Stuff
Jayne Lyons: A Self Portrait
Jayne Lyons Revealed
About Jayne Lyons
Revealing Questions
- Q. How would you describe your life in only 8 words?
- A. Busy, fun, chaotic happy. Working, mothering, writing, socializing.
- Q. What is your motto or maxim?
- A. Make your dream as fantastic as you can, have no limits, so that when it comes true, you haven't wasted it.
- Q. How would you describe perfect happiness?
- A. Laughing with my family or friends. Laughter is the most important thing to me. I have been the most happy when the silliest things have happened (usually when I am around my sisters or my husband and daughter) and you have that moment when you laugh so much that you cry and your stomach hurts. This can bring happiness even when everything else around you can be going wrong.
- Q. What’s your greatest fear?
- A. Spiders!!! Even thinking about them makes me feel ill. Esepcially hard living in Australia. untsman spiders. They say don’t be scared if it bites, they aren’t poisonous. Hello!!!! I would die of heart attack, it doesn’t need to poison me!
- Q. If you could be anywhere in the world right now, where would you choose to be?
- A. In Britain with my two sisters. I miss them so much.
- Q. With whom in history do you most identify?
- A. Jane Austen. I could imagine spending hours with her, discussing all the ridiculous absurdities one meets in life.
- Q. Which living person do you most admire?
- A. Nelson Mandela.
- Q. What are your most overused words or phrases?
- A. It's not my fault! (It always is though)
- Q. What do you regret most?
- A. Never knowing my father - he died when I was 5 weeks old.
- Q. If you could acquire any talent, what would it be?
- A. To be able to play a musical instrument. I never had the opportunity to learn and it is an amazing and mysterious skill to me.
- Q. What is your greatest achievement?
- A. Having raised a beautiful, popular, happy and charming daughter
- Q. What’s your greatest flaw?
- A. Impatience. Makes me irritable sometimes.
- Q. What’s your best quality?
- A. Sense of humour. I love to laugh and seem to be able to make others laugh too.
- Q. If you could be any person or thing, who or what would it be?
- A. I would be an X-Man and my power would be to move objects without touching them.
- Q. What trait is most noticeable about you?
- A. Inability to take anything too seriously.
- Q. Who is your favorite fictional hero?
- A. Freddy Lupin of course. He's hilarious - always saying exactly teh wrong thing, so full of himself and then it all goes wrong - but you can't help but love him anyway.
- Q. Who is your favorite fictional villain?
- A. Darth Vadar - he's as cool as it gets
- Q. If you could meet any historical character, who would it be and what would you say to him or her?
- A. Queen Elizabeth I. Just how amazing to be a woman so powerful in those times and yet I think she must have been very sad and lonely too. I guess I'd ask her whether or not she truly was in love once and if the throne was worth all her personal sacrifice - but from a distance, just in case she tried to cut my head off.
- Q. What is your biggest pet peeve?
- A. beards
- Q. What is your favorite occupation, when you’re not writing?
- A. watching great films
- Q. What’s your fantasy profession?
- A. a 'what not to wear' advisor
- Q. What 3 personal qualities are most important to you?
- A. openness, warmth, integrity
- Q. If you could eat only one thing for the rest of your days, what would it be?
- A. hot buttered white toast
- Q. What are your 5 favorite songs?
- A. They change all the time. It drives my family mad - I play the same songs over and over and then ignore them for a year. NOt sure you'll know these but I'll say, How soon is now - The Smiths, I want to be adored - Stone Roses, Dragging me down - Inspiral Carpets, Handbags and Gladrags - Steriophonics, Starlight - Muse
On Books and Writing
- Q. Who are your favorite authors?
- A. Jane Austen The Brontes Roddy Doyle Micheal Frayn Thomas Hardy Ian McEwan
- Q. What are your 5 favorite books of all time?
- A. Persuasion - Jane Austen Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen Paddy Clarke HA HA HA - Roddy Doyle Catch 22 - Joseph Heller Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
- Q. Is there a book you love to reread?
- A. Persuasion - makes me cry every time (in a good way)
- Q. Do you have one sentence of advice for new writers?
- A. Write a book you would want to read - and never listen to anyone who tells you who can't succeed.
- Q. What comment do you hear most often from your readers?
- A. I totally loved your book!
- Q. How did you come to write 100% Wolf?
- A. Well, I have to be honest, I can't quite remember. I know that I first wanted to write a story about dogs escaping a prison, but that didn’t seem quite enough. Then I thought about werewolves and that sounded a bit more fun, because they’re scary, and spooky, and can be people too. Then I wanted the story to be funny so I thought, what do we think about werewolves, well, they’re big, they’re scary, they’re mean, they’re frightening – see the Hidden Moonlight Gathering on my website. So what’s the total opposite of all that… a poodle, and especially a pink poodle with a hairstyle. And that made me laugh, and after that I was on a roll.
