When I got my monthly email about needing an article for a
newsletter I contribute to, I’d just sent off my fifth Thea Campbell
mystery to the final editor. I was feeling more than a bit tapped-out and was
wondering if I would be able to summon any words. I cast about for inspiration
and was, pretty much, finding nothing. Then it occurred to me that perhaps
inspiration and how we corral it would be a good topic. After all, each of us
deal with it – or the lack of it.
What a great idea! I could write about Nothing (notice the
capital).
We’ve all been there, right? -- The “I got nothing” for the
next book/story. I’ll bet 99% of us have even designed the T-shirt. I’ll also
bet we each have a pattern we follow in order to grab inspiration by the throat
and tie her to the chair.
I usually start a story with a body. Sometimes I don’t know
who it is or how they died, but I know something,
and I start to build the plot around that. The organic, story-growing process
for me always moves next into why that person has been killed, and then who would do such a thing.
I know a number or writers who joyfully dive into their
story without a single notion of “who done it.” I’ve tried that approach, and
it doesn’t work for me. I find I actually enjoy getting to know my villain.
Sometimes there are several antagonists and I frankly relish poking around in
their warped little minds (a bit of confession here: I freaked myself out
researching the villain for this latest mystery) (seriously).
Sometimes it isn’t a character, but an event. Maybe it’s
singular, like the I-5 bridge collapse in Mt. Vernon, Washington (we can hope
it’s a singular event, although from what I’ve been reading about the state of
our state’s bridges, we should worry). Maybe it’s an ongoing social phenomenon
like insider trading, or identity theft. Maybe it’s something as old as the
ages like sibling rivalry.
Okay, now that I’ve confessed to the Big Void and my usual plan
for conquering it, what about you? Do you like to spend quality time with the
bad-guys? Are they your inspiration? What kinds of things scream “story
material” at you? What stokes the “what if” spark into the kind of fire that
makes you write the story?
