Staciee Says: Lisa Clark

Fabulous-o, soon-to-be kick-ass journo-girl, Staciee, asked author-girl, Lisa Clark if she could interview her for her ‘meedja’ coursework.

Lisa, who secretly really rather loves being interviewed, said: “Me? Are you sure? Why, of course Miss Staciee, I would LOVE to!“
Check out Staciee’s radular talent and find out all about author-girl, Lisa Clark after the jump!

In a flurry of pink, Lisa Clark has her own franchise of books - the ‘Lola Love’ go-for-it guide series – the first of which, Think Pink and Beauty*Licious were published in 2007. There are two new titles to come this year - Viva La Diva and It’s a Girl Thing, along with the release of her first two fiction books in a brand-new, Lola based series.

Her first book was Think Pink. In her own words, ‘Think Pink is the essential go-for-it guide for teens and tweens.’

In a country where 94% of girls have low self-esteem, the book is a blessing, and there is nobody better to get these girls thinking pink than Lisa. When she’s not writing amazing books for girls, she’s answering problems in Mizz magazine, if that’s not enough she’s qualified in teen life coaching, counselling, youth work AND she’s a PSHE practitioner. So, she pretty much knows what she’s talking about.

She’s persistent too, she broke into the magazine industry with sheer determination and a bit of cheeky pestering.

“I was an obsess-o girl about the magazine J17 as a teen girl. I knew I really wanted to write for them, so I wrote for the local paper, got some clips together and kept pestering J17 in a nice way, natch, with feature ideas. This went on for 3 years, I’d send lots of feature ideas to all the teen mags and I’d keep getting back very polite ‘Thank you, but no thank you’ notes from the editors.

Then one day - probably tired of the relentless pestering - the gorgeous Sarra Manning (author of Diary of a Crush) who was Acting ed on J17 at the time, took pity on me and invited me up to J17 for an internship - I got to write features, learn how a real magazine really worked, and know what they really wanted in terms of ideas. When I finished, I kept in contact with the mag and they commissioned me features. Once I’d been printed in J17 it was much easier to persuade other ed-girls to commission me too!”

It is perhaps because somebody listened to her, that she has such empathy for young hopeful writers and journalists.
Alongside ‘Think Pink’, Lisa runs www.pink-world.co.uk, a webzine accompanying the book, where she posts articles promoting small jewellery and fashion sites, as well as writing about inspirational people. She even encourages young writers to display their own work on the site, she’s posted my own work on there a few times.

I ask her what advice she has for hopeful journalists.
“Write, every day - whether it’s in a journal, a blog, a letter - just write. Be persistent - if someone doesn’t like what you do, don’t stop until you find someone who does. Ask for help - find a mentor, someone doing the job already, and ask for help and advice.”

She tells me when she first discovered she had a knack for writing…
“I used to make my family little books for their Christmas presents with my own illustrations when I was about 8, I won’t remind them as they’ll only try and put ‘em on ebay for 50p! Then I discovered penpalling, it’s what the cool kids did before Myspace y’know! I had about 30 penpals across the world and writing letters and trying to make them fun was deffo a great way to hone my skill!”

Lisa has got it good. It’s the dream job for all writers, to write and get paid for it. The fact she’s freelance is even better, she gets to write in her pyjamas! She shares what else she loves about being a writer…
“You get to create your own world, new pals to hang out with in your imagination- it’s the best form of escapism from the real world! I like that I can create something that has an impact on people that read it. It’s the best job in whole wide world.”

And the best part so far?
“My favourite thing was when my agent rang to tell me that the publishers wanted to buy Think Pink - I cried. Then seeing the first cover, and then seeing the first book - ahhh, happy days!”

This is by no means the end for Lisa though, there really is not stopping her.

“I’ve only just started! I want Lola to be a huge success - I’d LOVE to see workshops, websites, films and lots and lots of books, I’d love to write more books with fab new characters too, I’d love to create a hugely successful online magazine, I’d love to live in the country, to live in San Francisco, travel to China, Japan and New Zealand and get myself a cute puggle called Frodo.”