Member Spotlight: John Whittier Treat

Why is writing important to you and why do you think it’s an important medium for the world? After a long career of teaching other people’s novels, I realized that I had four stories of my own to tell. My new novel, The Seventh City of Refuge, is the third of those four stories. I’ve led a life of taking risks, and this novel tells why.

What are your tried and tested remedies to cure writer’s block? Open the dictionary. Pick a word at random and start your next sentence with it. Chances are you’ll go back and change it, but at least you’ll be writing again.

What is your favorite time to write? Whenever I wake up. Do the most important thing first every day.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received and would like to impart to other writers? The book you want to write may not be the book anyone wants to read. Write it anyway.

What excites you most about being a writer in today’s age? We are living through times when a great many things are ending. New things may also be beginning, but in any case, we need to be witnesses to it all.

John Whittier Treat’s The Seventh City of Refuge is out now.