George R.R. Martin’s Game of Thrones series, and it’s really great!
Thank YOU so much for taking the time to talk to us!
| About M.D. Waters |
M.D. Waters lives in Maryland with her husband and two boys. She is a closet Housewives watcher, a wannabe goth-surfer with a side of nunchuck skills, and writes in her pj’s. |
Archetype by M. D. Waters
Release Date: 2014-02-06
Excerpt: Read HERE
Introducing a breathtakingly inventive futuristic suspense novel about one woman who rebels against everything she is told to believe. Emma wakes in a hospital, with no memory of what came before. Her husband, Declan, a powerful, seductive man, provides her with new memories, but her dreams contradict his stories, showing her a past life she can’t believe possible: memories of war, of a camp where girls are trained to be wives, of love for another man. Something inside her tells her not to speak of this, but she does not know why. She only knows she is at war with herself. Suppressing those dreams during daylight hours, Emma lets Declan mold her into a happily married woman and begins to fall in love with him. But the day Noah stands before her, the line between her reality and dreams shatters. In a future where women are a rare commodity, Emma fights for freedom but is held captive by the love of two menone her husband, the other her worst enemy. If only she could remember which is which. . . . The first novel in a two-part series, Archetype heralds the arrival of a truly memorable characterand the talented author who created her.
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