Member Spotlight: Luca DiMatteo

Why is writing important to you and why do you think it’s an important medium for the world? Writing, in whatever form it takes, is a gateway, a magic carpet, that takes the reader on an adventure. From fiction to non-fiction and everything in between, if it’s written well, the reader is transported by those words.

What are your tried and tested remedies to cure writer’s block? I pick an object in my office and start writing about it coming alive. For me, what it thinks, feels, and says are like jumper cables to a car battery.

What is your favorite time to write? In the beginning, it was somewhere between 2-3 AM. Now it is usually in the mornings around 9 AM.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received and would like to impart to other writers? When writing a story, get it down-just start writing. Then go back and edit the parts out that don’t progress the story forward. My newest novel started out at 103,000 words and ended at 98,000. Every written thought counts until it doesn’t.

What excites you most about being a writer in today’s age? For years I had characters telling me their tales and now I write them down almost as dictation. The most exciting part is listening to see where they will take me and sharing with readers.

Luca DiMatteo’s Green Haven is out now with Mascot Books.