.png)
ALL WRITTEN AND ARTWORK ARE THE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY OF PSG LOPES. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, 2018.
Q: When did you start writing? Have you always wanted to be a writer?
A: This is a difficult question to answer because there are so many layers to it. Let me start by saying that I have been writing for as long as I can remember. Being an awkward little girl, growing into an awkward woman, in terms of being shy and never feeling pretty and adequate, I have always found writing to be a means of escape. It was my way of coping with the cruelties of the world and writing comforted me through some very difficult times. I had gone to college undergrad and worked on my masters and Ph.D. in disciplines that have nothing to do with writing or literature in general. What is so amusing is that I hated reading as a child. I always found it to be boring and that is because the required readings in school were always boring so I always associated reading with being bored because my teacher’s reading choices were always lackluster and failed to spark any interest. It was a little different in high school. I had several eccentric English teachers that inspired me to love reading and helped to polish my writing. I continued to write for myself over the years. It was once again a means of escape and a coping mechanism to handle stress and whatever sadness was lingering around me. As an adult, I love reading and love writing and decided this was the perfect time to start writing. I started officially in September 2016 and have been the happiest I have ever been in my life. Since I have started, I independently published 2 major works: Dark Musings Poetry Anthology: Volume 1 and A Wynter’s Tale. One is my first poetry anthology and the second is my contemporary fiction novella. I am currently working on my next poetry anthology, which I am anticipating a release date of mid-April 2017 and my second novella, John of Art, which I am hoping to release in June 2017. I have also applied for several contests and writing residencies that I am hoping to get in the near future. I am very excited about the prospects that lie ahead for me. I feel that I can only go up from here!
Q: You started out as an erotica writer. I noticed that you are phasing out your erotica writing. Is there a particular reason you switched genres? Do you have any plans to write any more?
A: When I started in September 2016, I wanted to write erotica short stories thinking that was a quick road to be noticed and to make quick money. It was a fool’s errand and I realized quick that you don’t get to any destination quickly. Everything in life has to be earned. Slow and steady wins the race, as I always say! I decided to phase out the erotica for several reasons. As I was writing each month, since I started, I was trying to find my writer’s voice. It just didn’t come to me writing erotica. I didn’t enjoy what I was doing and I felt like a writing mill. It wasn’t organic and there were only so many ways you can describe sexual encounters. I wasn’t challenged and it was boring. My main goal for 2017 was to re-brand and completely eliminate the erotica by March 2017. I also have an editor now and I went back reading a few of those erotica stores and YOWZA! LOL! I have come quite a long way since I started just six short months ago! I am loving what I am doing now. I have tons of ideas for future stuff and the sky is the limit of my writing capabilities and inspirations.
Q: Describe your inspiration for Dark Musings Poetry Anthology: Volume 1. Were there any poems written about real people, or are your poems just generic?
A: I have always been a poet for as long as I can remember. I remember as a little girl enjoying the poetry of Shel Silverstein and then as a young adult enjoying adult poetry like Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Frost, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, and Shakespeare’s sonnets. I adore love poems, as generic as that sounds. Pain and suffering are easily depicted in poetry. I love the color and the language and the rhyme. It is therapy to me, writing poetry. Each and every poem, song lyric, and free verse is about someone or some experience I have had in the past. I think it is the greatest honor or greatest slight to dedicate a poem to someone depending on its content. The happy ones are obviously the honor and the ones meant to wound are the slights. I have dealt with a lot of sorrow and hardship in my life and I find that poetry is just a way to figuratively cry on paper basically. You let yourself bleed onto the paper as you write and you come out stronger because you aren’t holding onto any of that bad stuff in anymore. No matter the subject matter it is the strongest form of expression that I know of and one that I have been using as a means to heal for as long as I can remember. Volume 1 is really a culmination of the good, the bad, the ugly. It was what I have been feeling for years and it was about rejection, heartache, rediscovering myself and rebirth. I learned so much through this journey creating Volume 1. I am currently working on Volume 2 and I am so thrilled with how things are coming along so far! I am eager to present this work to you all!
Q: Speaking of Volume 2, when is that coming out and what does Volume 2 focus on? How will that be different from Volume 1? What themes are you addressing in Volume 2?
A: I don’t like to talk about works that haven’t been published yet. All I will say is that Volume 2 comes out mid-April 2017 and will feature my own cover art and illustrations throughout the book. I am excited to switch things up a bit and make it a really interesting piece for all to enjoy. Norman Mailer once said that a writer never talks about what he or she is writing before it is published. A writer’s work is like an affair that you keep secret until you are ready to have it discovered. That is exactly how I feel about writing. It is my own personal affair between myself and my characters and I don’t want to reveal anything about it until I absolutely have to. All I know is that I think Volume 2 shows real growth and change in my writing style. I was braver and bolder and I feel that my readers will take to it and any true lover of poetry will enjoy the adventure!
Q: Who does the artwork for your writing? I noticed that you have changed since you started writing going from generic covers to having crafted covers. Who does that work for you?
