Epiphany (Crafty Type Writerly Post)
Jan
24
2008

It’s just before the time when I need to leave my warm house again and take my middle kiddo to school. Madonna’s Ray of Light is playing and I’m drinking coffee and taking vitamins.

When I get back I need to finish up some revisions and get them back to Megan so we can turn Taking Care of Business around and get it to readers. Each book is its own journey and I have to say, Kate (my heroine) was hard to learn at first. Part of it was that I’d been interrupted a dozen times so each time I had to put the story aside to finish up something else, I had to re-learn her all over again. But each story has a sweet spot, at least for me. And that sweet spot is like an epiphany. All the sudden it’s clear – whatever it is that’s been lacking. You see it. You know your hero, or your heroine. You finally get what her big problem is, or you know what happened to him in the past and why it’s making him a dick now, or whatever.

It’s not necessarily writing blind – it’s like tasting the book and suddenly the full bouquet of it comes to you and it’s so vivid. I love that moment! Sometimes it doesn’t even come to me when I’m writing. I can be driving and see something out the window or hear a song on the radio or it comes to me while ironing. With Tri-Mates I had no real outline, I just had the idea of this tri mate bond thing and started writing (the concept came to me when I was writing Enforcer but I don’t do brother menages) and I’d planned on making Tracy good friends with Sarah, the Alpha female of her new Pack. but suddenly Tracy and Nick were fighting about Sarah and Sarah was not the character I’d imagined. She was such a fun villain to write because she was so totally unexpected. The whole money laundering storyline was something that just fell into my head as I was writing the first scene at the Pacific Pack House.

Other times, I plot very carefully and follow the synopsis I craft. But even then I still have the epiphany moment at some point or other. Because for me, the process is a surprise. I love that! I love that I find new things I hadn’t even imagined no matter how much planning I do. And sometimes I have to go back and re-craft something, other times it changes the ending a bit. It’s flying through my brain fast and furious or slow and sensual but it’s part of me and I couldn’t ask for a job I loved more.

One comment to “Epiphany (Crafty Type Writerly Post)”

  1. Red
    January 25th, 2008 at 2:34 pm · Link

    I can so identify with that moment! Sometimes I have a few rough chapters, sometimes more, when BAM, it all comes together, you can plump it up, reason it, know exactly what’s going to happen. Yes!! I LOVE BEING A WRITER! 😀