Author Interview: Lorianne Zeller

"I have published and been published, but what matters most is what I am writing today."
~Lorianne, from the Author’s blog.

Welcome to the first of many author interviews I will be hosting here at

A Rage of Angel. It is my distinct pleasure to introduce an exceptional writer whose work I greatly admire, Lorianne Zeller.

RAGE: In one sentence, describe everything there is to know about your writing.
LORIANNE: It evolves in its honesty, maturity and beauty at about the same rate that I do.

RAGE: Tell us your latest news.
LORIANNE: Started a new venture with http://13stitches.ning.com/, a community for writers. Also, some of my work will be featured this month at Outsider Writers Collective and also at Rusty Truck. I'm pretty excited about both, though I've appeared in Outside Writers Collective before, it's always a thrill to be asked.

Rusty Truck is a special thrill for me. I've religiously read it. Some of my favorite poets, whose work I respect have been published there, like Father Luke, Hosho McCreesh and William Taylor Jr. to mention just a few. Having my own words grace those same pages makes me feel all tingly and a little bit like bowing and scraping while chanting I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy.

RAGE: What do you like to do when you're not writing?
LORIANNE: You mean what things do I like to do while I'm thinking about writing but not actually doing it? Just kidding...sorta. Since moving last year to California, I've discovered I can make things grow, so I garden. I spend time with my kids as often as they will tolerate me (they're teenagers, so not that often). I paint and draw. I play a mean game of Texas hold-em from time to time.

RAGE: What do your family and friends say about your writing? Are they supportive?
LORIANNE: My extended family is barely aware of me, let alone my writing. My immediate family is very supportive and they always allow me the time and space necessary. They humor me when I talk to strangers or street people looking for experiences I will weave into stories. Both of my daughters write, not with the same rabid drive that I do and that's a good thing. My friends have always been my biggest supporters and best audience, cheerleaders and critics. I'd have to say they're the ones that keep me honest and grounded when it comes to the writing.

RAGE: One of my favorite stories you’ve written is the micro fiction piece “One Door Closes…” published on your Six Sentences blog. The confessional honesty and strong imagery really hit home for me. As a writer, I often feel like I’m hiding out “in plain sight” from my own family. Is this story based on true experience? If so, how has it changed you as a writer?
LORIANNE: That one is based on truth. To be honest even when it isn't easy, to say what’s difficult to say, to show myself as vulnerable and sometimes terribly unattractive in my humanity is something I work at in my writing, and my life.

I do come from this wildly talented family of artists, though I am the only one who writes. I think the hiding thing is part of the creative personality; like it's built in. My brother makes his living as an artist now, but as kids growing up in the same house, I never saw his work; none of us did. We were all shocked when he got a college scholarship to major in art.

I don't think having some of my family 'discover' my writing has changed how I write. I think I've been aware for some time that often a reader takes a piece as documentary, as a gospel truth reporting of facts or a diary entry, rather than a created work; understandable in my case since seeds of truth seem to always be sown within the furrows of the words. I mean we, our lives, are always in our writing... intended or not; it seems unavoidable doesn't it?

RAGE: What inspires you to keep writing?
LORIANNE: Life; if I'm brutally honest with myself, mostly the painful aspects of life. Other writers. God I love being in the company of other writers who take the craft seriously, but not themselves. Some kind of wonderful jambalaya always seems to result when you toss a wide range of creative folks into one pot. I sometimes write less often, sometimes more, but I'm always writing. Funny – I've never tired of it. My passion for it has never flickered to such a small flame that I could/would walk away from it. Words, language, writing...they've been the longest love affair of my life; fraught with all the wonder and all the angst of any love affair of course, but always enduring.

RAGE: If a publisher wanted to offer you the book deal of a lifetime, where can you be contacted? Where can we find your published work?
LORIANNE: Electronically I can be found all over the place via Google. Other than a brief stint writing non-adult content for an “adult” venture, I've always written under my own name. I already mentioned www.outsiderwriters.org, www.rustytruck.wordpress.com, and of course I can always be found at www.13stitches.ning.com

In print I can be found in some dusty old anthologies now lining birdcages or possibly in the basement of the now defunct Stand Alone Press; my mother might have a copy of a collaborative book I did with 3 other writers titled Table for Four and Other Reservations. That one I have to say was early in my poetic evolution and I am more proud of the title, which was my idea, than I am of any of the poems I contributed. Even thinking about them now makes me cringe. I really do believe what I am writing today is what matters most.


RAGE: Thank you so much, Lorianne!