Sue Guiney

Q: What were you like at school?

A bit giggly and a bit timid. Sometimes more interested in my friends than in my studies.

Q: What did you want to be when you were a child?

I always wanted to be a doctor until I decided I was better in English and writing than in science and maths.

Q: Which three words describe you best?

enthusiastic,stubborn,short

Q: What is your favourite word?

Yes

Q: What makes you cringe?

When people say intolerant things

Q: What are you afraid of?

loud noises and mice

Q: When did you last have a really good laugh?

Yesterday at a workshop where I had to pretend I was pitching a business idea. I was rubbish and it was hilarious!

Q: What is your most treasured possession?

My violin

Q: What do you do as a hobby?

Play the violin

Q: What strange habits do you have?

I must admit I snuffle a lot.

Q: What’s your favourite food?

chocolate cake

Q: What do you day dream about?

new book launches where I can get all dressed up and everyone says they love what I wrote!

Q: What’s the most outrageous thing you’ve done?

Decide to be a writer and say it out loud.

Q: What profession other than yours would you like to attempt?

Musician

Q: Do you feel younger or older than your current age?

Definitely younger - by a lot

Q: If you could meet one person, dead or alive, who would it be?

My favourite short story writer, Grace Paley, who unfortunately died in 2009.

Q: What quality do you most admire in a person?

Tolerance

Q: What is the most interesting place you have ever visited?

Cambodia

Q: What is the best advice anyone has ever given you?

Don't let other people convince you can't do something that you really want to do.

Q: What would you most like to change about yourself?

My height - I'm just 5 feet tall and I get easily lost in crowds

Q: What has life taught you?

Life keeps teaching me to have faith in myself and my dreams, but I keep forgetting this lesson and have to continually relearn it.

Q: How long have you been a writer?

Since I was eight.

Q: Where do you do your writing?

In my little office upstairs in my house, but also at a writer's retreat in Ireland that I go to a couple of times a year.

Q: What are the best and worst things about being an author?

Worst: getting rejections and having to find the courage to keep going. Also, the pay is bad. Best: working with words and feelings, and creating new people that never existed in the world before you imagined them.

Q: Where do you get your greatest ideas from?

They are everywhere, all around me.

Q: What do you do to combat “writers’ block”?

Take a walk or a nap. Luckily, it usually doesn't last too long. And if it does, I write something, anything, anyway.

Q: What was your favourite book as a child?

Alice in Wonderland

Q: What book do you wish you had written?

That's a good one...."Ulysses"

Q: What advice would you give to aspiring authors?

Read everything you can find. Write no matter what anyone else tells you to do. Find the time, sit down in a chair, and do it.