Fanny Fae at Panhistoria asks: "Do you find that your real life leaks out into your fiction and vice versa? How do you deal with that?"

I find my real life leaks into my fiction surprisingly infrequently. My male characters tend to share my sexual and cultural interests because I suppose we all tend to write what we know best, even if its subconscious, but very little of the actual events and situations in my life find their way into my stories. Maybe because I write for escapism, to be something else or something more than all the crap in my real life? My real life does occasionally provide inspiration for my fiction in a very indirect way, I suppose. For example one of my characters was born from the jokes about gold teeth I shared with a Pan buddy following a RL visit to the dentists years ago now. No, I never got a gold tooth *chuckles* but the character born of the jokes about my wish for one remains.

My mood leaks, though, even if my actions don't. If I'm sad, depressed, angry, then (if I write at all) I'll write one of my moody characters. If I'm feeling giddy and high-spirited, then I'm more likely to write something off the wall.

As for fiction leaking into my real life, well that would just be scary! Try explaining at job interviews that you ticked both the 'male' and 'female' box on the application form because you're actually a mystical hermaphrodite...