Nina Munteanu doing an interview on SiriusXM Radio
Being a Smart Reporter
Whether you’re writing non-fiction or fiction, at some point in your research you may need to conduct an interview. It might be a local police officer who handled a case similar to something you are writing about; it might be a scientist in the university who has critical information on something covered in your story; it might be a friend who has experienced something you wish to get first-hand knowledge of for one of your characters. Either way, you need to conduct your interview professionally, efficiently and with sufficient thoroughness and accuracy to get what you need.
In other words, you need to be a good journalist.
Pillars of Good Journalism
The pillars of good journalism include: 1) thoroughness; 2) accuracy; 3) fairness; and 4) transparency.
These days, thoroughness means more than exhausting your resources, real or virtual. It also includes getting input from your readers, says Robin Good, online publisher and new media communication expert.
Likewise, says Good, being accurate may include saying what you don’t know and being open to input from your readership; this invites dialogue between you and your respected reader. The key, of course, is respect.
Which brings us to fairness: this includes listening to different viewpoints and incorporating them into your journalism. Fairness, says Good, is about letting people respond and listening to them, particularly if they disagree with you. Both learn from the experience.
And, lastly, part of being transparent is revealing and making accessible to your readers your source material.
Things to Consider When Doing That Interview
As a writer it’s guaranteed that you will at some time require information from a real person. Depending on the nature of your research and its intended destination and audience, you may wish to conduct anything from a casual phone or email enquiry to a full-blown formal face-to-face interview. This will also depend on who you are interviewing, from a neighbor to a government official.
In an article in Writer’s Digest, Joy Lanzendorfer suggests that you adopt the following tactics to get your interview further than the basics and to fully take advantage of your source (oh, I didn’t mean it that way!):
- Do your research ahead of time: read up on your subject and include both sides of an issue (if that’s relevant). This helps you to respond intelligently with better follow-up questions.
- Ask open-ended questions: avoid yes and no questions and get them to elaborate. Asking “why” solicits explanation, which will give your article depth.
- Ask for examples: this provides a personal aspect to the article that gives it warmth and makes it more interesting.
- Ask personal questions: what’s the worst thing that can happen? They can simply say “no”; the up side is you may get a gem. The personal angle from the interviewee’s perspective gives your article some potential emotional aspect that gives it human-interest.
- Ask the interviewee for any further thoughts to share: it’s an innocuous question, but can offer-up more gems. What it provides you with is the possibility of getting something you might not have thought of, sparked by your conversation.
Don’t be afraid to confirm names, places or any facts your interviewee brings up. This will inspire confidence in them about the thoroughness and accuracy in your reporting.
What NOT to Say…
In an article in Writer’s Digest, Nancie Hudson gives the following excellent advice about what you should never say to a source:
- “There’s no rush.”—never reveal your deadline. Think about it; what do you normally do when there’s a deadline? Right … If you’re going to share a deadline, say it’s sooner than it really is.
- “I’ve never covered this topic before.”—this kind of information is inappropriate and may make your interviewee uncomfortable (and worried about your unproven abilities to properly interview her instead of focusing on herself and what you’re interviewing her about). Besides, it’s not what you know but what you learn that counts.
- “I’ll be using what you say extensively.”—don’t assume and make promises you may not be able to keep, until after the interview.
- “I don’t get it.”—if you don’t understand something, get clarification rather than making a negative remark that tends to stop them dead in their tracks.
- “you can review the piece before it’s published.”—this is something that can be dealt with over the phone to confirm facts; the source doesn’t need to see the whole piece before it’s published.
- “This is going to be a fantastic article!”—keep your tone professional; there’s nothing wrong with being positive, but you should maintain a professional attitude that inspires confidence in the interviewee rather than giddy wild energy.
References
Good, Robin. “The Pillars of Good Journalism”. In: Master New Media: http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2005/01/29/the_pillars_of_good_journalism.htm
Hudson, Nancie. 2007. “6 Things You Should Never Say to a Source”. In: Writer’s Digest. April, 2007.
Lanzendorfer, Joy. 2008. “Interview Tactics”. In: Writer’s Digest. February, 2008.
Munteanu, Nina. 2009. “The Fiction Writer: Get Published, Write Now!” Starfire World Syndicate. Chapter “I”.
Nina Munteanu is an ecologist, limnologist and internationally published author of award-nominated speculative novels, short stories and non-fiction. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books.
