Member Spotlight: Tara Weinstein

Why is writing important to you and why do you think it’s an important medium for the world? Writing—and reading—are one of the few ways to truly get inside the head of another person. I always know that my characters have become fully realized when they surprise me and start to do things that I would never do. Writing and reading are both phenomenal ways of building empathy, and I can’t think of anything that the entire world needs more of right now.

What are your tried and tested remedies to cure writer’s block? I go for a walk in Central Park or do something creative that has nothing to do with writing, usually in the form of dance, fiberarts, or watercolor painting. A walk is better when I’m at a part in a story where I have an idea of where I’m trying to go but haven’t figured out how to get there, and somehow getting out of my chair and wandering around in nature (or as close to nature as I can get in NYC) lets me scaffold things. If I really have no idea what should come next, then I find it more helpful to get my creative juices flowing in a completely different way. I take the pressure of writing completely in those moments, and after I’ve tapped back into creating and generating in another area, I’m usually able to come back to the writing and be excited about it again.

What is your favorite time to write? As a teacher, I get most of my writing done during the summer, usually in the morning or right after lunch. I am toying with the idea of trying to write in the mornings before I leave for school this year, but we’ll see if that ends up working out.

What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received and would like to impart to other writers? Don’t edit as you write. It’s so easy to fall into the trap of writing and then revising that first chapter ad nauseam, and it can really become a procrastination tool and a wasted effort, since the perfect sentence that you end up crafting may have to be jettisoned altogether in the second or fifteenth draft when the whole structure of the novel gets upended. Instead, just keep going. Get that rough—and I mean rough—first draft out, and then you can go back and revise to your heart’s content, within the constraints of a better-understood big picture.

What excites you most about being a writer in today’s age? Writing is both timeless and firmly anchored in its own time. I love history, but I always feel like I better understand a historical time period after reading the fiction written during that time as well as studying the people and events from a non-fiction perspective. We are living through some truly bonkers times right now, and the fiction we are creating will better help to contextualize events for those who come after us.

Tara Weinstein’s The Only Way Out Is Through is out now with Blair.