A huge thanks to pianist_18 for transcribing the entire 20 minute Q&A & allowing us to post it on our site!
Stephenie Meyer Q&A
Thanksgiving Point Host Tour
May 16, 2008

About the Twilight movie:
Hasn’t seen the entire thing.
Director is kind of a genius.
Actors fit roles really well.
And no, I can’t say things about Breaking Dawn.

Is it (Breaking Dawn) the last book?
Only from Bella’s point of view. I may go back and write other stories from other characters points of view.

Would you ever post outtakes about Jared and Melanie being reunited on your website?

Interesting question. That is the one outtake that I probably would write. It is the one scene I see in my head and really happens. Only thing is when I’m on tour, I’m not writing and I’m on tour a lot.

You write intense falling in love experiences. Where/who did you get your inspiration from? Do you believe people can experience the love you describe in your stories or is it fantasy to you?
Uh, I don’t think you’re going to like the answer to this question, but I could not have written these stories before I had my children. They were my first experience with the kind of love that absolutely without question I would give my life for. You know I had different boys that I fell in love with off and on, but I always had a really firm grip on reality. But with my kids, I didn’t anymore. And that was really my experience with not the kind of romantic love, but to be able to understand the intensity and the way you do things that are insane and dangerous for somebody. That was when I kind of learned how it feels like that.

At what point did Doc start seeing Wanderer as a person and how did that change his outlook?
I can’t say an exact part in the book when that happens, but I think all of the humans living in the caves get used to her after a while—as you get used to anything. And once you stop looking at someone as an enemy, and you start noticing the really good things that they do—especially since Wanda does a lot of really good things, it’s hard not to look at her as a person. Also, Doc is just a very compassionate person. It doesn’t bring him any joy to hurt anyone, and so he always thinks of her very kindly and would never be the one to do anything nasty to her as much as she was afraid of that. So, Doc is on of the easier cases.

Why did you make Jared so mean? I was bothered that he hit her “Wanderer” over and over again. (Steph: He only hit her the one time.) Why were Sharon and Maggie so bitter towards Wanda?
Here’s the thing—because I wrote the story from the alien’s perspective, I think everyone’s looking at it from that side and saying, “But Wanda means no harm. She’s this wonderful, kind person who would never hurt them, how can they be this way?” And I think what you need to do as you’re trying to understand them, is think of the scariest movie you’ve ever seen with a really scary monster—something that kept you up at night. And then imagine that the whole world is filled with that monster and you’re all by yourself with all the rest of them out there, and that you live in horror and fear every single day. And that’s a really hard thing to think about, it’s on thing to say the words—but to imagine it is something else. Then imagine that that monster is in your power and that you finally have a group of people who are on your side and one of them comes to you, how would you feel towards them? This person has taken away everything from you. This is your worst enemy in the world. I’m surprised that so many people can understand Wanderer because it doesn’t make sense from a human perspective to think kindly of her at all. And Jared in particular, think of the person you love most in the whole world and imagine if someone took them from you and they came back with their face. You know how you would feel towards that person. That he’s able to overlook who she is; is an amazing thing to me. It was interesting writing his character because originally I had only planned for him to be the only love interest in the story. But he was very inflexible, and it made sense for his character. When I write, the one thing I can’t do is make my characters say something or do something that isn’t part of who they are. And so I couldn’t make him be something he wasn’t. Ian, on the other hand, he wasn’t supposed to have a part. He barely had a name. But from the first time he opened his mouth to ask Jeb, “What are you thinking? Why are you doing this?” That sense of him wanting to know more and being willing to listen to the answer, sort of leaped into his character and by the time he had his first conversation with Jared, it was over. I was already sold. So, he really came in and changed the story and made it an ending that I enjoyed a lot more.

Why are the souls able to live in a perfect society and the humans failed—aren’t the souls dealing with all the human emotions?
Yes. And if you think about it, all of us have human emotions and some of us try really hard to be good people. We don’t always succeed, but we try. And we would never dream of stealing from anyone or hurting anyone or doing anything bad. Then there are other human beings who have the exact same emotions as us, and they don’t mind strapping a bomb to themselves and blowing up a crowded square. Humans are capable of an amazing range. The souls aren’t the same—they don’t have that range. They really can’t be anything but kind. So they have the emotions, but like those of us who try to be good people, they’re quite able to handle them, and that’s why their society works so much better than ours.

On page 218, please say it is not a coincidence; Jeb says he hears a lot of Jims and Pams. Please say it is because you love The Office.
Yes. That was absolutely an Office reference. And I’m really glad people got it.

Stephenie darling, how is Ian completely able to look past Melanie’s body and fall in love with the worm in the back of her head?
That was kind of the magic of the story for me. I knew people were going to accept her after a while. But when Ian started to fall in love with her, it made the experience. That’s why I finished the book I think, because I was so intrigued with this character who could do that. Who could care more about what somebody said and did rather than what they looked like or who they were. He was amazing to me and so, he was able to do that because that is who he is as a person. He takes people for what they really are and there aren’t very many people who can do that, that’s why I love him.

Will there be a sequel to The Host?
This is one of those probably questions. It’s funny because I’ve been working so much on my other stories and I’ve been editing forever, and just thinking in the Forks world. That’s where I’ve been mentally. And so, in these last couple weeks, answering Host questions and going through the book again and again, I’m starting to get excited about the sequels which are kind of cool. I have outlines; I have the prologue written for the second one and the epilogue written to the third; so I’ve got the frame. And I imagine eventually that I’ll get to that. It might take me a while, so I don’t want to make any guarantees, right now as soon as I get done with this summer, what I want to do is just take a year and just write again. No publicity, none of that, just sit down and write for a whole year. Which sounds like an incredible luxury to me. So, we’ll see which books come out of that time.

