Facebook

m/sShare on Facebook

About Me

My photo
Corfu, Greece
Liana Metal lives in Greece, on the island of Corfu. She is an EFL teacher(MAEd -Applied Linguistics), book reviewer and freelance writer. Liana is also an artist. Her drawings/paintings can be found both online at www.aggelia-online.gr and at several shops in Corfu town. To contact the artist visit http://LianaMetal.tripod.com or her blog at http://LianasKerkyra.blogspot.com Η Ηλιάνα Μεταλληνού διδάσκει Αγγλικά στην Κέρκυρα, γράφει άρθρα και ιστορίες για έντυπες και ηλεκτρονικές εκδόσεις σε όλο τον κόσμο και ζωγραφίζει. Μπορείτε να την επισκεφθείτε στην ηλεκτρονική διεύθυνση http://toasprosaligari.blogspot.com και http://www.coffeetimecorfu.com

Storytime

Storytime
A book for kids/ 3 stories in English

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Meet Margaret Fieland


This month we have with us a multi-talented person, Margaret Fieland!
Margaret is a computer engineer, a musician, a poet and a writer.
Enjoy her interview!



Tell us about yourself first.


I'm a native New Yorker, born and raised in Manhattan, though I've lived in the Boston area since June of 1978, just after the big blizzard. I live with my partner and our seven dogs in the suburbs west of Boston. I play the flute and the piccolo, write primarily poetry and children's stories, and earn my living as a computer software engineer.

When did you start writing?


I started writing poetry as a teen, then continued on, writing poetry for friends, family, and significant others for pretty much any occasion I could think of. I enjoyed (and still do) rhyming, and developed my own algorithm for generating rhymes. I make frequent use of my thesaurus when writing, but rarely resort to rhyming dictionaries.

What genres have you written?

Poetry, nonfiction articles, children's stories, one or two stories for adults, technical documentation .. pretty much everything, though my first love is poetry, and now writing for children.

Is The Angry Little Boy your first book?


My book, "The Angry Little Boy," is unpublished as of now.


Tell us about your book. What is it about?


It's about a little boy who loses his mother in a fire, and he and his father go to live with his grandmother.


What inspired you to write this book?


Many years ago now, a close friend lost his wife and four children in a fire. He was pretty much of a mess after that, and while there was nothing I could do to change the real, horrible, outcome for him, I could and did decide that I would write a story where the father and the child survived. I didn't want any dead siblings, so my main character is an only child.

How long did it take you to write it?

The first draft was 5000 words and I wrote it in a weekend. It's been over a year since I wrote that first draft. This is probably the third major revision.

Who is the publisher of your book?
Where is it on sale?


It's not -- yet.


Tell us about your other books/work.


I have a collection of poems about mathematics that I've started sending around seeking publication, and I'm most of the way through the first draft of my second novel, also for children.


What are the major challenges that you have faced in your career?


As a writer? Taking myself seriously, and making finding time for my writing a priority.


Has the Internet helped you in your writing career?

How?

In several ways. I started writing for publication because of the internet. As a computer professional, one who's had to deal with lost data in my professional life I'm paranoid about losing documents, so I keep copies of my work online, currently in Google documents, which I love.

Several years ago, when I first started keeping my stuff online, I was home alone over Christmas vacation.. All the rest of the family was out, and I was reading a favorite ezine, when I noticed it had a poetry contest and that I had a poem which fit the parameters of the contest. I submitted it, and it was one of four finalists. It didn't win, but I was tremendously encouraged, and started working on my poetry. I joined a couple of websites with poetry forums. In one of them I learned about the Muse online writers conference. I joined another forum as a result of the conference, and started writing fiction.


What do you advise new writers to do?


Write, write, write. And keep backups of your documents, and keep them somewhere it's easy for you to get at them. I can't emphasize enough the benefits of being able to get your hands on your work, and to be able to look back over it. When I was scribbling in notebooks, I never reread my work, in large part because my handwriting is so awful even I have a hard time rereading it.

Thank you!


Contact details:

Margaret Fieland
blog and website:
http://www.margaretfieland.com


More about Margaret on the 3rd of this month.

Thanks for visiting!

Liana



16 comments:

Liana said...

Thank you Margaret!And good luck with your new book!
Liana

Vivian Zabel said...

What an interesting interview, Margaret and Liana. Thanks for allowing us to know more about Margaret Fieland.

Margaret Fieland said...

Liana, thanks for hosting me.

Margaret Fieland

Nancy Famolari said...

Very interesting Interview. I hope you keep trying to publish "The Angry Little Boy." I think it's a great story

The Old Silly said...

Wow Margaret you've an impressive resume and have written in many genres! Nicely done feature, Liana - and best wishes to your writing career, Margaret!

Marvin D Wilson

Katie Hines said...

Poems about mathematics? You're in rarified air there!

elysabeth said...

Good job. Thanks for sharing more about Margaret. I think she will eventually get her story published. Keep on writing - see you all in the postings - E :)

Carolyn Howard-Johnson said...

Liana, I was having nightmares about losing my work. Thus, I bought a backup system. It was only $99.--money wellspent to stay sane. LOL. Thanks for reminding everyone!

Best,
Carolyn Howard-Johnson
Tweeting tips for writers @frugalbookpromo

Darcía Helle said...

Margaret, you are certainly mult-talented! I'm looking forward to learning more about your work. Best of luck with the publishing world!

Darcía Helle
www.QuietFuryBooks.com

Anonymous said...

You're a very talented individual Margaret. You have a very unique gift that few of us have. Thanks for sharing it woth the world

Stephen Tremp

Karen Cioffi said...

Margaret, I've lost files also - thanks for the tip on Google documents. I have my work on a zip drive, and back it to another zip and my computer - I still worry. The Google doc sounds perfect.

Great interveiw, Liana.

Karen

Unknown said...

great post. I've featured one of Margaret's math poems in my newsletter-very clever.

Jane Kennedy Sutton said...

Enjoyed the interview. Writing a book in a weekend is quite an accomplishment! I also have problems reading my own notes.

Liana said...

Thank you all so much for visiting Margaret!
It's been great pleasure hosting you, thanks Margaret!
Liana

Mayra Calvani said...

Good luck with your writing! I think computer engineering and children's books is an unusual combination. :-)

Margaret Fieland said...

Jane, I'm lucky I learned to type. Otherwise I'd never have published much of anything, 'cause I wouldn't have been able to read it.

Mayra, my mother was an artist, and one of the few pieces of advice she gave me was always be able to support yourself. That was one of the reasons I didn't become a professional musician.

Margaret Fieland