I thought I would share a little about how I sit down to write. Not because I think there is anything useful I can share but so I can be nosy and ask about your process!
Sometimes ideas come to me, usually in the middle of the night, they wake me from my slumber and I have to get up and write it down. These flashes of inspiration are few and far between, rarities my muse dispenses when she so wishes.
In reality something tends to catch my eye or ear and my mind ponders it for a while. It can be a picture, a quote or even a song and it will capture something in my imagination.
Recently I saw this image and knew it would be one of those images to get the cogs in my mind moving. So a grovel later and the photographer Liam Dagan sent me the image to use. I am grateful that I can borrow the images of super talented people like Liam from time to time just so that I can show you where my mind starts!
Any way here is Liam's image and the snippet that it put in my mind.
To Hell and Back
"Let me get this straight, I'm dead and this is hell?""Ahha"
"And i could climb out up that?"
"Yup"
"Anyone ever make it?"
"One"
"Who?"
"One of the original fallen. He fell for a human girl on the living plane, forbidden eve for a fallen so he was condemned to eternity in here. Always looking out with that smallest glimmer of hope to torture him."
"He climbed out to be with her?"
"Yeah, it even worked out for a little bit. Right up until Death caught up with her and they were both consigned to Hell for eternity. Apparently if you ask them they don't care where they are, as long as they are together. Personally I could do without the eternal damnation, but who am I to argue."
"Why don't you climb then?"
"I've nothing worth risking everything for."
"But we are already dead! What could be worse than being dead and stuck in Hell for eternity!"
"Nothing."
"That's my point."
"No, seriously, nothing!! Fall on there, and its not an easy climb, and you'd kill yourself all over again. Only this time you have no body to die, just your soul. You would simply cease to exist at all. Granted some do it just to get away from the torture of being down here, but not many things are worth that!"
"There are a few"
"So, who's yours?"
So what gets your creative juices flowing? Do you get the same impulse to tell a pictures story that I do?
I'm one of those weird people who see characters in my head. They form slowly, but over time flesh out and become more lifelike to the point where I can smell them, hear them talk, etc. I don't sit down to write about them until they reach this point. It's maddening, sometimes, but I don't like to rush it.
ReplyDeleteI guess sometimes I jump in while they are still forming for me, time will tell if I should make them wait a little?!?
DeleteBah! I swear I commented before this, but there's nothing here. So let me start over again -- I loved this short-short. The dialogue is spot on. Spot on. The picture is a great visual, and you do a great job (especially in such a small space of words) giving depth to the characters. All of the characters -- those speaking, as well as the Fallen and the Eve. Love the underlying story. Love the idea of a second death being worse than the first. Love the hint you give at the end. This is so well done it makes me giddy.
ReplyDeleteFabulous job.
hehe *blush* Thank you. It was part inspiration from the picture and part a writing exercise to focus on dialogue, which is one of my weaker areas!
DeleteI love that you love it :-)
I really admire (and, okay, envy) you that combination of imagination and curiosity that allows you to see an image and follow that inspiration to its end. I think I tend to muck around a bit too much inside my own (overly analytical) head--not just in my writing, but in general.
ReplyDeleteBut on the flip side I am usually so far off with the faeries that I miss really obvious things and am rendered completely unable to analyse anything...that I have to really concentrate on!!
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