I
confess to a fascination with the way writers write books, with the vast
differences in approach. I’ve self-published two books, one silly (Suddenly Spying) and one serious (Disappear Our Dead). I’m afraid another
is on the way, and there’s no stopping it. Getting ready to write a new book is
like a sneeze that’s coming. You know it’s on its way, and you know you better
let it, or your head could explode. But unlike a sneeze, in the case of a book,
it’s gonna take a lot longer than a nanosecond.
When
I feel a new book coming on, a thousand ideas swirl in my head. Another
thousand live on the pages of my new book file. I start filling a new book box
with columns from newspapers and articles from magazines and various items I think
might relate—no matter how loosely—to the idea I have in mind.
When
I go for walks, I stop in random places to write down thoughts. I get acute
anxiety when I find I don’t have a pen. When I hurry into a convenience store
to buy one, I break into a sweat when they tell me the pens have been moved and
they don’t remember quite where. When they finally find them, and I hold one in
my hot little hand, I thank them loudly and voluminously. When they stare, I
explain I am a writer. They nod sympathetically.
While
riding in the car, I don’t turn on the radio; there’s so much noise in my head
I wouldn’t be able to hear it anyhow. During this phase I often can be heard
mumbling to myself, and people have told me I look cross. But that scowl’s not
anger, it’s the confusion that comes with constantly crossing between this
world and the fictional one that’s forming.
My office becomes a sea of stickies with cryptic notes, sometimes so cryptic I can’t even figure out what they mean anymore. I found one on my forehead the other day when I looked in the mirror (yes, I’m kidding!). I am in a miasma of information. Nothing makes sense, yet I have to move forward through a hot, smoky blur. I will have to make choices that slam the door on ideas I loved so that others may thrive. Some characters will have to go. I will grieve their loss (no, I’m not kidding!).
I
start to write scenelets, scene ideas with a splotch of dialogue in there. I
recognize along the way that there are scenes I must write. MUST. I am so over-the-top
excited about the scenes I must write that I vow to make every scene in this
book a scene I MUST write. (I will later break this vow.)
In a
way I don’t completely understand, information is being sorted, connections
made, acts forming. The time is coming when the words and stars will align (I
hope).
On a three-foot
by four-foot poster board, I label the left section the setup, the middle
section complications, and the right section the resolution. I don’t recall who
developed this technique, but I find it very effective. Here’s what happens:
I start
putting stickies containing scene phrases on the board, placing them where I think
they should go to create the story, but to be honest, it feels pretty random at
times. The beauty of it is, I begin to see how the story might come together and
begin to see what my characters need to do to get from this sticky to that one.
I add stickies and move stickies and the story emerges, the fog lifting and
morphing to shimmery sparkles on the midcoast, Maine sea.
Eventually
(and I mean that with a capital E), a book is born, like Disappear Our Dead. The picture of the poster board included here shows
the final version of stickies for that book.
Psst!
Now I’m gonna tell you a secret. Lean in a little closer. That’s right. I’ve
heard tell of an author who makes an outline, and writes straight from that,
pretty as you please. Just writes a list of the scenes and then writes the
scenes, right in order! Of course I’ve heard of Bigfoot, and Nessie of Loch
Ness fame too, and I don’t believe in them. But…you never know. Maybe I gave up
on the guy with the roly-poly belly and the sleigh too soon, and maybe there is
a pot of gold at the end of that rainbow.
For
me, the messy process changes from book to book, and there are always some
unexpected twists. For Suddenly Spying,
I didn’t know how much time I would spend laughing as I wrote. For Disappear Our Dead—a book about loss and
grief and learning to live again—I didn’t know how many tears I would shed.
While I wrestled with the plot, Disappear
Our Dead was teaching me one of the most important lessons I needed to learn
as a writer: Leave my heart on the page. And I did.
Has
your process changed depending on the book you’re writing? Have any of your
books taught you something you hadn’t expected to learn?
Gin
Mackey is the author of Disappear Our
Dead, featuring home funeral guide and amateur sleuth Abby Tiernan, and Suddenly Spying, a madcap caper. She
lives in Owls Head, Maine. Visit Gin at www.ginmackey.com
