How we write

When we start to write, we start with an idea, a memory or an observation.


Observation is the first pool, it is what we see at the surface. The minute details, textures, sights and sounds that make our descriptions vivid; the complex plots that keep us guessing, all stem from this pool. Not unlike the sun, this is a source of energy that is both immediate and free. At this point, our work has characters, structure and a plot, it might be easy reading. However fiction is not a travelogue or a documentary, we need more, so we tap our next pool.

Memory is formed from observations from days, months or years past. Not unlike how we get fossil fuels, all we see is transformed into something a little different, a single whole instead of isolated sights or sounds; and like petroleum, it is the most portable and powerful fuel that a writer has to keep her engines running.
A story where the characters are enriched by their memories and the plots go beyond the immediate to form well developed arcs are definitely much richer. We have now reached a good read, but the reader is still outside our work, to draw her in, we need to cast a further spell. And so we tap into our final pool.

Ideas are our deepest pool, from this darkness comes all light. Not unlike the interstellar clouds that give birth to new stars, our imagination produces all kinds of ideas, It can help the reader find out about the world that the characters inhabit, make them feel joy and pain, live the dilemmas, or even when your story is really good, identify with them, become them (if only for a little while). Not every idea is a star, some a just red dwarfs and some go supernova on you. The sincere writer knows that imagination running wild will kill the story, just as too much love will kill you, every time.