Interview with Nicole O’Dell (Part One)

She writes. She talks. She reads. She changes diapers. Nicole O’Dell is a mom of six–including a set of toddler triplets who may or may not be potty trained sometime in 2011. Jury’s still out on that one. She is the author of a bunch of YA books, including the popular Scenarios for Girls interactive fiction series and the upcoming Diamond Estates Series, 10/11. She’s also the host of Teen Talk Radio at www.choicesradio.com. You can find her books and links to all the fun social stuff at www.nicoleodell.com.

Hi Nicole, you are an amazing storyteller. I just read your latest scenarios book, Swept Away (review here), and loved it! Tell us when is your next book coming out?

My Scenarios interactive fiction books for girls are releasing in a 2-in-1 format on 4/1/11. Books 1 and 2 (Truth or Dare and All that Glitters) are in the 2-in-1 called Dare to be Different. Books 3 and 4 (Magna and Making Waves) are in the 2-in-1 called Risky Business.

And the never-before released:

SCENARIOS 5 & 6—SWEPT AWAY

In High Stakes, seniors and best friends, Amber and Brittany, are neck and neck in a good-natured competition for a car being given away by a local business. In Essence of Lilly, sophomore Lilly Armstrong is always looking for ways to escape the confines of her unhappy home. She “invents” youth group activities just so she can hang out with her boyfriend, Jason—the only one in Lilly’s life who makes her feel special. What happens when Amber and Lilly are faced with making difficult choices? Readers help Amber and Lilly make the difficult decisions by choosing between alternate endings, and then see how their choices create consequences with life-altering results.

Your current series, Scenarios, is targeted to girls 10 to 16 (though I enjoy them and I am . . . over 16). Can you tell us why you feel led to write to that age group and what your goal is for the reader to take away from each book?

I had some rough teen years full of poor decisions and a lot of heartache. As I matured and realized I wanted to walk a different path, I committed to helping other teens avoid the same mistakes I did. The teen years are so difficult for so many reasons—physically, emotionally, spiritually—and I just want to help girls navigate those years a little easier.

Each Scenarios book has a choice for the reader to make for the main character. The alternate endings allow the reader to live out the consequences of her decision through the eyes of the books’ characters. The goal is that the reader will feel more personally affected by the outcomes because it was an actual decision she had to make and she has a personal stake in the story. Then, at the end of each story, there’s a contract and a prayer designed to help the reader commit to the choices she’ll make about that issue in her future.

How do you carve out time to write with all your children (the triplets sound cute and exhausting!) and housework and grocery shopping and cooking and homework (I’m exhausted just thinking about it)?

Well, I’m a work-at-home mom. It’s not always easy, but my husband and I have committed to making sure I have certain hours to write or do other writing-related work. We try very hard to protect those hours. It doesn’t always work, and family comes first no matter what, but we do our best. So far, so good.

Who/What spurs you to write? Where do your story and character ideas come from?

These days it’s those looming deadlines that keep me on task. I try to stay pretty organized about what’s due when and what I need to take care of first.

I get my ideas mostly from my own life—either from things that happened to me or that I did, or from things I witnessed my friends doing.

What do you think makes your style of storytelling unique?

Oh, that’s a difficult question to answer. I don’t know that I do think my style is so unique. It’s just me. Voice is such a tough thing to identify. I will say that my books are motivated from a deep desire to see teenage lives changed in big ways and small ways.

Well, you probably need to get to those triplets, how about we finish this interview tomorrow? See you then 🙂