INTERVIEW WITH SANGEETHA NARAYAN

With the Fall Contest now closed, I was asked by our wonderful editors of WOW, to sit down with one of the contestants, her name is Sangeetha Narayan. It amazed me how much she and I have in common. I hope you enjoy this interview as much as I did.

WOW: Congratulations, Sangeetha, on becoming one of the Runners Up for your story, “How I Became a Published Writer”. Thank you so much for sharing your story with us. You have touched so many of us, by sharing your experience with becoming a published writer.

What was your first reaction when you heard that you had been placed in the top 10?

SANGEETHA: Thank You Carrie! I must say, I had a great time going down the memory lane. And then, when the entry got selected in the top 10, it was just an icing on the cake. I was ecstatic, and began to call my friends and family informing everybody about my success! I’m not sure though if they were too pleased about me gloating almost every day for the next couple of weeks... LOL.

WOW: Hey, you deserve to gloat; you did a great job with your piece.

Is WOW!’s writing contest the first you have ever entered or have you entered in other writing contest?

SANGETTHA: Actually, I’d entered a couple of other contests, but didn’t hear anything from them. WOW was the contest that really made my day!

WOW: We are so glad that you did enter the contest. It is so wonderful to see what everyone could do.

In your Bio, it states that you received a Master’s in business commerce, what made you turn to writing?

SANGEETHA: Well, actually I was just casually surfing the net about three or four years ago. I came across this website belonging to Institute OF Children’s Literature. They were offering free aptitude test to check if I had an aptitude in writing for children. I just took the test and sent it. Within a few weeks I started getting mails from them asking me to join their course. It took me a couple of years, but I finally joined the course and received my diploma within a year. I was hooked after that. I guess it was fate.

WOW: That is fantastic that you finished your course so quickly. I also studied with the Institute and found it to be very informative and helpful to my writing as well. I can relate to the excitement that you must have felt when your received the message about getting one of your stories published for a magazine. Was the story for adults or was it a story for children?

SANGEETHA: I remember that day, or should I say morning? I received this email from Ms.Cynthia John, informing me that she liked my story. I was in seventh heaven! It was a very short children’s story based on the theme friendship. I had a very tight word limit … 350 to 420 words. It was an amazing feeling to be finally accepted for publication.

WOW: We all know how difficult it can be to have to make those word counts. It is a challenge and you did a wonderful job making every word count for your story with WOW. I see that you are from Sugarland , Texas . Do you get any of your story ideas from living in Texas ? If so, has living in Texas helped with your writing?

SANGEETHA: Well Carrie, I believe that writers get more ideas from people than a place. I have taken my three year old daughter to a park nearby, observed other people, and come up with some great story ideas. So, I can say that people in Texas have motivated me a lot!

WOW: People do make the story. It is great that you get your ideas from your daughter. I have to admit myself that I also get many story ideas from my children. They are a great source of information. When you are blogging and writing stories for www.sulkeha.com do you write for adults or do you write for children?

SANGEETHA: The website is www.sulekha.com. I write for everybody

--- adults, kids and anyone in between too. It all depends on what kind of ideas I get on a particular day. I’m a great fan of fiction writing as I feel people pay more attention to real-life experiences that have been conveyed in a fictional format.

WOW: It is great to see that you are an eclectic writer and can be so versatile it what you write and for whom you right. If anyone is interested in reading your stories on the website, do you go by your name or do you use a pen name on the website?

SANGEETHA: I write under the pen name …sanghouston. My blog address is http://www.sanghouston.sulekha.com

WOW: Thanks for giving us your pen name, I am sure that all of our staff will be excited to check out some of your other work on www.sulkeha.com. You mentioned in your Bio that you are writing a young adult novel, can you tell us something about that?

SANGEETHA: I’m actually working on a couple of book ideas. One of my young adult novel will be titled, “How I taught my mom to play tennis!” It is about a young girl who tries to teach her reluctant mother to play tennis.

Well, it sort of touches my personal life because I’m scared of tennis. I’ve tried to play this game a couple of times and have given up now. So, I thought it would be funny if my daughter loved the game and tried to teach me the game. The other one I’ve started writing is an adult fantasy called “The cracked Mirror”.

WOW: Fears can definitely work to our favor when it comes to story ideas. We are glad to see that you could overcome your fear of tennis to come up with such a great story idea. What an interesting title. “The Cracked Mirror” I myself am intrigued. I love a good fantasy. Does the story you are writing come from a child hood experience?

SANGEETHA: Well, I do plan to use a lot of my childhood experiences in the book. They’ll be fictionalized, but my experiences will only enrich my book, at least that’s what I hope!

WOW: I am sure that your experiences will make the story stand out even greater. We wish you all the best of luck with it. Given that the Month of January is dedicated to all of the wonderful readers of our stories out there, do you have any favorite author’s that you enjoy and do you derive any inspiration from their style of writing?

SANGEETHA: I have so many favorites that it just won’t fit in here. But, my most favorite ones are Jane Austen, Agatha Christie, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Danielle Steel, Louisa May Alcott, Jeffrey Archer … the list just goes on! Each of them have their own favorite style, but what is common is the spell that they cast on their readers. They all have different genres and effectively communicate their views through their characters. Every one of them is amazing and inspires me to do my best!

WOW: I have to say that I am a mystery buff at heart and Agatha Christie is one of the best. You do have a point, they do have a way of casting their spells over us and making pulling us into their stories. Once again congratulations on a wonderful story and placing in the top ten of our contest. We look forward to reading more of your work!

If you would like to check out Sangeetha’s stories please go to http://www.sanghouston.sulekha.com You can also check out her story for the Fall Contest contest.

Happy Writing Everyone!

Carrie Hulce