When you write about a place you give it life. Perhaps the best way to ground a story is to focus on where it takes place. Steinbeck spent pages describing the California countryside in The Grapes of Wrath, Neil Gaiman sets the story of The Graveyard Book in (you guessed it) a graveyard. I can think of no better example where the setting of a story becomes a character. The setting in that book is alive despite itself. It offers beauty and dread and in this writer’s humble opinion, the story would be lost without it. One could spend days discussing the various uses of setting in literature regardless of genre.

I have always felt that the surroundings the characters of a book find themselves in are tantamount to adding another character to the scene. In Carolyn Forche’s prose poem, The Colonel, the setting stands out as a stark reminder of the situation in which the speaker in the poem finds herself. Stucco walls with broken bottles embedded in them to “scoop the kneecaps” of would be intruders, and the razor wire on the walls, all serve to provide the reader with the sense that the speaker is in a dangerous place. But it’s more than that, it’s as if the dictator’s compound itself looms as a shadowy henchman over the speaker. It makes the implied threat to her real at all times.  

Wherever we go, if we take a look around and notice the uniqueness of our surroundings we might see that even the buildings or mountains or trees appear to have their own sense of personality. I live in Tempe, Arizona. On McDowell and Priest Roads there is a park known as Papago Park. Red Rock Mountains rise from the park at the peak of the hill crested by McDowell to overlook Phoenix. Aside from the amazing sunsets, if you look from the western side of the mountains you can see a face in the rock. It looks like it could be the face of a gorilla or maybe Jabba the Hut melting. I’ve never been able to drive by without noticing it.

What does the use of setting say about the following short pieces based in downtown Phoenix? 

Barrett drives home from the mental health clinic through the familiar streets of Phoenix. The clinic sits behind a dusty, barren lot surrounded by a chain-link fence between railroad tracks and an old factory. Shanty huts made of anything scrounged from dumpsters are stuffed into underpasses like broken childhood dreams. A woman walks down the dimly lit sidewalk as the sun closes its eyes to the world. She stops at a motel with more boards in the windows than glass, wearing a gray gown fit to her form. Down the side, from armpit to ankle, her dress is cut like a knight’s tabard. It gives a side view of the woman’s naked body underneath. Seeing her reminds Barrett of another woman who used to go to his clinic.

The first time he met Grace, Barrett and her case manager conducted a home visit. Grace was a woman in her thirties with a face of sixty. The smell of cigarettes leaned on the nostrils when she opened the door. A cockroach sat in the open on a wall. Grace reported that she took her medications, for the most part. She was wearing a gray dress with a hole cut in the crotch, where the mid-morning light died in her pubic hair. Inside the apartment, a thin mattress sagged on the floor under a weight Barrett could not imagine. There was one chair but no table for the social security checks that paid for the apartment.

“Have you been saved?” Grace asked Barrett.

Surprised, he answered, “I’m not religious, Ma’am.”

She smiled and said, “I’ll pray for you.”

The examples above, I believe, show the use of setting as a means to express a sense of loneliness or hopelessness in someone’s situation. The trappings of poverty or wealth can convey so much about a person in a story. Who they are or what they do can sometimes be decided by their surroundings.   

Below is a different example.

Barrett locked up the clinic for the night and parked his car a few blocks from work. It was Friday, the end to a long and trying week. He was ready for a beer he was ready for twelve. He walked by the old psychiatric center where he used to take people when they were psychotic or suicidal. It had been closed for years and now had a fence around it promising a smart new restaurant or nightclub. The area around it had been gentrified. Where before Barrett would have seen a dive bar, a drive-thru liquor store and a strip club he now saw a coffee house and a trendy spot where people could drink craft beer and play shuffleboard. Downtown was confusing now, there were tall buildings where before was only sky. Smiling women walked together down sidewalks dotted with lamps. The night was young and full of fun. The light of possibility and youth danced on their cheeks.

The setting above shows something quite different from the two before it. Ironically, all these are composites of real parts of Phoenix that are all only a few blocks apart.

Setting is important, and something that I try to give due respect to, though I have been guilty of overwriting it. The characters should still be the focus in the story. I say that for myself as well as anyone who might benefit from it. Too much exposition and not enough character development can stifle a story. As writers, we all have to find our own balance.

Have you ever walked downtown at night and really noticed the various buildings? High rises and squat, rectangular shops are like people in a crowd. How do they fit in a scene? Maybe they are innocent bystanders to the characters in a story. Or maybe they are witnesses who stay silent at the scene of some tragedy. They stand around, apart from one another, nobody speaks–they just stand there knowing. Buildings in cities do not look each other in the eyes. When something happens, they just stand there. Silence is their dialogue, perhaps saying, “This is how it is. This is how it has always been.”