Due to the success of your career, what is the biggest sacrifice you’ve had to make and is it worth it?
There’s kind of two things, one of them that I think is like the daily sacrifice. I used to read three or four books a week. Every week. Reading is a huge part of who I was, and I can’t do that as much now. And it’s crazy, I feel like—Wow, how many books did I read this year? Ten so far? For me, that’s really weird. I miss reading, but it’s worth the sacrifice there because writing is just way better than reading. It’s amazing, it’s my favorite thing.
The other big sacrifice is time and there are things that aren’t exactly worth it. You know I’m missing some graduations this week. And that’s kind of hard. Being away from my kids is a really big sacrifice for me. I don’t think they mind as much, you know I get home and they’re like, “Oh Mom, you were gone?” So, you know, boys. We’re going to have a big party when I get home. My husband is DVD’ing everything for me and we’re going to eat popcorn and watch Kindergarten graduation and all that good stuff when I get back.

What’s it like to be in Time magazine for the “Top 100 Most Influential People”?
I don’t think I even have an answer to that. I don’t know. It’s too weird, it’s surreal, I don’t believe it entirely. I have a couple copies of the magazine, and that’s my picture there right next to Oprah. And I still don’t believe it, but I mean, it’s so cool and I’m so glad this year Time decided to put everyone on the cover. So I can say, “Hey, I was on the cover of Time magazine.” That’s probably my favorite part, but you can see the dedication to my fans. Because last week I was in Kansas City doing an event because it had sold out quite a while earlier and when I could have been in New York in the same room with George Clooney and Robert Downey Jr. You know that I was okay with it when I only knew about Clooney. And then the morning of, I was watching The View in my hotel room and Robert Downey Jr. was on, he was talking about going to the party that night. I’m like, “NO! NO!” I emailed my agent, “How do I get to New York?” So, Robert Downey Jr., I miss that.

How do you juggle being a mom and a writer?
It’s a constant balance. Because things change. When I first started writing, I had babies on my lap and so, literally juggling. Now my kids are in school all day and it’s a different thing. And so I have to readjust all the time, but the way I manage is I always keep my office—with the houses and different moves we’ve done—in the middle of the living room pretty much. Because I’ve found as long as I can hear my kids, I’m fine. If I can’t hear them, I start to think, “What are they up to?” So I can’t ever close a door. And then I’m lucky to have these kids that are just well balanced and centered and they’re fun and easy going. And so that makes my job so much easier. And I have my husband who’s willing to be a stay at home dad and take care of my kids. Which is so cool for them to have their Dad around all the time. That’s amazing. Yay for good husbands! That helps, you have to have a lot of help, and we have family that helps out. My mom lives down the street and that’s the best thing ever. You can’t do it alone, absolutely not.

Is that your face on the cover of the book? If not, whose is it?
I have no idea. It’s some gorgeous model who gets paid to be in pictures. It’s not my job. I get a lot with the other cover too. The way publishing works is they do a cover and show it to you and say, “Here’s your cover. What do you think?” And if you say, “Wow. I hate it.” They say, “Aw, too bad.” Actually that’s not so much the case with me anymore, and with The Host, it was a great experience. They sent me the picture and said, “What do you think of this?” I said, “I love it!” They said, “So do we.” We said, “Yes, we’ve got it done.” That’s not always the case because people ask me about the Twilight covers—and no, those are not my hands on the front cover of Twilight either. Again, that’s a pretty model. So really quickly what the covers mean—
The Host is pretty easy.
Twilight is for me, kind of the idea of choice—the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. Not having taken a bit yet, but contemplating.
New Moon is one of those covers they said, “Here’s your cover, what do you think?” I said, “I hate it.” They said, “Too bad.” So that one actually means nothing to me.
Eclipse is one we were able to find some common ground on. For me, it’s sort of trying to cut ties with your old life. Bella thinks she can do that easily with a nice clean cut but it doesn’t work that way, and there are some threads that are harder than others. So that was my depiction, my metaphor for her to try and leave her human life behind.

Just to finish up, I get a lot of questions about being a writer. How do I get my books published? How should I go about this and that? And this is sort of my normal spiel; this is what I tell people who want to write.
Write. Don’t worry about any of that other stuff. Because it really doesn’t matter. If you’re not writing for the experience of writing, the rest of it is not going to be worth it. Because it’s actually, I know some people think it’s kind of glamorous and everything—it’s really not. In fact, we were in Texas and some girls got in trouble with the police because they were hanging out of their car. They had seen this white limo and they figured I was in it. It’s like, No, I don’t roll in limos, sorry. There’s a lot of hard work involved in being a writer and there is a lot of sacrifice and that’s not the good part. The good part is the writing. So if you’re not, if it’s not enough for you to be able to sit down and just write the story for yourself, then maybe that’s not the right way to go. If it is, and you love it and you love those characters and you want to share them with other people, wait until you’re done. Finish the book. Write it for yourself and never second guess and think, “What will someone else think about this? Is it appropriate for this audience? Or should I write for a different audience?” Don’t think about any audience but you. Finish the book and then when you’re all done, get online because there are a million resources out there. Do the research; follow the rules because agents hate it when you get cutesy with your letters. Just send them what they want. There’s a really great website called, Writer’s Market Online and that will give you all kinds of information, but my main advice is wait until you’re done. And enjoy the writing because I would still do this even if nobody here had ever read any one of my books and no one was going to. Because to me, writing the stories is just sure joy that it really doesn’t matter that anybody else enjoys it. But I’m really glad you are here, and have read my books. And it really does make it magic to know that my characters don’t just live in here (Stephenie’s mind) but in everyone else’s heads too. That makes them so real for me, it’s really cool.

Thanks you guys so much for being amazing.