Blogger: Michelle Ule
Sitting in for Wendy who is recovering from visiting Jane Austenland.
How do you interview writers?
Or, why would you interview a writer?
If you’ve been a blogger for any length of time (6 years for me, 8 if you include Books and Such), you may find a need to “fill the hopper,” with blog posts.
Why not interview a writer?
Who?
I’ve interviewed writer friends on several occasions because after reading one of their books, I realized they had expertise in a subject area that interested me.
Check out posts I wrote about Lori Benton, Jill Eileen Smith, Latayne Scott and Tessa Afshar, to see the how and why.
What?
I asked them to comment about their subject areas.
Writers are full of interesting ideas and have lots to say about ideas they’ve spent years researching.
Four questions produced enough for several blog posts!
When?
I sent my questions long before I planned to write the posts–and I told the writers that.
They did NOT need another deadline.
(Indeed, I’m still waiting to hear back from another writer I wrote months ago . . . hmmm, must follow up . . .).
Once I got their answers, I wrote the blog post.
They were doing me a favor in answering.
I’m thankful.
Where?
If I don’t personally know a writer, I used the contact form on their website to send them a message.
I also included links to their website and a picture of their most recent book in the post itself.
No one expected that, but it only was fair to include the information so others could benefit from their expertise.
Why?
Writers are interesting people who have thought long and hard about subjects most of us don’t think much about.
In many areas, they’re wiser than I am, why not ask them to explain things?
Inviting intelligent writers to my blog makes my blog post stronger.
As an added benefit, the social media opportunities allows them to appear to my audiences and me to their audiences, too.
A win-win for both.
How?
While most knew me, I introduced myself and my queries by saying something along the lines of, “I’m writing a blog about __________ and after reading your book ________, I thought you might have interesting insight on this subject.”
Of course they did.
If I’m asking for their time, or anyone else’s, however, I tried to make the questions as simple and straight forward as possible.
This works for people you don’t know as well.
Keep the questions simple:
“What can you tell me about ___________?”
“How did you learn about _________________?”
“Where would you suggest I look for additional information?”
They’re writers. They’ll write back more than one sentence. 🙂
Last things
I always let the writers read the post in advance, to ensure I’ve understood what they’ve written and to give them an opportunity to clarify or expand what they originally wrote.
Most journalists would bristle at letting a source read the material, but I’m not writing a blog post to prove a point; I want to ensure accuracy.
No one has ever complained and I’m confident I’ve not made a mistake.
You be your own judge on that!
Tweetables
Interviewing writers: the how and why. Click to Tweet
Interviewing writers for clever and thoughtful ideas. Click Tweet
Michelle, thank you so much. This has been on my heart lately. I’ve been wanting to interview an author on my website. Who? That’s the question. But I know the Lord will lead me to the right person. I think I’d like it to be about their life’s toughest challenge and maybe how they overcame. * I interview missionaries often for the magazine I write for … and I always let them read over my work to ensure I got everything accurate or to let me know what changes I should make. They sign off on a permission form, too. That is very comforting.
It’s a little tricky from the journalism ethics code, to let subjects read what you’ve written about them. When I was a reporter, no, of course we didn’t allow subjects to read our stories beforehand.
But since I’m writing a blog post about something that interests me, I want to make sure I’ve got the facts correct. I’m also not writing slam pieces, so I don’t feel that constraint.
Most of the time, however, I’m using quotes straight from the questions they’ve answered via email, so it’s not a problem.
The inner reporter, however, raises its eyebrow from time to time . . .
Thanks for this post,Michelle. It’s given me idea. I’ve only been interviewed twice. One was Australian award winning historical art hot, Susan Preston, and the other was by the editor of a missions magazine in Nigeria who found me though the Roman site. Both asked deep questions that were fun to think about and answer. I should think about interviewing others myself.
Author, not art hot. I’m on a bouncy road on the way to thE ACFW conference and can’t scroll back to check at the end on my phone
Can’t wait to see you Saturday, Carol. 🙂
Me too!
It’s not a bad idea, Carol, or doing an “imaginary” interview with your own character. I’m actually doing that myself the next couple weeks on my blog–and I’m a little surprised at some of the things coming out of my subjects mouth! LOL
Another thought in your case, would be to interview the people who wrote some of the research books you’ve used (the ones still alive, of course). I’d be interested in something like that . . . and have done it myself.
Thank you Michelle for filling in for a weary traveler. I followed Julie Klassens tour to England on Facebook. They were very busy. It was so much fun to be with them via Facebook posts. A wonderful trip.
I’m regard to your blog post, it was do informative and practical. I always wondered how bloggers were able to get interviews. Your clear explanations gave me what I needed. Thank you.
It was fun watching those photos pop up on FB, wasn’t it!
I’d encourage you to reach out to an author whose writing you admire or whose story is interesting and simply ask to interview them. I’m not sure I’ve ever been turned down . . . but do give them some time. You never know when you’re going to land right in the middle of their edits!
Thank you, for this insightful post! I enjoy interviewing authors on my blog. It is wonderful to get to know them better, and to learn fun behind the scenes details about the book. Your post here gave me more ideas for questions to ask. I like to change up the questions from time to time, to keep things fresh and exciting.
Happy to help. I find author interviews are the most easy blog posts to write–they’re so interesting and they write well!
It’s been a privilege to learn their research skills, too!
You made it easy, Michelle, to BE interviewed. You asked thought-provoking questions, showed familiarity with my book that sparked some good questions, and gave me leeway to answer just the ones I wanted to answer. So– you’re a great example of someone who knows how to interview a busy writer, and I thank you!