News & Blog by Taylor Stevens
Read the latest news and bulletins, essays, features, opinions from our bestselling authors. Find out what's being said, debated, and discussed in the world of books and ideas.
When THE INFORMATIONIST released in March of 2011, it seemed that the media and book reviewers focused nearly as much on detailing particulars of my own life story as they did on the novel itself. This was understandable. I was born into and raised within The Children of God, a rather controversial and notorious apocalyptic cult spun out of the 1960’s Jesus Movement. In lieu of schooling,...
Many who’ve read THE INFORMATIONIST have asked if I see myself as Vanessa Michael Munroe, the kick-ass gender-bending chameleon heroine of the story, or if in some way she is modeled after me or anyone I have met. The answer is a very boring no—although if I had to pick an alter ego, Munroe would definitely be the one. However, the idea of Munroe’s gender neutrality did come from real life...
Reading Robert Ludlum’s Bourne series cemented my decision to become a writer—a rather spontaneous, spur-of-the-moment flash of “I want to do this. Wait. I can do this.” There was no way I could have known at the time, struggling as I was to find a place in the world, with no education and no career path in sight, fighting for every dollar, that because of Robert Ludlum, my life would change...
I was fourteen the first time I heard of Equatorial Guinea. With a postage stamp in one hand, and a world atlas on the floor, I’d set out in a quest to track down the origin of this place called Guinea Ecuatorial. I had already lived on three continents and in roughly a dozen countries, so I’d been around a bit and I wasn’t searching in, say, South America. I did eventually find my prize: two...
Born and raised into the Children of God, an apocalyptic religious cult that didn’t allow education beyond sixth grade, or access to television and books from the outside, I’d spent most of my life insulated from popular culture. By the time I was an adult and free of the cult, and had started writing THE INFORMATIONIST, I’d read perhaps thirty novels, most of them thrillers, and most of them,...
My background is, perhaps, a little unusual for a novelist, in that I was born and raised into the Children of God, an apocalyptic religious cult that believed education beyond sixth grade was a waste of time and didn’t allow access to television and books from the outside. Whereas many writers spend years reading voraciously before setting out to hone their craft, I grew up in a popular culture...
