… An avid reader asked me the other day where I get my ideas from and
specifically whether I'd been given a particular remit for a short story of
mine that she had read recently. The
first part - well, that's a really big question - but the second aspect is much
more easily answered. Read on…
My ideas come
from anything and everything around me.
A chance remark overheard on a train or at the bus stop. A picture on a wall that makes me ask myself
a question, the ensuing answer often being an idea that I can run with for a
story or a story arc in one of my novels.
My ideas come at any time of the day, but most often when I'm
undertaking menial tasks such as peeling vegetables for lunch, ironing,
cleaning the bathroom or vacuuming the carpets. Such tasks require little or no intellectual input and I'm afraid
my brain just has to find something to keep itself occupied. A great many of my ideas spring up at such times.
But that's not all. Things I experience also become ideas. For example, whilst I was visiting the Cévennes in September 2007, the weather changed overnight and I awoke the next morning, September 29th, to snow and a pristine and white landscape. It was whilst I was watching the flakes of snow twirling past the window that it occurred to me that if someone had some terrible misdeed to hide, snow could be very useful. Later that morning, the opening lines of Messandrierre were crafted and a rough outline for a story was formed and jotted down in my notebook. From that idea to finished book took a lot more thinking and a great deal of hard work. In my current book, Montbel, the weather also plays a part. Jacques and Beth are discussing their future plans and I decided that it might bring a note of doubt into the reader's mind if the conversation was brought to an abrupt end because of the weather. The storm that is described in that scene was yet another experience from my time in the Cévennes in 2017. So, it's true my ideas really do come from anything
and everything around me.
As for the
second part of the question, writing to a remit. Yes, it can be constraining but it
can also be liberating, as I
found when I was asked to contribute to the Miss Moonshine anthology. At
the point at which I joined the project, Miss Moonshine was an
already
partially formed character. As I started to write my story I found I
couldn't hear her voice very clearly in my head and I wasn't totally sure of
exactly who she was as an individual. A couple of lunches with the other
ladies who form Authors on the Edge and
the sketchiness began
to become more defined. I realised that Miss M had her own magic, that
she was timeless, that she behaved impeccably and had her own style.
Through our discussions and supporting email exchanges I understood that she
was all things to all people and she became the person she needed to be for
each of the stories in the anthology.
So much about writing is
solitary and those lunches with my fellow authors gave me the confidence to
venture into a completely different genre from the one I normally write.
It was a wonderful opportunity to work collaboratively for a change. And
I think that, perhaps, Miss Moonshine's magic might also have been at work,
too.
Another fellow Author on the Edge will be visiting the blog next month, so watch this space...
You can read previous posts from Authors on the Edge
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