The First Steps

Today I thought we'd start at the very beginning. A writing group I attend met last night and talked about why we write, what drives us, but that is not what I am talking about when I talk about the very beginning. You are here, doing what you do, or hoping to, because you have a passion and desire to write, and it does not matter so much why. What does matter is the story, and that's where we start.

The Story.

Where does it come from? Do you write about your own life, somebody else's or do you make something up from scratch? The most important thing in my view is to write about something that is important to you, or that you love.

When you find yourself sitting at the keyboard and nothing is happening, or you are walking the streets looking for the first idea don't try too hard. The ideas you have in your head will fit into the right story when the time comes.

My first book, Arlington Reef came from two news stories, which both appeared on the same day. One was on one of the morning shows on TV and was talking about why ships are not allowed to navigate on the inside of the Great Barrier Reef (in parts) and the other was in a newspaper and talked about an art robbery. I put the two things together and came up with drugs and murder. It was not such a big leap to take as reading the story would show.

Room 22 came next and I tried the same thing, but I was living in Cairns and for two weeks nothing remarkable happened! I finally took four of my short stories and put them together. It was amazing how ell all the characters got on and next thing I know there was murder and intrigue spilling all the way along the golden shores of Cairns.

Now the fact I think you should write about things you love does not mean that I love murder and mayhem, I just like the art of exploring people's minds.

Stories are all around us and we do not have to write them as they happen, that is why I deal in fiction. All we need is the one thread that strikes home and lets us get the first words out. One line, one paragraph, one page. A first chapter that has you wanting to write more. Then you are away.

The story may not come and tap you on the shoulder so you might have to be paying attention, but it is looking for you almost as hard as you are looking for it, and remember, when you first start writing it, don't worry about it being perfect, the story is a patient best, and it likes to hibernate every now and then.

Where have you found your stories? What is it that sparks your interest in sitting down and writing?

BJR

Great first pages

First let me apologise for taking so long to get back to my blog. I had a weekend with my youngest brother a little while ago and we decided to write some songs (he is a great musician) and I have been flat out working on that project as well as my latest manuscript. I have not neglected my writing group though and this week we met and discussed the first pages of many novels.

Our group is very strong, we had a dozen people present on Wednesday night and there were a few apologies, so when we discuss topics like this we get a wide range of ideas and thoughts, which is the object of the exercise.

There are so many books in the world it is a big decision just to come up with two or three each to discuss and some people went for the classics, others went for books that had me reaching for dictionaries and googling terms used by midway through page one. When I read I prefer to read, not research but others loved the learning aspect of these books. I myself chose three very different books, all by large selling authors, as this is something I think we all want to achieve.

Raymond Chandler's Killer in The Rain was one I chose. His dialogue is so brilliant it describes the physical appearance of the character without him having to, and it entertains as it does so. His choice of names also is perfect and describes the character he is creating. In this book he introduces three characters on page one but one of them he only gives you his name. Violets McGee. In my mind that was all I needed to see the character in my head. There was also a descriptive sentence He looked like a bouncer who had just come into money, which I thought was concise but perfect way to het the man into the reader's head.

The range of books we talked about included The Girl who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King, Abarat, but we talked more about the way the title appears on the cover then we did about the first page, The Book Thief, Captain Corelli, Middlesex, The Little Friend by Donna Tartt and The Hopkins Manuscript, as well as many more.

It was a great way to learn what worked and did not work on the first page of a book, it also showed that there is not one formula to work to as readers all prefer something different to each other, and it also highlighted the usefulness of these types of writing groups.

We had two first nighters on Wednesday, one of whom was only now about to embark on his writing journey, and they came away from that with a lot of knowledge but also they gained confidence from talking to others and finding out that this dream we all have running around in our heads is in fact achievable.

Exercises like this are well worth doing so if you are in writers group get active and involved.

Good luck and good writing.