Lisa Girolami has been in the entertainment industry since 1979. She holds a BA in Fine Art and an MS in Psychology. Previous jobs included ten years as a production executive in the motion picture industry and another decade producing and designing theme parks for Disney and Universal Studios. She is now the Director of Creative Development for a firm in Los Angeles and a counselor at a mental health facility in Garden Grove. Writing has been a passion for her since she wrote and illustrated her first comic books at the restless age of six. Her imagination usually gets the best of her and plotting her next novel during boring corporate meetings keeps her from going stir crazy. She currently lives with her partner in Long Beach, California. Visit Lisa’s Bio page at:
http://www.boldstrokesbooks.com/Bios/LisaGbio.html

Who would you count among the authors who have inspired and influenced you?
There are many. I came from a family that encouraged reading. There were many quiet evenings growing up where we would all read and chat without the TV. When I was in my teens and early twenties, I was hooked on Stephen King and Dean Koontz. I loved the thrill factor of those kinds of books. When I first came out, I searched for books I could relate to and found Rita Mae Brown’s Rubyfruit Jungle. Then it was on to every lesbian book I could get my hands on. I can’t say that any specific authors inspired me over any others, although there are some incredible writing styles that I envy like those of Nicola Griffith and Kelley Eskridge. I think at last count my lesbian library tipped five hundred books. There are authors whose books I collect every one of: Kate Calloway, Lauren Wright Douglas, Radclyffe, Karin Kallmaker and Diane Salvatore. I suppose the one person who has really helped me is Nicola Griffith in that I took an online writing course from her and the exercises where phenomenal!

Tell us about the process of writing your first book (Love on Location, 2008)
The process was long, but enjoyable. I had these two main characters (Kate and Dawn) that wanted to be together. The book, however, was written in an odd order. I first wrote the beginning then I jumped ahead to when they first got together. I then began to fill in the gap. I knew there’d be trouble in the form of Hannah and then I just let the story take me where it wanted to go.

Can you give us a sneak peek of the book?
Well, the back cover blurb sets up the story… For a sneak peek of the back-story on writing it: I had the idea rolling around in my brain during a two-year relocation to Orlando that my company sent me on. I was part of a team that built Universal’s Islands of Adventure theme park that sits right next to Universal Studios Florida. Anyway, while I wasn’t there to shoot a movie, I did work with a woman after whom I based the character, Dawn Brock. Years before that I had been a Production Executive with Buena Vista Pictures, which is part of Disney, on a film shoot in Orlando, so I combined those two experiences and worked in a love story that takes place on a movie set.

How much research did you have to do about the film industry in preparation for the book? Share some interesting tidbits?
I suppose my years in movie making gave me lots of fodder for this book. And believe me, I’ve got lots more packed away in these old memory banks! I started out at 19 as a script supervisor and then, in order, was an assistant director, production coordinator, production manager, set designer, producer, production executive and finally, with my own short film called “The Deal” starring Michelle Wolff, was the writer and director. Interesting tidbits from my movie-making days? Hmmm…gosh, there was the time that I had a shotgun pointed at me in Arkansas by a man that didn’t want “Hollee-wuhd” invadin’ his state (and when I finally got away from him, thankfully with no holes, and got to the Sheriff’s office that night after wrap to lodge a complaint, the same man was sitting with the Sheriff, feet up on his desk, sharing a bottle of whisky). There was time that Meg Ryan and I sat in the back of an alley in the middle of the night shootin’ the shit while we shot some pick up scenes of Dennis Quaid on the film, DOA. There was the time that Linda Hamilton, on the set of the original Terminator movie, grabbed me and bear hugged me because she was demonstrating how someone had hugged her and made her spill her coffee (of course, I didn’t complain). There was the time that Disney chartered their private jet to take me, the only passenger, on an emergency flight to a set in Austin, Texas so that I could not only fire the first assistant director, but take over until they found a replacement. Once the actor Dabney Coleman and I went out on the town in New York after wrap one night. He took me to the famous "go-there-to-be-seen" bar called Elaine's. I was not hip in the ways of New York and when a woman plopped down at our table uninvited, rambling on and ordering herself a drink, I gave her major attitude until I realized that it was, in fact, Elaine. And there was the time that Uma Thurman and I spent on the set of Where the Heart is (in Toronto and New York) when she greeted me in the mornings with a big ol’ kiss (again, no complaints).

Why the film industry? What attracted you to the subject matter?
I loved every aspect of working in that industry. It’s intense, it’s crazy, it’s surreal, and it’s so very creative. An example of all four is when I was on a film crew one time that was shooting exteriors of a film; the set was a football field that our actor had to drive across in a limo. We were at the end of a gruelling location shoot, due to travel back to LA the next day. We had had torrential rain the previous six days and had shot everything we came there to shoot except for the last scene. The rain had stopped that morning but the field was so saturated that there was no way the limo would make it through without getting horribly stuck right away. We HAD to shoot that scene and we were losing a lot of money (thousands of dollars an hour) as we sat there unable to shoot. So in true Hollywood form, we rented two helicopters from the local airport and paid them to hover about five feet off the ground - for hours. The wind from the rotors eventually dried the ground enough that we could shoot later that day.

