Marta Moran Bishop walks in the shoes of her characters and weaves the tapestry of their lives with the threads of her dreams.
Her first book, Wee Three: A Mothers Love In Verse, a children’s poetry book, illustrated by Hazel Mitchell, was a collaborative effort and a labor of love. She took the short, sweet verses her grandmother wrote in the nineteen thirties for her children and expanded those and added additional verses of her own.
Ms. Bishop, is a prolific and versatile writer, writing in multiple genres, while continuing to stretch herself and her craft.
Her series The Divide: Darkness Descend (book 1) and The Between Times (book 2) tell the story of a bleak world, where society consists of the poor and the rich and the poor live in squalor, with only a prophecy for hope of a better future. It has a touch of paranormal within its pages. She is currently working on Book 3 in the series.
She has written three adult poetry books and a variety of fantasy and paranormal stories. A few of them are stories that her mother wrote over forty years ago and she finished while others are new and vibrant stories.
Her novel Dinky: The Nurse Mare's Foal won an award at the EQUUS Film Festival, it is written first person horse, and is the story of the first year of her rescue foals' life. She also wrote the story of Dinky's mother's plight, and what a nurse mares' life is like, and what they usually end up facing, when they are no longer able to breed, and be rented to nurse another's foal.
Ms. Bishop has taken many of the stories her mother, and sister wrote and finishing them.
She currently lives on a small farm in New England with her husband, three horses, cats and a conure parrot named Jack. They help her remember to view the world through a child's innocence and keep her young and imaginative.
My grandmother wrote poetry for her children, my mother wrote stories all her life, when my mother was dying one of my sisters brought in an old notebook of poetry my grandmother had written in the nineteen-thirties for her children. It was written from the child’s point of view and precious. After she passed away I inherited the notebook, and first decided to publish it just as it was with her simple poems and drawings, but they didn’t appear to all be finished. So I took on her voice and continued most of the poems, leaving a few that were hers alone. Most were a combination of both of us. I also added some poetry from my own childhood to the book and hired an illustrator. Wee Three: A Mother’s Love in Verse was born.
After that my husband and I, who had two horses, adopted a rescue foal at four months old. As I watched him and knew that in the horse world he was considered ‘junk’ I started writing the story of the first year of his life told through his eyes. The beginning is from research, but the rest is about events I witnessed and told as it appeared to me he was living them. Dinky: The Nurse Mare’s Foal won awards and is a heartfelt story of what animals experience. During the writing of Dinky’s book, the characters in The Between Times started screaming at me and their world opened up to me as I put it down on paper. It was during this period that I knew I was and always would be a writer.
Did you have any influencing writers growing up?
My Grandmother, (who died before I was born) and my mother who wrote all her life.
Are any of your characters based on people in real life?
Only Dinky’s and Keeping the Upper Paw: A Cat’s Guide to Training your Human (which my mother and I had begun while I was her caretaker.)
Where do you draw your book inspirations from?
My mind works in odd ways, sometimes (such as in The Between Times) bits of things I have heard or read in the newspapers seem to come together all at once as if the puzzle was putting itself together.
But my inspiration is drawn from everything I see or hear. From the ether so to speak, and the characters start talking to me. Most times I do not know what they are doing or going to do until after the story is written.
Do you use have a basic outline when starting a new story or do you let the characters lead the way?
Outlines don’t usually work for me, sometimes I will see a partial path or as in Dinky’s book, I know the basic ending. But the characters always lead me down a merry path.
When you are picturing the characters in your book, do you have a cheater photo for inspiration?
I have no cheater photo, the characters tell me what they look like. Sometimes I think they are from somewhere else (another time, another place or another world.)
Many people read as a form of escape and relaxation. What is your favorite way to sit back and relax?
I relax by reading, writing, brushing and playing with my horses, meditation, taking walks, painting, even doing the dishes can be relaxing.
Who are your favorite current authors to read?
