Roslyn Carrington
Interviewed by: Lauretta Pierce
Well, for starters, she's a split personality. She works all day as Public
Relations Officer for a large state company in her home island of Trinidad,
churning out serious stuff, like advertisements and educational material.
By night, however, she is magically transformed into a slightly mad, harried
writer who cusses the keyboard and talks to herself. She's a
low-maintenance girlfriend, as she spends so much time on her writing that
there is little time left for her to nag her boyfriend to take her out for
dinner. She is an animal lover, with two huge dogs who scare just about
everyone, even though she protests staunchly that they have a deep and
abiding love for humanity. She also has a cat, Simona, from whom she has
derived the pen name under which she writes romance for BET/Arabesque.
Simona makes a great under-the-desk footrest, although it's often like
putting your feet down on a pin-cushion.
It was a sequel to A Thirst For Rain, which I had published 2 years
previously. I felt that I really needed to find out what had happened to my
characters, especially Rory, because I cared for them so much. And for me,
the only way to find out what happens next is to write it!
I found it in the Bible, in Proverbs 27:7. I like the idea of everything
bitter in your life becoming sweet. It's the idea of personal development,
putting away things that hurt you, finding new direction, and actually being
happy. It's what I want for myself, so why wouldn't I want it for my
characters?
I suspect that Odile is a little about who I was when I was her age. Very
rebellious, but longing for affirmation from my mother. Bright, but
prickly. She's a typical young woman who wants to get by without any help
from anyone, and doesn't want to take advice because she thinks it will make
her less independent. She hates the idea of "becoming her mother", but
realises that she needs to understand her mother before she can move on and
be herself. (By the way, her name is pronounced Oh-deel. She was named
after a girl I once knew as an exchange student from Martinique.)
In a way, I thought Miss Ling was just supposed to be a funny, wacky
character, but as I wrote, I realised that she was serious stuff, a strong
woman with a devastating past. I chose Chinese characters because I wanted
to show the world the cultural diversity that you can find in Trinidad. But
if you want to know a secret, I chose Vincent because I have always been
VERY partial to Asian men....
I can tell you a secret: Jacob was the first character I wrote about in A
Thirst For Rain: The book actually began with him and grew out of him. He
is tall, broad, very sexy, with dark skin and eyes, totally masculine.
Physically, he is actually patterned after a doctor I once had. I won't be
indelicate enough to say EXACTLY what kind of doc he was, but I think that
my women readers can pretty much guess....
Myra was, well, the kind of woman I thought Jacob deserved.
They just developed in their own way. In A Thirst For Rain, Saul didn't
even have a name. He was just the brutal father that shaped a boy like Rory.
And I had first conceived Rory as the pesky boy next door, an interesting
background character. When he started bugging Odile and following her
around, he grew on me as much as he had grown on her. I fell in love with
him. As I said, Rory's salvation was the main reason for writing Every
Bitter Thing Sweet.
I'm not a plot-driven writer at all, so I can't really answer that. For me,
I sit at my desk and start writing. The characters pretty much do whatever
they want. I actually have those experiences where I an busy typing out a
story, and saying to myself about a character: "I can't believe he did
that!"
I've been writing all my life. I wrote my first book (ha!) at age nine. I
tried to form a writer's club in school at that time. We had about 3
meetings during recess and then the other members lost interest. I was
totally ticked off.
I've written three under my real name, Roslyn Carrington: A Thirst For Rain,
Every Bitter Thing Sweet, and Candy Don't Come In Gray, which was released
this August. Under the pen name Simona Taylor, I've published four
BET/Arabesque romances: Night Heat, Mesmerized and Soul's Desire. My
fourth, Love Me All The Way, will be released next year.
Candy is about the illegitimate daughter of a wealthy, well-known gentleman
who has always been very good to her, but has always warned her that she is
not to reveal herself to his wife and daughter. She becomes convinced that
he has the power to affirm or deny her existence, and is terrified that if
he denied her, she would become invisible. Her father dies suddenly, and
she is thrown into a crisis. Her father has been such a powerful influence
in her life, that now he is gone, will she just fade away? Her solution is
to seek out his family. She learns, eventually, that she is the only one
who has power of her own existence, not her father or anyone else.
A cool room, for one, because when I write my skin heats up. I call it "the
burn", and it's always a sign that my writing is doing well. The more
excited I get about a story, the hotter my skin gets. I've been known to
start stripping at my desk, and finally wind up writing in my underwear. I
also need quiet. No music, no conversation. My boyfriend knows to leave me
in peace when I get started. A cat sleeping on my feet is always welcome,
though.
I think that in the same way there's a bit of every mother in her children,
there is a bit of me in every character, but I don't use them as a
mouthpiece for what I believe. They can actually hold entirely opposite
views from mine, and I'd still love them.
The value of our collective history, passed down through the generations.
The experiences of our mothers and fathers are vital for our understanding
of ourselves, and holding them in disdain, and refusing to learn from them,
will just cause us to wind up wandering aimlessly. Family links us, and our
history is a road map we must follow, or risk getting lost.
God, I have no idea. I loved Zenobia's character. She was so selfish and
callous and yet so weak and needy. And funny too, at times. I suppose
sexually importuning young boys was exactly what a woman like her would do,
so I let her have her way. I realised afterward, though, she was an
archetype of Pophitar's wife, from the book of Genesis. Remember, she made
advances toward Joseph while he was in Egypt, and when she was rejected, she
cried rape. Typical spoiled-brat wife.
Every Bitter Thing Sweet
August 18, 2002
2. What inspired you to write the novel "Every Bitter Thing Sweet?"
3. How did you come about the title "Every Bitter Thing Sweet?"
4. How did you come about Odile character?
5. How did you come about Vincent and Miss Ling character?
6. How did you come about Myra and Jacob's character?
7. How did you come about Saul and Rory characters?
8. How did you come about the plot for "Every Bitter Thing Sweet?"
9. How long have you been writing?
10. How many novels have you written?
11. Could you tell us a little about your new novel "Candy Don't Come In
Gray," that will be out this month?
12. What type of atmosphere do you require to write?
13. Are there any of your personality traits in any of your characters?
14. What message would you like readers to receive from reading "Every
Bitter Thing Sweet?"
15. How did you come about the plot surrounding Zenobia and Rory?