How did you make the mental shift from wanting to be an author to actually becoming one?
I’ve written all my life. I paint as well and the times when I can’t paint, due to the set up time or whatever, it’s quicker to sit down and write. Either way, it’s about expressing myself creatively. For me it wasn’t a matter of wanting to write, I’ve always just written. I think the bigger shift was going from writer to author. That was a thrill!

Do you plot significantly before you start writing?
Not really. Much of the plot unfolds as I go. My writing is like a trip I took once. I had just left my job at Universal Studios and I needed to clear my head and figure out what I wanted to do next. I threw a cooler of water, fruit and chips in my car and headed east (from Long Beach, CA). My plan was to drive the original route 66, at least those stretches that are still there. That was really all I had planned, the rest I would find out as I went. This is what I did with the plot of Love on Location. I had a basic idea and then went from there, discovering what my characters would do or say as I went along.

The trip down route 66, by the way, was incredible, awesome, enlightening, and definitely good for the soul.

What about your characters – do they tend to surface fully formed or change frequently throughout your writing process?
I believe they are fairly formed. I believe I can always grow in that area. I strive to be as proficient as possible in character building. My goal one day is to be half as good as Nicola Griffith is with her character Aud from The Blue Place.

Do you rewrite as you go along, or do you prefer to finish a first draft first before returning for the second?
I do both. Mostly I just try to FINISH! But if a scene isn’t working for me, I stick with it until I feel good about it. For me, it’s like a fish tank. It’s kinda hard for me to do anything but fill it evenly.

What is your writing environment like?
I have a couple. My main environment is at home, on a laptop, on the dining room table, which faces out my front windows. I live in Long Beach in a really cool neighbourhood. It’s quiet; the ocean breezes blow the bamboo wind chimes, which sound soothing. I have a little fountain outside, the water falling lazily on little pebbles. I’ve tamed the fox squirrels and they actually come up to the screen and scratch at it until I hand them some walnuts. People walk by every so often – mostly my neighbours walking their dogs or out for a run. My best friend, Bruce, and I bought houses next to each other, so his family comes by. It’s kinda Mayberry-ish and I like it. The other environments are where my Sandisk portable hard drive goes. I write at the mental health facility where I am a counsellor, in between clients. I write at work, sometimes and I write when I go out of town on business.

Current projects – anything exciting on the horizon?
I have three manuscripts that are between 80% and 100% finished so I need to decide which one to focus on next. All are lesbian stories. And I have one screenplay (don’t we all in LA? Sheesh).

Tell us something about Lisa Girolami no one else knows…
I have given CPR to two people with success. LEARN CPR!!!

If you could sit down with any writer for a chat, living or dead, who would you pick?
Wow. Funny, the first person that comes to mind is Gertrude Stein, not necessarily because of her writing, but because I’d like to learn from her what it was truly like living as she did, with Alice B. Toklas, in France, in her generation. She was a true pioneer. I visited her grave at Pere Lachaise in Paris a couple of times and was so incredibly moved that she and Alice are buried in one plot. I would love to hang out with Dean Koontz. His mind is so rockin’! He has scared the crap out of me more times than I can count! How does he DO that?!

What have been some of the most surprising aspects of writing your first book?
Having Radclyffe call me and tell me she wanted to publish it. Hands down.

What do you always have in your fridge?
Sourdough bread and European butter for some awesome toast! Salami (hey, I’m Italian). And Azuki (Japanese red bean ice cream) in the freezer.

What inspires you to write?
Women. Most of my characters are women I know. Some I have loved. Some I wonder, “What if?”

Any interesting books you'd like to recommend?
Fiction: The Blue Place by Nicola Griffith. Solitaire by Kelley Eskridge. Fried Green Tomatoes by Fannie Flagg (a hundred times better than the movie). Phantoms or Midnight by Dean Koontz

Non fiction: Trapped in the Mirror by Elan Golomb. Drama of the Gifted Child by Alice Miller

What do you feel makes your books unique or stand out from others in your specific genre?
I hope that Love on Location stands out because of the behind the scenes look into the world of filmmaking. And I hope that the characters stand out as individuals.

What do you consider your best and worst attributes?
I’ll answer as a writer, specifically, because answering the ‘worst attributes’ part as a person would take way too damn long (starting with my swearing). As a writer, my best attribute would be, simply, that I know enough to know I don’t know enough. I will be learning and learning until they push my pine box into the crematorium. My worst attributes? I usually can’t write for more than five hours at a time. Sometimes I pull all nighters, but usually, I write a bit, futz around the house, write a little more, go outside and water the flowers, etc. I also get distracted when my cats, Pierre and Penelope, turn on the ‘cute charm’.

A happy writer is...
One who is blessed to have others read their work and enjoy it.