I love writing dialogue. It is where the people in a story really come to life. I mentioned in my last blog, “The Journey,” how writing dialogue and action can ultimately change the course of a scene, a chapter or even the whole story.

How many times have you had a conversation with someone that was so deep it stays with you long after? Even if the conversation was short, I remember instances when I met someone and what we talked about, the gist of it has never left me. Though we may not remember all the words, they create a form that remains in time where that conversation took place. The words then are like a ghost that lingers where a moment was shared with another human being.

We’ve all had trivial or even seemingly meaningless conversations throughout our lives. The “How are yous?” and the “Good mornings,” and all the little bits of dialogue with strangers, or people we see every day. These moments of shared words have meaning too. These tidbits of conversation are like the spaces of blank page between scenes. Everyday words with others give us the space for the important, soul moving talks to grow. We need it all to complete the stories we live, and the ones we write.  

What an incredible creature the tongue is. It tastes our food, keeps our lips from being dry, it can signify disapproval with a simple protrusion from its little cave. It can be used for pleasure when invited to play with another person to whom we are attracted. Mainly though, we use it to fit sounds around our thoughts and push them out of our mouths to be understood, feared, adored or obeyed. It’s like having a miniature god to control, one who obeys our commands only some of the time. Without it we would have no spoken word, but with it, the ability to say anything. Words are used to create, convey, or destroy. It’s how we use them that matters. Where would humanity be now if we’d never developed the ability to use these sounds that that somehow make sense? What would the world be without them?

I’ve heard it said that you need other people in order to be human. I think that might be true. Talking can reveal a new sense of being. Words spoken aloud when alone are like puffs of smoke. They may linger for a while, they might even be good to hear for ourselves, but they dissipate quickly without others to hear them. Words spoken aloud with another person are like tiny strings that tie us to one another, even if they are meant to drive us apart. Words matter and they have form.

When you’re writing, how many times have you had two characters speak in a scene when one of them says something you didn’t expect? Aren’t we as the authors supposed to have total command of the words our characters speak? I think yes and no. there is something to be said for just letting the conversation play out. I like to put two characters in a scene and let them go. Much of what I write in such moments is ultimately cut, but in my opinion, it’s the best way to get the most authentic conversation out of the people.

We create our characters from some primordial pool of our imagination. On paper, we set them upright, and give them a face, and a name, and motives by using little black letters set in a row. Yet, I believe that aside from the actions they take, it is in the moments when we let them talk that we learn the most about them.  

Conversation between two or more people is a living thing. Sometimes when I write dialogue I just play it out, I try to go where the characters’ conversation goes and they reveal themselves even more. I have had moments of dialogue reshape entire chapters. It can be illuminating and frustrating, just like talking to a person. Dialogue is alive. It becomes its own character, and that character has a place in the story. 

“A story should entertain the writer too.” – Stephen King

I am only talking about my process here. Maybe something will be amusing or helpful to another writer, if so, I will feel fulfilled, and if not, I thank you for reading.

To my good friends I am not known for my spontaneity. The phrase, “a man of routine,” has been uttered about me a time or two. I like to cook a giant crock-pot full of food so that I don’t have to wonder what I will eat for lunch during the week when I’m at work. Sometimes I do cook the same thing several times before changing it up, but that’s only because I love my own cooking. I generally get up at the same time every day, around 5:30am, I eat the same breakfast, and I drink the same coffee.

It’s not that I’m opposed to change, but the goal for me is productivity. Time is valuable, and I try to use it to the best of my ability and write as much as I can before I have to leave for work. I eat the same thing because it takes no deciding, and that leaves me more time to devote my thinking to whatever it is I’m working on at the time. Writing is an adventure. It’s like going on safari in my mind. Having certain mundane things taken care of is like packing enough water and a first aid kit when you go on a hike. I like to have all the nuts & bolts taken care of so I can enjoy the journey, after all, safety first!

The Stephen King quote above puts into words something I have always felt. It is so important to be surprised, moved, saddened or even elated when you write. I have felt them all as sit at my computer and tip-tap out the fate of people only I know. That happens because when I write, I think of it as an experience the characters and I are having together. Of course, I don’t mean to say that I am literally unaware of what’s going to happen to the people in my stories, but there have been many times over the course of my novel, Mother Made of Iron where I was legitimately surprised.

When I write I try to maintain a level of curiosity and wonder. I do plan certain things, but I would not call myself a planner when I write. Nor could I ever get away with saying that for anything else in my life. I don’t know where things are going to go all the time. I may have a general idea and a structure of sorts but it often works out differently than originally planned. This may explain why it took ten years and two attempts to get the book right.

