Interview with Ted Michael, Author of Crash Test Love and The Diamonds

 


Crash Test Love, just released in June, is Ted Michael's follow-up to his wickedly enjoyable and popular young adult novel, The Diamonds, (see my book review here).  

Through the graces and goodwill of Nancy Sondel, Founding Director of the Pacific Coast Children's Writers Workshop (Ted will be presenting and I will be attending this year's workshop in August), I was able to secure an e-mail interview with him.  Below Ted shares his thoughts on crafting realistic dialogue, sifting through ideas and the writing process.


Fans rave about the realistic characters you create in both The Diamonds and Crash Test Love. In particular, the dialogue seems as if it was lifted straight from the hallways of High School, USA.  How do you research your characters and especially capture teen lingo so deftly?

Thank you—what a great compliment! Having dialogue that rings true is very important to me. This kind of stuff is hard to research; a lot of it is culled from what I remember of being in high school myself, or moves and television shows. Interestingly, a large portion of both these novels were written in a Panera Bread on Long Island that was highly populated with teens. Sometimes, I would just listen to all of their conversations and try to absorb as much as possible. I also have a younger sister who helps keep me “hip.”


In your recent interview on the Teenreads.com blog, you talk about where you find inspiration for your books. What is your process for transforming those ideas into books, and what has been the time frame for each of the two books you've written? You're an agent, too--when do you find the time to write?


I tend to have more ideas than I know what to do with. The hardest part is siphoning through them and determining which would actually make good novels. I have started a lot of books and then decided that, really, there was not enough “meat” to the plot to justify an entire novel.

With both The Diamonds and Crash Test Love, once I had the initial ideas, I spent some time plotting out the core of each novel. The Diamonds took me nearly a year to write, and another year to revise with my editor (which involved cutting nearly half the novel and rewriting a ton of new material). Crash Test Lovewas a much swifter process—it took me about three months to complete the draft, and another month or two to revise.

I write in my spare time (of which there is admittedly very little). Luckily, working in children’s book publishing is closely related to my writing, so both of these jobs inform each other.

What has been the biggest surprise about having your books published?

The biggest surprise has been that people actually read the book! Writing is so solitary that it can be easy to forget that eventually, your words will be read by other people. Hearing from people who have read my work is, I think, one of the great thrills of having a book published.


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Ted Michael is the author of Crash Test Love (2010) and The Diamonds (2009), both by Delacorte Press, and he is also the agent Ted Malawer with Upstart Crow Literary.