Uvi Poznansky, Casi McClean, Linnea Tanner, Kathleen Harryman, Dellani Oakes, Viv Drewa, Karen Vaughan, Robert Walker, Robert Whitehill, James Rollins, Kathi Goldwyn for current.
What are your favorite books by others?
Oh Geez, there are so many and it depends on what my mood for a genre is at the time.
Do the locations in the stories have any meaning to you?
In my stories, yes. The Divide Series (Darkness Descends, The Between Times, and the Sequel Dawn Rises) are set in Chicago where I grew up.
Dinky’s book at our home in MA.
The Choosing (a pre-historical novella) in the desert (I have fond memories of when I lived in New Mexico.
Do you write in single or multiple POV?
Multiple POV, each character tells their own story.
What do you find to be your best research tool?
Watching what is around me, listening to others, trying to put myself in their place, my memories, and Google lol.
Do you write under a pen name? Also, do you write under more than one name?
I write under my name as well as a pen name (now and then)
What genre do you write and why is this your preference?
I’m a multi-genre writer and do not have a preference for one over the other. It is the characters and the story that move me, each one is a baby of its own.
Tell me something about yourself outside of writing. Jobs, accomplishments, family, quirky trait...what led to you being you?
My mother grew up in an old money East Coast family with a rich history in the government. Including the signing of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, her uncle Herman was the head of the Secret Service during five Presidencies.
My mother ran away with my father who was at the time a taxi driver, moved up to Northern Minnesota, learned to cook, clean, write, and had nine children. Was very political, and we were very poor. When I say poor, I mean lard sandwiches, and clothes handed down through five or six generations. Once my sister (who I was living with at the time) sent me on a scavenger hunt “do you have a potato or a dolls head.” Type of thing so we had something to eat. That and the drama of living in a two-bedroom house with nine kids, and a boarder.
I was always shy, a bit clumsy around people, and our parents would have us give Sound of Music types of performances for company. It made me a bit weird. But aren’t we all in our own ways?
What advice would you give to an aspiring writer?
Read, read, listen, watch, open yourself to the ability to truly feel another, and keep writing.
Don’t write because your only desire is money or fame, those are rare, but write because you have a story/poem to be told.
How do you deal and process negative book reviews?
Depends on the review. If it is a 1 star, it usually appears to be more about the reviewer and less about the book. If it has within it something I can take from it and learn to write better that I will do, and appreciate the time it took to write it, and learn to be a better writer.
What is the most difficult part of your writing process?
Editing and reediting.
What do you need in your writer’s space to keep you focused?
Me. I’ve pulled over on the highway and written on a piece of paper when I had an inspiration, written in a notebook at work during a break at my desk surrounded by the noise of a call center, and I’ve written in the quiet of the morning or late at night.
What is your naughty indulgence as you are writing?
I don’t think I have one unless it is the ability to live someone else’s life for a bit.
If you could spend a day with another popular author, whom would you choose? And why?
I think Robert Jordan (if he was alive) I’d love to discuss how he built all the different worlds that compromise his Wheel of Time series.
What is your schedule like when you are writing? Do you have a favorite writing snack or drink?
I usually have coffee or water, but I don’t have a set schedule though I probably should.
Do you listen to music when you write – what kind of music is your favorite?
I like all kinds of music, but when I’m writing I shut out everything so it is usually quite if I have the choice.
Have pets ever gotten in the way of your writing?
Sometimes my cats will push to get attention or sit on the keyboard or our bird Jack will steal a key.
What is your kryptonite as a writer? What totally puts you off your game?
Time, or illness, mine, or another’s.
Have you ever killed off a character that your readers loved?
Not yet, but who knows.
How do you celebrate after typing THE END?
By rereading it or putting it through my voice reader and listening to it. I don’t really have a celebration time. I guess I have a bit of mourning as I might not see those characters again.
I hope you enjoyed this interview!
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