This
morning while I was driving down Carmel Valley Road on my way to the grocery
store, I drove alongside a pair of black BMW X5s with New Jersey plates
traveling in tandem. Now coastal California is a LONG drive from New Jersey. I
immediately wondered what their story was. When I mentioned it to OG when I got
home, he suggested they might be here doing some road testing on behalf of the
manufacturer or maybe getting ready to film a commercial on the Bixby Bridge in
Big Sur. He’s probably right, but how mundane. My hypothesis was much more
colorful. Can we say gangsters on the run, anybody?
Because
we live in a tourist destination, I see cars with license plates from all over
the U.S. and Canada all the time. And I always wonder the same thing: what’s
their story? Does anyone else do this? I can’t help it. When I was little
growing up in Kansas, I wondered about the story behind every abandoned
farmhouse along the highway between home and my grandparents’ house in Junction
City. I imagined all kinds of romantic and/or tragic scenarios. I was
disappointed to later learn the answer was simple economics: they were likely
victims of the Great Depression.
Many
writers use bits of strangers’ conversations as inspiration. I don’t seem to do
that. I’m more visual. I see people like the young woman in the shopping center
parking lot wearing a zipped up ski parka and rhinestone encrusted flip flops
in fifty-six degree weather and wonder: what’s her story? Or I drive past a
lavish mansion or dilapidated shack and speculate about the lives of the occupants,
both past and present. My first book, a historical romance set in 1866
Missouri, was inspired by an antebellum house in Kansas City I’d driven past
hundreds of times.
I
blame my active imagination for my becoming a writer. I need an outlet for all
these conjectures—otherwise my head might explode. Sometimes I wish I could
call up orderly ideas on demand, but alas, that rarely happens. And when it
does, it’s never as much fun.
I
might never be any good at creating a strong, consistent author brand, but at
least I don’t have to worry about running out of ideas. I see stories
everywhere!
Alison
www.alisonhenderson.com
10 comments:
Your author brand is your name and building a reputation as consistently writing great stories. My mind gets bored easily. If I had to write the same kind of book all the time, say historical or romantic suspense, I'd get bored. Some authors write nothing but wolf shifters. Great for them. But I'd be SO over the wolves by the sixth book. I need variety, so my brand for all the mish-mash of stuff I write is my author name. I'd say the same goes for you. Yeah, I see, hear, and read stories everywhere. I love those two-sentence space fillers in the newspapers. I always think, man could I make a story out of that. Great post.
I honestly don't know how I get my ideas. With the series I'm working on now, I came up with the concept of a scavenger hunt, and it became a cross country journey for my h&h. The supporting cast from the first book grew personalities that determined the course of the other books. It's odd what sparks our imagination.
My own experience with funerals helped me write the series; my travels on the boat inspired my British Columbia remote resort story as well as my Petersburg, Alaska story. But I grab character quirks from the newspaper (the blind forensic investigator, for instance). I saw a woman in a black cowboy hat for 2 minutes when our train stopped in France. She is my FBI agent in the story I'm writing now. So places I go, people I see/meet/read about. And oddities I pick up in the newspaper. It's complicated how they meld into books. But the drive/interest has to be there!
Hey Alison, as a resident of East Hampton (maybe the east coast equivalent of Carmel?) which is so famed as the setting for various tv series and so on, I find there are a lot of stories there--but, surprisingly, many are historical as it was actually founded in the 1600s. Lots of things spark this writer's brain, but most of them are out west. and just for the record, on my 7 week road trip with my daughter this past year, we drove through KS from MO and those abandoned farmhouses still exist--in fact, I mentioned them to my KS friend when we visited with her. We were amazed at the number...
Love your reflection on how you get your stories. Readers always want to know that. I have a different inspiration for every book I've written so no consistency there.
Houses and people I see are my inspiration too. Loved reading the comments of others here. We are a diverse group, a definite plus. My first full length book was the result of an Alaskan cruise we took with the in-laws (brother, sister, mother). My hero and heroine enjoyed the same experiences we did, with a few twists and turns of their own along the way!
Thanks for all your comments, everyone! I'm sorry to be late responding, but we were the victims of technological mayhem for the past couple of days. All is finally well now, and we're back up and running. :-)
More and more of those farmhouses as farms go from being family concerns to big business and young people move "to town" because that's where the jobs are.
I think if I knew where my ideas came from, I'd have more of them. :-) Nice post, Alison.
As soon as I read your first sentence, Alison, I thought "Mafia"! That's a lousy statement about my beloved home state though, isn't it? :-) I do the same thing, only I do both visual and audio. Saturday I was in the restroom at a local library and the woman in the stall next to me was have a hushed conversation on her cell phone (or just to herself...I couldn't see, obviously). Already mysteries and questions are brewing in my head. Then I realized she was speaking a different language, and I didn't recognize it. A whole plot began to develop having to do with spies and runaways and Cold War sorts of scenarios. Fun stuff. :-)
Yes, I do the same thing. I see people or places and wonder what their story is. I also get ideas from newspaper articles, and various other places. Like you, I'll never run out of ideas. Enjoyed the post!
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