F.A.Q.
Updated
So these are some questions I've been asked
via email, or during book signings, or by various friends. The questions are in no particular
order. Enjoy! And feel free to send me more questions at
info@alexmcaulay.com.
Name your five favorite books.
1. "Lord of
the Flies" by William Golding
2. "The
Magus" by John Fowles (a great 1960's head-trip
thriller)
3. "The
Sheltering Sky" by Paul Bowles
4. "Sir Vidia's Shadow" by Paul Theroux
5. "The
Beach" by Alex Garland (an inspiration for Bad Girls)
Talk about your writing process.
I write late at night,
usually from
Where do you get your ideas from?
I've always had tons of
ideas (many of them crazy, only a few of them really good!) Sometimes it's hard to sort the bad ideas
from the good ones. Still, it's always
fun to pursue an idea and have it turn into a story. I don't know where they come from. Dreams, maybe?
What book do you wish you had written?
Alex Garland's "The
Beach", or maybe Conrad's "Heart of Darkness."
What celebrity do you look most like?
John
Lennon (or so they tell me). I actually got an offer from an agency my
first month out here to work as a John Lennon impersonator. Yes, I'm serious. It freaked me out so much I couldn't even blog about it. Do I
really look that much like him? Sheesh. Thank God people love him. It would be awful to look that much like
Jeffrey Dahmer or something!
Name your five favorite albums.
1. "Surfer
2. "Young
Americans" by David Bowie
3. "Dirty Mind" by
Prince
4. "Midnite
Vultures" by Beck (the ultimate soundtrack to
5. "The Sensual
World" by Kate Bush
Why did you move to
My wife Lisa got a job at
UCLA, and I'm working on a screenplay, so it made sense.
Talk about your music.
When I was in high school, I
played in an indie rock band called Vegetarian Meat
(yeah, stupid name, I know!) We got
signed by a label in NYC called No.6 Records that was part of Elektra Records,
while we were still in high school. We
released a couple singles and an album.
After that band broke up, I started making albums under my middle name
"Charles Douglas" that were released by a number of different
independent labels. I got to work with
Moe Tucker from The Velvet Underground and Joey Santiago from The Pixies, and
go on a couple tours. I even got a
letter from David Bowie. It was a fun
time.
Where did you grow up?
My parents are from
What advice do you have for aspiring
writers?
Just read as many great
books as possible. I never learned much
in school or in creative writing classes, with a few notable exceptions! I mostly learned from reading stuff on my
own. My other advice is to keep at it,
and write a little bit every day. If you
write a couple pages every day, you will have a whole book done in just four or
five months.
Why does Bad Girls end kind of abruptly?
I just didn't think the book
needed any sort of "happy" epilogue.
It ended when it needed to end. I
didn't care much for Anna's parents, so I didn't want to see them come
back. In a way, Anna is more mature than
them by the end of the book. I wasn't
planning on leaving the door open for a sequel or anything (although it's
something I talked about with my editor—I think we both decided it wasn't a
great idea in the end. Most sequels
really suck). Anyway, the end is pretty
abrupt in retrospect, but I still kinda like it.
Name your five favorite films.
1. "Body Double"
directed by Brian de Palma
2. "A Clockwork
Orange" directed by Stanley Kubrick
3. "Blue Velvet"
directed by David Lynch
4. "Notorious"
directed by Alfred Hitchcock
5. "Wild at Heart"
directed by David Lynch
What's the best live concert you've ever
seen?
It's a four way tie for
first: The Breeders with Mudhoney in
Are you going to get a dog
sometime, or do you only like cats?
I love dogs,
but I'm pretty lazy, and I don't want to go walk them. We also live in an apartment in
Do you have any involvement in the film
version of Bad Girls?
I had a really great lunch with
the MTV executive in charge of the production (hi Carrie!) Other than that, I'm not super involved. A very talented writer named Holly Brix is writing the screenplay, and Michelle Manning is
producing (she worked on "Sixteen Candles" back in the day, and has
done a ton of great stuff at Paramount).
Is the fictional
Yup. I was
surprised so many readers caught this! I
guess you all are more up on geography and the Outer Banks of NC than I would
have thought.
Where do you see yourself in ten years?
Hopefully still alive! Writing books, making music, and directing
films.
Will you ever write a nonfiction book?
