Heidi Julavits
Heidi Julavits
Heidi Suzanne Julavits is an American author and co-editor of The Believer magazine. She has been published in The Best Creative Nonfiction Vol. 2, Esquire, Culture+Travel, Story, Zoetrope All-Story, and McSweeney’s Quarterly. Her novels include The Mineral Palace, The Effect of Living Backwards, The Uses of Enchantment, and The Vanishers...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionAuthor
CountryUnited States of America
fix plot time
Usually I'll write all the way through to an end, and then I go back and try to fix the ending so that it makes sense. I don't think out the plot ahead of time.
plot reviews complication
I don't usually read my reviews. I've noticed older reviewers are much more bothered by the plot complications. Younger reviews don't seem to be bothered by the complications at all.
break check constant days desk few takes work
During the summers, when I'm in Maine, I work at a desk that's located beyond all tendrilly wi-fi reaches. It takes me a few days to break the constant e-mail-checking habit, then I find I don't want to check my e-mail ever, and often don't for days.
buy existences known otherwise via whose
I buy a lot of books I've found via the Internet, whose existences I'd otherwise never have known about.
country order people
People don't hijack planes anymore because that old system of hijacking in order to barter for a prison release or get to a different country no longer works, exactly, because 9/11 recoded the hostage's interpretation of a hijack. If a hijacker isn't trying to use the plane as a missile, then he is in danger of being killed by the hostages. There is no minor terror threat anymore. No mid-level terrorism.
successful thinking two
It's fascinating to imagine two successful writers in one house. But when you think about it, it isn't very unusual. In fact, so many writers have writer spouses.
somewhere-else want sometimes
As a writer, you want to go somewhere else sometimes. You want to vary the terrain that you're exploring.
hate thinking today
Every once in a while when I get a migraine, I like to think, "Who hates me today?"
couple writing thinking
I think the one reason that writers marry other writers - one of the reasons that I married another writer - was, I fell in love with that writer. But second of all, I had been married before and a source of marital strife was me needing to go away for a couple of weeks to write or it's Saturday and I think I just need to work today and not hang out with you.
done firsts
There are some writers who are done when they finish a draft because they've thought it through beforehand. Whereas I'll finish a first draft and I'm nowhere near done.
book discovery done
If I'd done the discovery before I wrote the book, then there would be nothing to discover. It would feel dutiful instead of exciting.
writing thinking trying
I want the plot to be as complicated as possible. Usually I'll write all the way through to an end, and then I go back and try to fix the ending so that it makes sense. I don't think out the plot ahead of time.
want online belts
You should never read online comments if you want to keep thoughts above the belt.
people world saint
We're not saints, any of us. Maybe somebody is, but I don't know those people. But we all know people who behave very smugly and are very egotistical and put you down as a manner of improving their own place in the world or improving their own place in the world.