A: I do all of my own cover art. I have taken an interest in photography since I started writing full time and I have also taken an interest in digital art. The only exception is my brand logo for The Moonlit Goddess, one picture of a peacock I used for a poem I wrote and some filigree bordering I am using for Volume 2. The brand logo for The Moonlit Goddess was created by my younger brother who is a freelance graphic designer. He is an amazing talent and incredibly supportive and patient with me and helped me get my brand off the ground in early September 2016. I was at my lowest then. His support meant so much to me especially when I was doubting my abilities as a human being. My mother, sister, and younger brother gave me the strength and perseverance to keep going and keep fighting. My younger brother also helped me create the filigree border that I am using for Dark Musings Volume 2. My sister was the one who took the picture of the peacock when we went to the Bronx Zoo a few years back. I wrote the poem and thought to myself, “Where the heck am I going to get a picture of a peacock?” Then I remembered she had taken the picture and asked her if I could use it. She gave me her blessing then I filtered the pic and made it the version that you see on my Red Bubble Cover Art Merchandise Shop! The rest of the cover art you see in all of my writings and all of the illustrations you will see in Volume 2 are all of my own creation. All of the Red Bubble Cover Art Merchandise is all my own personal designs. I took the photos and manipulated them and filtered them to the designs that you see! Feel free to check out my Red Bubble Cover Art Merchandise Shop! There are always good sales and fun items for sale. I absolutely adore this outlet of expression! I like to alternate between working on my art pieces and my writing. It has been a very cathartic and a marvelous journey of self. Check out my designs here: The Moonlit Goddess Red Bubble Cover Art Merchandise Shop
Q: Tell me a little about your inspiration for your novella, A Wynter’s Tale. Why the cover choice? Where did you get the idea from?
A: Since phasing out the erotica, I wanted to create another writing line aside from the Dark Musings poetry line to expand my brand a bit so I created Seasons of Change. I wanted that to be my novella line. I wanted to use the idea of writing novellas as a vehicle to writing bigger stuff like full-fledged novels. I don’t regret starting out writing erotica because that helped me shape my writing a lot better. I went from writing in an academic capacity for years working on my master’s degree and Ph.D. It took me months to get out of that stiff mode of writing and to loosen up and to write for leisure and to write things that people actually wanted to read. With the Seasons of Change, they each focus on one season in each novella. They are all contemporary fiction. I no longer write erotica. There may be some elements of romance, but there are no explicit scenes. There is a fair amount of cursing and may include violence, but I purposely removed any sexual content out of my novella line. I no longer want to be associated with that genre. Not that there is anything wrong with it. I commend other writers in that genre, but as I mentioned before, that is not something I want to do anymore. I want to make my writing more accessible to a broader audience. I want more people to read my writing and this was the best way that I knew how. As for the inspiration, it kind of just came to me. I have a journal where I write my ideas down. I had been toying with the title, A Wynter’s Tale, first. It is a play on the poem by D.H. Lawrence, “A Winter’s Tale,” that I have always loved. I played with the title and the cover art first. The cover art is actually of my own backyard during a blizzard a few years back. That gave me the inspiration to come up with the winter theme and my character Wynn. I loved writing that novella so much. It took me two weeks to write that, but a month and a half to edit. It was a great journey. I loved every moment of it.
Q: Tell me what other projects you have planned after Dark Musings Poetry Anthology: Volume 2.
A: Right after Dark Musings Poetry Anthology: Volume 2 is released, I am going to dive right into my second novella, John of Art. I have the outline of that already done and I know exactly what I will be writing for that one. I have 2 other poetry anthologies coming out in 2017 and maybe one other novella for the year. Then I am going to switch gears a bit in 2018 further expanding The Moonlit Goddess writing line. I am excited to continue building my writing resume and look forward to having you all read my stuff!
Q: Who is The Moonlit Goddess? Where did you come up with that name?
A: That was a name I have been toying with since 2009. I have been wanting a writing line for years but was much too busy to fully pursue it until now. I had originally wanted to split up my writing line between two names. I would have The Moonlit Goddess as my mainstream writing line and Hellbound Goddesses as my erotica writing line. But it didn’t work out that way for one reason or another. I didn’t want there to be any confusion and I also didn’t want to create more than one brand logo. I thought that would be too complicated and wanted a one-stop-shop for readers to access my writing. I think it came out exceptionally well and I am happy with how things turned out.
Q: Is your writing available in other places other than Amazon? And if so where can they be located?
A: At the moment, my writing is only available through Amazon. It isn’t out of laziness. I am a big believer in being consistent and reliable. I didn’t want to flip flop and go to several different websites and have all of these links confusing potential readers who might be interested in my work. If people can trust and rely on me always being on Amazon then they may feel more inclined to read my work. That is at least my take on it.
Q: What other plans do you have in the future, aside from the writing?
A: Aside from novellas and poetry writing, I also do several writing contests and am applying for several writing residencies. I want to expand my writing line in 2018. I want to dabble in horror writing and also write my first full novel in 2018. Also, in 2018 I have ideas to write two children’s books. So I have a lot on my plate right now. There is a lot of exciting stuff going on with my writing. I am certainly ambitious and have material to write for years to come. The thing that troubles me about it is being able to continue funding the venture. I am living one day at a time and trying hard not to think too much about that yet, but it is definitely weighing heavily in the back of my mind. For now, I am okay and I am not taking the time for granted and writing as much as I can.
Well, that is it for my Q&A session for now! I hope that you all enjoyed learning a little bit more about PSG Lopes, AKA The Moonlit Goddess!
Comments