Janet Stilson

Janet Stilson lives in two worlds. On the one hand, she is a journalist. On the other, she writes scripts, novels and short stories that largely fall in the grounded sci-fi and fantasy genres and illuminate the human condition in provocative ways.

Her work has been selected to be part of the Writers' Lab for Women, which is funded by Meryl Streep and Nicole Kidman. And it’s also been published by the esteemed sci-fi literary magazine Asimov’s. As a journalist, Janet got her "chops" at the storied showbiz bible Variety. She has traveled the world, chronicling the business of media and entertainment. It afforded her many busman's holidays in places like Shanghai and Paris, for which she is forever grateful. Along the way, she interviewed lots of executives about many aspects of showbiz—most notably, where the heck we're all going. Janet lives in New York City with her husband and two mischievous cats.

Twitter: @JanetStilson 

Are there particular films that have influenced your writing?

Yes. There are several. I’ll tell you about one. I always come back to watching Chinatown, written by Robert Towne, directed by Roman Polanski. There’s something elegant about the way it unwraps secrets and mysteries, some of which are quite intricate. Frightening and suspenseful moments give way to tenderness and vulnerability. I love that kind of broad canvas.

Towne’s script is a stellar example of how screenwriters paint with emotions. Film scripts are like skeletons, to me. The writer lays out the groundwork that (hopefully) inspires the cast and crew. And Towne gave Polanski, Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway and John Huston such a beautifully structured base – to say nothing of cinematographer John Alonzo and composer Jerry Goldsmith. (I’m hearing the sultry soundtrack in my head as I write this!)

What period of history do you wish you knew more about?

I would love to have experienced Paris in the 1920s and ’30s, when Henry Miller, Ernest Hemingway, Collette, Brassaï and Pablo Picasso were about and art deco was flourishing.

Not all books are for all readers… when you start a book and you just don’t like it, how long do you read until you bail?

Here’s a round-about answer to your question. Some books speak to me at certain points in my life, and at other times not so much. I had that experience years ago with Roddy Doyle’s Paddy Clarke Ha, Ha, Ha. Just couldn’t get past the first 50 pages. A few years later, I picked it up again and was so amused by it.

On the flip side, last year I picked up Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. I’ve read that book several times, but I just couldn’t keep going this last time. Anna made me impatient in a way she hadn’t when I was younger. Maybe that reaction will change again over time.

To answer your question more specifically, I probably give a book a chance to fire up my imagination in the first 50 pages. If I’m not transported by that time, it doesn’t seem worth continuing. At least, not at that point in time.

Is there a work of art that you love. Why? Have you ever visited it in person?

Yes! My favorite work of art is the painting “Family Reunion” by Frédéric Bazille. In fact, I wrote it into one of the most critical scenes in my novel, The Juice.

In the picture, an elegant, mid-19th century family is gathered for tea in a garden. And some of them stare out directly at the painting’s viewer rather primly, as if the person has just entered the party and dropped a china cup. Others look out more benignly.

When I’m there before the painting, I feel as if I’ve just sauntered into the garden wearing mud-spattered breeches, hair all tangled. And I let loose a few curses just to enjoy the reactions. Whenever I’ve visited it in the Musée D’Orsay in Paris, I have always enjoyed that.

Vacation druthers… City or Rural destination? Why?

Both feed me in different, but utterly delicious ways. If I’m traveling with my husband, David, we usually visit cities, seeping in the layers of history and art, enjoying the street life. In 2019, we took in some of Italy’s smaller cities – Padua, Mantua, Siena. They entranced us, and we wished we had been able to stay longer. The year before, we fell in love with Mexico City, Puebla and the city of Oaxaca.

Many times my “vacation” is actually a writer’s retreat – a place where I can plunge more deeply into my novels and scripts and become inspired by natural beauty. On those occasions, I often travel with a very gifted painter pal, Elinore Hollinshead. We’ve found great inspiration as artists in residence in an ancient manor in the Languedoc region of southern France, cabanas in the rain forests of Costa Rica, a beach house in El Salvador and atop an arid California mountain where roadrunners dash and coyotes sing into the night.