Recently I put out a call for people to do interviews for the blog. We have featured many interviews throughout the life of the blog, ranging from the staff here at GA, to the authors. Todays interview isn't with one of the many authors here at Gay Authors, she is actually one of the prolific reviewers on site who also carries the title of Editor. Please enjoy this interview with Lisa and thank you Percy for conducting the interview!

Interviewer: Percy

GA was started to connect authors with readers. Readers can often be the silent members of the Gay Authors community, but I figured it was high time we heard from one of them here in the GA News blog. At over 1,960 reviews, Lisa is one of the most interactive readers on GA and happily for the authors, she’s far from silent. She also serves as an editor for several authors. I was thrilled when she agreed to answer my questions about what inspires her to read and review.

Have you always been such a prolific reader?

I'm pretty sure I was born with a book in my hand. In high school, I used to bring my paperbacks to school and read them in between classes. One day in Geography, the teacher called on me but I didn't hear him because I was reading my book! I had the book in between the Geography book. He gave me detention for a week. I was so friggen HAPPY! For one hour extra per day, for five days, I had to go to detention and, you guessed it, READ to my heart's content!!!!! So yes, I was always a voracious reader.

How did you first make your way to GA?

I've been at GA for three years now. September was my three-year anniversary. "Desert Dropping" by Dom Luka was the first story I ever read on GA. I was in another site [that] recommended this story and the link was the story link at GA.

What prompted you to start editing here?

I am a little fuzzy on the details, but I think Sid (Sidlove), was responsible for that. He was writing on another site and he wrote a few Nuke stories. (Luke and Noah from "As the World Turns"). I used to watch that show just for the Nuke storyline so I started reading his stories. When I got to GA, he suggested I write down that I was an editor (I was currently editing a bunch of stories on another site), and that way he could use me as his editor.

What’s the hook that gets you to read a story? Is it the description written by the author? The genre? The tags they choose? Other reviews people have left?

For some odd reason, I love reading high school or college-aged stories. So if 'teen' or 'college' is in the story tag, I would definitely want to check it out. I'm boring and just like normal stories. Last year when KC posted his "Shepherd's Crook" story, he didn't put 'ghost' in the story tag until at least a couple of weeks into the story. By that time it was too late for me and I had to finish the story anyway. Lol. But if I had seen that first, I would have never read it. And of course I would have missed out, so now maybe I should re-think my prejudices. It's not only teen stories I read. It also depends on the author's description of the story. There are many others I read such as "Dust & Ash" which doesn't revolve around school.

What inspires you to leave a comment?

I know authors work very hard at their stories and they love hearing what people think of them. I know that when I leave a really good comment, I'm anxious to find out what the author thought of it, so I can imagine how I would feel if I were an author and waiting for readers to comment on my story.

I also like commenting if I can relate to what's happening with a character. There was a story on GA about a year ago (maybe a little longer than a year), about a high school boy whose mom had a pretty bad case of OCD. I always loved reading the updates because I could relate to that so much. My ex had OCD for many, many years and drove me absolutely insane. I could relate so much to the kid in the story. The author never finished the story, which was too bad.

Do you ever try to influence the direction a story takes with your comments? I would think that would be tempting if you know the author is still writing as the chapters are being posted!

It's so funny you ask this. Over on the site where I started, there have been reviews I've left where I said something like, "Wouldn't it be great if so and so happened...?" and then in the next chapter, that very same thing I said was written. But who knows? The author may have planned that all along. I never try purposely to influence an author's direction.

Any advice for offering up constructive criticism when leaving feedback or even figuring out if an author is receptive to that sort of comment?

If the grammar is poor and there are typos, etc. I will comment on that. Most of the time it's because the author isn't a native English speaker. There have been a few times where I just would stop reading because I couldn't get through a sentence without grimacing. In other cases, the storyline was so good that I just had to grin and bear it.

I will point out a problem to the author once, even though I may see continuous errors in later chapters. I don't want to be known as the pain-in-the-ass reviewer who only finds faults with the writing. I do find that there aren't that many readers who will call an author out on poor writing.

My feeling is if you are an author and you want people reading and LIKING your story, it better be good. You just can't throw up any old thing online and call it 'writing.’ The way a story is written is a reflection on the author and if it's not as perfect as the author can get it (with other people looking at it if necessary), then don't put it up there!!!!!

I do read for enjoyment, but if I'm cringing at every other word, I'm going to give up.

Any advice for authors posting here on GA?

Just re-read, re-read, re-read your chapters! Don't post anything until it has been re-read to death! Don't take all comments about your story personally; if you rile someone up, that might be a good thing because you got some reaction out of him. Oh, if a reader fails to review a new chapter posting, it is probably because they're really busy and they will get to the story as soon as they can. I keep a running list of stories I need to catch up on and when I have a few minutes, I start reading them.

Lots of good advice in here for both readers and writers. Many thanks for agreeing to be interviewed, Lisa!

If you would like to do an interview for the blog, please let me know via PM! Thank you and don't forget to follow in Lisa's footsteps and REVIEW!!!!