Fortunes collide with a USU writer’s destiny
Catalysts come in all shapes and sizes. For novelist Stacy Lynn Carroll, that shape was a fortune cookie.
Carroll, 27, studied English with a creative writing emphasis at Utah State for three and a half years.After she was married, Carroll completed her schooling at the University of Utah.
Carroll said she refers to this time as her “dark period” because it did not compare to her experience at USU. Carroll published her first young-adult novel, “The Princess Sisters,” in October 2010.
“I always loved to write stories,” Carroll said. “I never really thought of it as a career path, it was just fun.”
It wasn’t until she wrote a piece that went to the state level for a Reflections contest in ninth grade that Carroll realized she had a viable talent.
“I think winning that initial contest gave me the confidence,” Carroll said. “I had verification from outside sources other than my mom telling me I’m a good writer.”
While Carroll’s ultimate goal was always to be a writer and a stay-at-home mom, she said she was unable to immediately follow that dream. While working, she wrote the first half of her novel in a year and a half. Her husband was still in school, and after she became pregnant with her first child, Carroll debated about whether to stay at home and write or return to work as an administrative assistant for an engineering company.
“It was not a career, it was a job,” Carroll said.
It wasn’t until one fateful night of Chinese food that she made her dream a reality. Carroll opened her fortune cookie and read “The world will soon be ready to receive your talents.”
“I went to work the next day and quit my job,” Carroll said. “A fortune cookie changed my life. It sounds really silly but it was that final push I needed.”
Carroll said the fortune cookie is taped to her laptop.
Once Carroll made the “leap of faith” by quitting her job and becoming a full-time writer, she completed the last half of “The Princess Sisters” in six months, she said.
“My favorite part was the incredible accomplishment of finishing a book,” Carroll said. “I was practically ready to just jump up and down.”
“The Princess Sisters” is the story of five teenage cousins named Ariel, Aurora, Belle, Cinderella, and Snow White. The cousins are ridiculed for their unusual names and develop unique characteristics as a result. For example, Ariel is terrified of water, and Aurora is an insomniac. They have to learn how to overcome and embrace these stereotypes while surviving the plights and romances of high school, Carroll said.
“It’s kind of a modern twist to these fairytales,” Carroll said. “You can’t have a princess book without a prince, or a couple princes.”
Carroll started other novels before “The Princess Sisters,” but met dead ends.
“They never went anywhere for me,” Carroll said. “I would just sit at my computer for hours and I could never get past a certain point.”
“The Princess Sisters” was different. When Carroll thought of the idea, she said she went home and wrote the entire prologue in one night.
“My characters kind of came to life more than they ever had, and they kind of wrote the story,” Carroll said.
Her characters took the story in a direction she did not expect, Carroll said.
“Every time I sat down at my computer, the story just came out of me. I finally had something that flowed,” she said.
Despite the flow, Carroll still experienced her moments of writer’s block. When caught in such a moment, Carroll said she would take a walk outside to clear her head and generate fresh ideas.
“I could see things and hear things and smell things and it would kind of restart my senses,” Carroll said. “If you try and force the writing, it’s never any good.”
Though the idea for “The Princess Sisters” was sparked by a conversation Carroll had with her husband about baby names, Carroll said she dreams most of her ideas.
“I tend to have very vivid dreams,” Carroll said. “All the time people are like, ‘your dreams could be movies or books.’ And I’m like, ‘I know,’ I don’t even know where they come from.”
Carroll pictures her story in her head like a movie, playing out scenarios in her mind and putting them to paper, she said.
“I’m inspired by my surroundings as well as things that have happened to me,” Carroll said. “Several chapters in the book take place at Utah State because I have so many good memories from up there.”
Star Coulbrooke, USU Writing Center Director and English professor, worked with Carroll in the Writing Center in 2005. Coulbrooke called Carroll an excellent writer.
“Stacy was one of my fabulous tutors,” Coulbrooke said. “It’s great to see her go on to get recognition for her successful book.”
Carroll is currently working on a sequel to “The Princess Sisters.” Originally, she had not planned for more than one installment, but the story turned into a trilogy.
“(The Princess Sisters) would be like a 600-page book if I tried to fit everything I wanted to into one book,” Carroll said.
She said she has other, unrelated, ideas for future stories that she hopes to someday get out.
“I can’t really explain how writers kind of connect to their characters,” Carroll said.
To aspiring writers, Carroll said, “If you’re in writing just to make money, you’re not going to go anywhere. You have to be in it because you love to write.”
She also stressed the importance of writing daily. Carroll said she constantly has a notebook close by because if she doesn’t write an idea down instantly, she loses it.
“If you write one paragraph, one sentence or if you write five chapters in one night … write every day, no matter what,” Carroll said. “If you write every single day, you’ll end up with a book in the end, no matter how long it takes you. For years and years I thought, someday I’ll write a book. Sometimes you have to make it happen, which is kind of what I did.”
“The Princess Sisters” is available on Amazon.com and on the Barnes & Noble website.
– noelle.johansen@aggiemail.usu.edu