Boy falls for girl. Boy kisses girl. Boy has to move away from girl. Boy lights a whole building on fire to try to get back to girl? This is only part of C.D. Payne’s hilarious novel, “Youth In Revolt,” a coming-of-age story starring a 14-year-old boy, Nick Twisp. Released in 1993, the novel finally made its way to the big screen this past month. Payne spoke exclusively to Release about writing, arson and all things Nick.

Release: What got you started writing?

C.D. Payne: I worked out of college in the newspaper field for a while trying to be a writer of short humor pieces, but there wasn’t much of a market. Eventually I wound up doing catalog writing for years. I tried over the years writing short humor pieces and then tried writing a novel and found out that that was pretty much what I was best equipped to do. I basically fell into writing by a process of elimination. I was a history major in school and didn’t really study writing. With a standard liberal arts degree a lot of people go in to these kinds of fields.

Release: When did the idea for “Youth in Revolt” first come to you?

CDP: In the early ’80s, I wrote a short humor piece written by a kid similar to Nick. Basically, it was his 12th birthday or something and he was writing a letter to his parents assessing his life up to that point. I didn’t really do anything with that piece, but the idea stuck in my mind for a long time and I thought if I wrote a novel with that and do it in diary form it would be more interesting. I started writing in 1989 and the novel took about three years to write.

Release: What was your inspiration for Nick Twisp’s character? Was he modeled after anyone in your life?

CDP: I pretty much just made him up. Some of the other characters were modeled after people I knew, but Nick just sort of appeared fully formed.

Release: What made you think of the crazy situations that Nick gets himself into?

CDP: I torture the protagonist and so I just put him in as many scrapes as possible. I didn’t have it planned out or anything, one thing just kind of led to another.

Release: Did you have fun while writing the novel and coming up with the plot?

CDP: At the time I was working three days a week at a catalog so the novel was good because it gave me a break. Sometimes at work I would just think about what could happen next and then ideas would come to me. Overall, yeah it was a fun book to write. I would occasionally remark to my wife that Nick would be doing some fun stuff that week.

Release: Would you advise your readers to follow Nick’s example for pursuing their love interests?

CDP: Oh sure, yeah, a little jail time never hurt anybody. It’s an opportunity for growth, but they should probably stay away from arson.

Release: How did the idea for the movie version of “Youth in Revolt” come about?

CDP: It took about 14 years. The first option was in 1995 and it would be a TV series. It just sort of bounced around and I didn’t have much input into the script, but I was just happy that it finally got the green light. There were times when I thought they would never make the movie and there were times when it would be making good progress but then the studio would get bought by someone else and it would come to an end again.

Release: Were you very involved in the process of adapting the novel to a screenplay?

CDP: No I wasn’t involved, the screenplay went through a lot of reworking from its original form but I was not involved.

Release: Do you feel the movie has captured the essence of your book and will appeal to the Nick’s fans?

CDP: I saw smaller versions and from what I saw yeah, it can only take fragments of the book but I think it captures the essence of Nick.

Release: Were you happy with Michael Cera as Nick?

CDP: Yeah, he also helped with the script and he and the director pretty much rewrote the original one. There’s not much from the original script for the new version. Both also picked the music, he definitely had more input than most actors in the making of the movie. If the movie had happened years ago he would have been younger but as far as I know I think he was the only person really considered for the role.

Release: What piece of advice have you carried with you from your childhood?

CDP: I’m pretty much a guy who doesn’t take advice and I’m pretty much a low-key guy. I never get too excited or worried by anything so in the writing business that’s helpful.