Q&A with LA Bourgeois
Please welcome LA Bourgeois to our Featured Author Q&A series at Writer’s Fun Zone. Enjoy!
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If you’d like to be considered for an interview, check out our guidelines here.
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About LA Bourgeois
LA Bourgeois writes for the Writers Fun Zone as well as telling her tales in Diary of a Lesbian Housewyfe. She strives to be that heartfelt humorist who sits down for a chit-chat and makes you spit your tea across the tablecloth. Follow her for creativity and writing tips, and delightful stories for a queer-curious world.
On to Our Interview!
Q. Tell us who you are and what inspires you to write.
A. I’m LA Bourgeois, writer, coach, and the Lesbian Housewyfe. While my work often finds inspiration in the familiar, curiosity leads me into a wilderness filled with humor and the oddness of life. In general, my drive to create art inspires my writing action each day. Whenever I think of getting creative, I reach for a pen.
Q. How did you get to this place in your life? Share your story!
A. During the pandemic, I transitioned to freelance work and, along with the writing, I became a Kaizen-Muse Certified Creativity Coach. Then, in 2022, my mother died and I entered menopause. Talk about transitioning into your Crone years! Those events inspired me to stop waiting for other people to make my dreams happen. Thus, I began self-publishing my books (yes, there are more in this old head of mine) and promoting my Diary of a Lesbian Housewyfe column/newsletter.
Q. What are you most passionate about?
A. My mission on this planet is to delight and empower people to create joyfully.
Q. Can you tell us a little bit about your writing process, routine, and/or rituals around your writing?
A. I am very ritualized around my writing. Each day (except Sunday) begins with yoga, a cup of tea, and ten pages of a craft book (writing or creativity). A few minutes of journaling/morning pages and I jump into my writing. The majority of that work happens in the morning and I spend the afternoon responding to emails, marketing, and doing client work.
Q. What are a few challenges you faced in creating, marketing, or publishing your creative work? And your solutions to them.
A. Overall, making the time and space in my life to actually do the work of self-publishing was difficult for me. I ended up marking off a month where I put all of my extra energy into that process and that worked great.
The cover was my biggest challenge. I’m a word person, and images aren’t a strong part of my skill set. However, I did have an old piece of art (that I made) that I wanted to use. I cobbled together a cover for this first book, but in the future, I plan to work with a cover designer.
Finding the right tools was also a challenge. While Scrivener is my go-to word processing program, it’s not very user-friendly in terms of formatting a book. Atticus does that for me, and I’m very pleased with how my book looks, both in electronic and paperback.
Q. What do you wish you had known before you started writing fiction?
A. I can’t think of anything. Really, I didn’t have a choice. Writing is something non-negotiable for me. Even if I’d never decided to write for a living, I would still be writing.
Q. What’s next for you in your creative work?
A. I have another essay collection going through its final edit, and a Christmas ghost story that I’ll be releasing after Thanksgiving for my Diary of a Lesbian Housewyfe readers. I’m also working on a book that describes how my creativity coaching tools helped me survive the transitions of the past few years.
Q. Is there anything else you wished I’d asked? Please share!
A. Along with the coaching and writing, I’m also working as a developmental editor. That work is a wonderful creative outlet as well!
Diary of a Lesbian Housewyfe: Delightful Stories, Yummy Recipes & Gay Household Hints by LA Bourgeois
This delightfully funny collection of essays includes recipes and household hints from the first twenty years of marriage for LA Bourgeois, Lesbian Housewyfe. Here you’ll find
Stories of life and love with great advice like “have sex while your parents are in the house,” “coming out to the grocery bagger isn’t necessary,” and “adopt an organic lifestyle to avoid mowing.”
Recipes including her famous “You Can’t Make Me” Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookie – Guaranteed to keep you off the softball team!
Tips like how to groom your best friend’s dog and keep the seasoning on your cast-iron skillet.
Connect with LA Bourgeois
Site Link https://lesbianhousewyfe.substack.com/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/housewyfe/
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/la-bourgeois-16b7542b/
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/lahousewyfe
