My grandfather had been a newspaper reporter, as was my uncle. They were pretty good writers and so I thought maybe somewhere down the line I would do some writing.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
My aunt got me interested in journalism - she found an old typewriter, had it worked over, put it on the dining room table, gave me a stack of paper and said, 'Play like you're a writer.'
I was an English major in college, took a ton of creative writing courses, and was a newspaper reporter for 10 years.
I'm still an old-school reporter at heart. Writing fiction satisfies my journalistic need to hear and relay the testimony of everyday people at the center of events.
During my past career as a journalist, I relished writing obits and equally dreaded phoning relatives for the necessary facts. But to my surprise and great relief, they often wanted to talk - they wanted their recently deceased loved ones recorded in print.
I come from a long line of people that write. My folks ran a weekly newspaper.
I knew I was going to be a journalist when I was eight years old and I saw the printing presses rolling at the Sydney newspaper where my dad worked as a proofreader.
My mother was a reporter, and though she quit when they had kids, she still loved it. She told me about the people at the paper and the articles she wrote. She had the best memory of anyone I know, and she could really tell a tale.
I started writing by doing small related things but not the thing itself, circling it and getting closer. I had no idea how to write fiction. So I did journalism because there were rules I could learn. You can teach someone to write a news story. They might not write a great one, but you can teach that pretty easily.
I did not read newspapers until I became a reporter.
I write as well as I can. I'm a journalist at heart, so it's the story that matters.
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