I'd be open to the
idea. I always wanted to write a book
about my misadventures in the "Grunge" years. I got to work with, hang out with, or meet:
members of The Pixies, The Velvet Underground, Nirvana, Dinosaur Jr., The
Breeders, Luna, They Might Be Giants, Pavement, Eugenius,
Busta Rhymes, Braniac,
Guided by Voices, Grand Mal and St. Johnny, Mercury Rev, and too many more!
What celebrities would you like to meet?
J.D. Salinger,
Thomas Pynchon, and The Wachowski Brothers.
Who are your heroes.
The
Flaming Lips.
Do you get along well with your parents?
Most of the time, we get
along really well.
Is Hilary Duff and/or Lindsay Lohan going to be in the film version of Bad Girls?
This rumor has been pretty
persistent since before the book even got released! But I don't think it's going to happen…
still, who knows.
Do you believe in God?
Maybe. I'm skeptical
of organized religion, but concede that God (or some form of alien life that
helped "create" the universe as we know it) probably exists, or
existed. But I don't really know
anything! Ask a priest or a rabbi!
How did you get your agent and get
published?
I wrote a letter to the
novelist and musician Matt O'Keefe who lived nearby in
Does
Yes. I lived there for a month when I was 15. It's a very strange place, almost exactly
like I described it in the book. The
character of Cici in the book is based on an actual
old woman who lived out in the jungle.
The island is huge and almost completely desolate—very spooky at
night. When I was there, one of the
islanders was having an alcohol-fueled mental breakdown and menaced me and a
friend with his hunting knife. Later
that night, he stalked a female marine biologist working nearby and then set
fire to a bunch of trees, trying to start a massive forest fire. A posse of locals caught him, tied him up,
and tossed him in the back of a pickup truck.
We never saw him again, and were advised not to discuss the incident. It was that kind of place!
What kind of person/student were you like
high school?
Luckily I went to a very
small non-traditional private school (we didn't even have a football team and
there were less than 30 kids in my class) so my oddball tendencies were
nurtured rather than crushed. I was really
into punk and indie rock music, but I was also geeky and studied a lot.
I was so into music, I figured that would be my career in some way,
shape or form. I'm not sure how I ended
up writing books.
Who is your favorite fictional character
from your books?
Reyna from "
Which of your fictional characters are you
most like?
All of
them.
Now that you're living in
Fortunately most
celebrities are relatively cool, and I would never think to bother them. However, some semi-well known types are
frankly horrible people (such as the author of "Prep"—I don't even
know her name, but she was really rude to my wife for no reason, and Ryan Adams
is also a total jerk off.... I'm sure that surprises no one).
What was your favorite celebrity
encounter?
Don
Cheadle (at the Budget Rent-A-Car in
What is your favorite recent YA book?
"Looking for
Alaska" by John Green is really good.
Do you like living in
Love it!
How do you think you are going to die?
As I'm planning to
cryogenically freeze my body and reenter society 3,000 years from now, this
question has no real answer.
What sign are you?
Aquarius.
Do you like the cover art for your books?
Absolutely! I especially like "Bad Girls" and
"
What is your favorite food?
Hamburgers and French fries
(yeah, I know, I know). Lasagna is a
close second.
Do you smoke, drink, or do drugs?
No, Yes, No.
Now that you live in
I would need
some convincing!
What's the weirdest book,
movie, music you've ever encountered—not that you necessarily liked it...
The weirdest
movies are probably "El Topo" by Alejandro Jodorowsky and "Riddles of the Sphinx" by Laura Mulvey (I actually quite liked both of them). The weirdest book would be J.G. Ballard's
"Atrocity Exhibition" which I thought was unreadable, although
Ballard is one of my favorite authors.
The book is basically just a big jumbled collage without a plot. There's tons of weird music out there (I
generally love weird music, I have to admit).
I think the weirdest song I've heard is "Gretchen's New Dish"
which can be found on the American Song Poem collection released by Bar/None
Records. Words cannot do it justice!
Will you come to my school and read?
That depends on where you
live! I like to go to places and
read. It's fun. If your school is in or
around
Do you listen to music when you write?
Yes. This week it's Beck, Jule Brown, The Brakes, The Strugglers, and many more.
Do you have any brothers or sisters?
Nope. But I did grow up with a bunch of cats and
dogs.
What is your favorite inspirational quote,
or a quote from a book, movie or TV show?
I'm paraphrasing
here but, "Koala bears… they're telepathic! Plus they control the weather." (Bonus points if anyone can tell me what film
that's from.)
Keep the questions
coming, and I'll keep answering them…