After she and fellow colonists crash land on the hostile jungle planet of Mega, rebel-scientist Izumi, widower and hermit, boldly sets out against orders on a hunch that may ultimately save her fellow survivors—but may also risk all. As the other colonists take stock, Izumi—obsessed with discovery and the need to save lives—plunges into the dangerous forest, which harbors answers, not only to their freshwater problem, but ultimately to the nature of the universe itself. Mega was a goldilocks planet—it had saltwater and supported life—but the planet also possessed magnetic-electro-gravitational anomalies and a gravitational field that didn’t match its size and mass. The synchronous dance of its global electromagnetic field suggested self-organization to Izumi, who slowly pieced together Mega’s secrets: from its “honeycomb” pools to the six-legged uber-predators and jungle infrasounds—somehow all connected to the water. Still haunted by the meaningless death of her family back on Mars, Izumi’s intrepid search for life becomes a metaphoric and existential journey of the heart that explores how we connect and communicate—with one another and the universe—a journey intimately connected with water.
Fingal’s Cave
Fingal’s Cave is a sea cave on the uninhabited island of Staffa in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. The cave is formed entirely from hexagonally jointed basalt columns in a Paleocene lava flow (similar to the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland). Its entrance is a large archway filled by the sea. The eerie sounds made by the echoes of waves in the cave, give it the atmosphere of a natural cathedral. Known for its natural acoustics, the cave is named after the hero of an epic poem by 18th century Scots poet-historian James Macpherson. Fingal means “white stranger”.
Nina Munteanu is an ecologist and internationally published author of novels, short stories and essays. She coaches writers and teaches writing at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. For more about Nina’s coaching & workshops visit 
Reiterating Jim Tovey’s earlier comment on the water treatment plant as its own sculpture-art, Munteanu celebrated the location and the nature of the exhibit: “When technology, art and ecology are celebrated together, you get magic.”
Nina Munteanu is an ecologist, limnologist and internationally published author of award-nominated speculative novels, short stories and non-fiction. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit 
In December 2017, “Water”, the first of Reality Skimming Press’s Optimistic Sci-Fi Series was released in Vancouver, BC. I was invited to be one of the editors for the anthology, given my passion for and experience with water.
In the years that followed, Reality Skimming Press published several works, including the “Megan Survival” Anthology for which I wrote a short story, “
Nina Munteanu is an ecologist and internationally published author of award-nominated speculative novels, short stories and non-fiction. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit 
I’m not a very patient person. I make no time for writer’s block or lingering in useless limbo over some plot issue or misbehaving minor character. I write pretty much to a tight schedule: this short story to that market by this date; edits to this book to the editor by that date; blog posts created by such and such a time; an article to another market by another date. It goes on and on. When I go to my computer to write, I write.
Pinned in the moment, my mind first struggles with the need to pound out the next line. My mind then rephrases and teases out nuances of that line. Finally, it wanders out with my gaze and I find myself daydreaming in a kind of trance. Giving in to the cat-purr-meditation.
Arizona State University’s Imagination and Climate Futures Initiative is again hosting a Climate Fiction Short Story Contest. In years past they invited writers from around the world to submit speculative fiction stories that explore climate change to narrate a world in flux. Previous contests received submissions from 67 different countries and 12 finalists were published in a digital anthology “Everything Change”.
When I was just beginning as a novelist, the publisher guideline request “submit a synopsis and sample chapters” was intimidating to say the least. There was something terrifyingly daunting about writing a succinct compelling summary of my 300-page novel packaged into just a few pages. As author Katherine Eliska Kimbriel said, “The instinctive response [of the author] is to clap on a helmet and start digging a trench.” I had a right to be terrified. In some ways the synopsis is the hardest thing for a novelist to write. Yet it is the first thing most publishers and agents want (and have time) to see of your cherished project (aside from those sample chapters, of course). Every fiction writer who wants to sell in the current market must know how to write a synopsis because that’s what an editor wants to see first. Most editors (if they’re good) are overworked with scarce enough time to answer their phones, much less their emails.
A synopsis of your novel goes beyond the outline to help polish elements of story arc, characterization with plot and setting with story. The synopsis can answer questions perplexing the author, stuck on a scene or plot item. It helps you weave your novel’s elements into a well-integrated story that is compelling at many levels. Because the synopsis is based on emotional turning points (related to theme), character dramatization of the premise is a key foundation. It makes sense to write drafts of your synopsis as you go along in the novel; that way it’s useful to both you and to the editor and then it’s more or less written when you need to submit it along with sample chapters…and not quite as daunting a task either.
