Tuesday's Inspiration - The Creative Cycle via Sue Grafton #MFRWauthor

Last week, we looked at the first three steps of this cycle, now we'll finish the remaining ones.

First draft. For me this is the rough draft and often finds me traveling along the road I've planned for the story and discovering part way along my planned story that it won't work. I may not have figured out my characters or some other problem like too much plot. What I do then is just begin again and write as fast as I can to push past what ever blockage stopped me the first time. Often much of what had been written can be saved with some tightening or some twist in the path I hadn't seen before. Like Ms. Grafton, the writing continues until I have what may look like a hodge-podge of material but the story is down and then comes the fun part.

The next step in the cycle is revision. What Ms. Grafton speaks about is making the mind a blank and looking at this as though you weren't a writer. As I start this, little ideas and twists show me where something must be taken out or what must be expanded on. There's nothing worse that reading a story and finding a scene that the writer wimped out on and didn't play the entire drama out. Do I miss some of these on the first revision. Sure but on the second or third or as many times as it takes for the story to feel complete I usually pick this up.

From here the cycle turns to completion and this means a clean copy and a final read- through for me. This means for me things like Italizing sentences, changing the opening or closing of a paragraph but really leaving the words as they have evolved.

Now comes the end part of the cucle. For Ms. Grafton, this means submission, followed by elation that the story has been finished and wonderful. Second thoughts follow making the writer wonder if the story is really good. For Ms. Grafton comes the dormancy stage. For me, I usually have a story that's been pushing to emerge and thus the cycle begins again.

Tuesday''s Inspiration - Sue Grafton On "The Creative Cycle" #MFRWauthor

I may not finish this bit in just today but I found this an interesting look at the way someojne becomes a writer. The cycle may be a little different for some people but I really think this is what happens at least my road to becoming a writer followed much of this paty and sometimes I do go back to review a step or two.

First comes the urge. I know though I'd written bits and pieces over the years, not much of what I wrote made sense. Then I found books on writing and began to read them. Not everything I found made sense to me but often I discovered just a thread or two that led me to find some way of stringing words together in some way. I also read other writers fiction, a lot of fiction. I've always been a reader but this time the reading was different I began to look at how a writer defined their characters, used the setting or found a plot that made sense.

The second step in this cycle is Inspiration. A bit different from these weekly ones. Something tells you it's time for you to begin that story. My spark came when I was recovering from pneumonia and I received a bag of "nurse" romances. As I was reading them, one day the spark struck. "I can write one better than these." Of course I could -- Not. But I sent the story off and received editor responses. They hurt but they also made the spark brighter. From these rejections and by trying to do what the editors said, I finally sold that book.

In Ms Grafton's cycle the third step is research. Since I began my road from writer to author writing nurse/doctor romances and I was a nurse I had a built in research factory on those days when I went to work. My research was a lot of observation, and a delving into what I learned but as I continued writing, I began to look to other things and have accumulated a lot of material on other professions, other places in this world and off the world. Who knows what bit read or seen might trigger a strand in a story.

This is to be continued but look at your own cycle or road to becoming a writer and did you skip any of the steps?

Tuesday's Inspiration via Sue Grafton - On Inspiration #aminspired

Am reading essays by authors about this business of writing. In the recent one Sue Grafton talks about Inspiration. How neat to find something that fits the day. I'll give my take on what she says and how I've come to wait for that moment.

You're mulling over an idea and not sure where you'll be going with it. For me this happens frequently.
Here's the quote. "Eventually there is that spark--that wonderful flash--aha!--that mental leap" There's more to the quote but this is the essence. All of a sudden you know where the story should go and you take off running.

For me this often comes during the rough draft stage. My rough drafts sometimes wander all over the place before I find that one thing that gels the story. "Aha" is what I think and I start the words flowing again. The rough draft may be begun again because of that magical moment. Perhaps this is because I think with a pen in hand. My rough drafts are usually written by hand. Just my style and not a must in the writing world. Just a must for me.

Back to the quote. If there is no spark or flash or a mental leap, the story doesn't come about. But when it happens, the story takes form and the real writing can begin.

How about you? Are you hit by a a mental leap and suddenly you know the idea has merit and will become a book?

Tuesday's Inspiration ala Sue Grafton - Creative Urge #amwriting #am inspired

Any time I meet people and tell them I'm an author, almost all of them say that someday they would like to write a book. Not all of them do, though lately more people are entering the reals of published author. Something I read in an essay by Sue Grafton made me think about what might be missing that keeps these people from penning that book.

"First of all, there is the urge to create, the need that comes to us from some formless state, something stirring that will not let us rest." This urge ahs led Ms. Grafton to write a wonderful set of mysteries.

Has it led you into writing down word after word until you have a story? It has me. I know I feel uncomfortable if too many days pass without my working on a current story. This itch has been in my life for a very long time. From sitting on the porch with friends years ago and making up stories, or putting on plays in a neighbor's garage telling stories had been with me. Of all those story tellers I'm the only one who went on to write books. I often wonder why I couldn't do anything but scratch that itch and put word after word on paper. How about you? Did you have a group of storytelling friends? Did any of them go on to write, too?

Like Ms. Grafton, I also became a reader and explored a lot of interesting and strange works of fact and fiction. Then came the day when I had to try. High school, and I started a lot of books and worked on one and then another. Went to a hospital nursing course. My mother cleaned out my room and threw all those budding stories away. But the itch never stopped and finally I began to painfully start to write.

How about you? Has the itch remained and do you scratch it every time you sit down to write.