(I did mention this is not meant to be advice right?)

Music for me can be a great medium for spontaneity. I will often listen to music when I write, as I am sure others do. No words, just music, words get in the way. Typically, I listen to soundtracks of movies or whatever music I come upon that moves me to write. I once wrote eighty-seven pages from listening to the 55-second intro to Metallica’s, Unforgiven 3. It’s a haunting piano piece that I challenge anyone not to be inspired by.

I love how dynamic writing can be. Whether you stare at a sunset, a mountain, or the face of a beautiful woman, words come marching in. I never know what is going to happen when I sit down to write. Sometimes I have an idea, I know where I want to go but not how I’ll get there. The map is never finished until it’s finished. The journey is the joy.

When I was writing my novel, I had watched the movie, Lucy, with Scarlett Johansson. The music in that movie is amazing. I found clips of it on YouTube and listened to one particular clip, “Melting Into Matter,” by Eric Serra, which is all of 3:31 seconds and wrote an entire chapter of my book listening to it again and again. It was so moving, and the imagery that came to me when I listened to this beautiful piece of music added a kind of beauty to the character’s story line. I get this from music all the time.

Certain types of music belong to specific characters I have found. The music I previously mentioned was for only one person in my novel, “Faunie.” She was originally meant to be only a minor person in the story. What she became, and what she is still becoming grew beyond my imagination.

Through the combination of dialogue, action and a healthy dose of music Faunie turned into one of the most significant characters I’ve ever written. When I started writing out her scenes, I had no idea what would happen, but she has since become so real I miss not writing her right now. She owns a special place in my heart, this girl with a black wing mark on her arm. I hope to introduce her to people one day.

“A writer is working when looking out the window.” – Unknown

What is wrong with taking time away from writing? Nothing, it is not a bad thing. It can even be, at times, necessary. You can’t do one thing too much without reaching a point of exhaustion. I write every day, generally speaking, but there are times when that’s just not possible. Life has to be lived. We have to work, we have to relate to others, take care of those who are important to us in whatever ways we do. Mothers have to be mothers, fathers have to be fathers, and friends have to be friends.

Time away from writing is not the same as not writing however. Each and every single one of life’s experiences and moments we live, whether they are shared with others or by ourselves are subject to later material. Our minds are like refineries taking in our senses and memories and turning them into potential fuel for stories. The refinery never shuts down, never stops.  

I once got into oil painting, deeply into oil painting. I mean that both literally and financially, (it’s not cheap to paint with oil). I got so into it that I didn’t write for probably a year. I had no idea what I was doing, had never taken a class save for the typical art classes you take in high school. I enjoyed it, like writing it got intense–I would sometimes spend up to eight hours painting and could get so lost in it that I wouldn’t eat until I felt I was going to pass out (something I had only ever done with writing).

Being creative feeds me. I eat at work almost non-stop. I might as well have a feedbag strapped around my neck so I can graze endlessly throughout the day. On average, I have three meals at work from 8 to 5 and snack on whatever I can find. When I am at home, writing, I hardly stop at all to eat. As I typed that last sentence, it is 9:32 pm and I’ve eaten twice since I got up at 5:00am.

I am no visual artist, but I had fun doing it while I did. I think in some way it made me a better writer. Exercising my creativity with different skills only makes it stronger. When I first started painting, I did so out of grief. I was going through the breakup of my life at the time and after spending years of writing, I felt that words would not do the trick. I picked up a brush and filled my small apartment then with drawings, easels and canvases and the ubiquitous smell of oil paint and turpentine based cleaner. I took a few classes at my local park recreation center and learned a few things. One day in 2008, I just stopped and put down the brush to sit at the keyboard again. I haven’t painted since.

I still dabble in drawing sometimes, but the painting days are over, at least for the foreseeable future. It wasn’t long after I’d stopped trying to channel my inner Van Gogh that I came upon my idea for my fantasy novel. Once that hit, I was in full-blown creative mode for ten years straight, writing like a man possessed, because I was. Taking a break from writing may or may not work for other writers. Only the writer can determine that for her or himself.

We don’t know what will happen in life, so there is always a risk, but in my case at least, I feel it was necessary. Taking a step back is scary though, I must admit. However, I had exhausted myself and I needed to refuel in a way that fed me differently. The creative side of my soul is a ravenous creature. It stopped eating for a while there, and had I not fed it with visual art it might have gone mad and eaten me alive. If I don’t put words down, or if I am unable to get the time to write for more than a day or so an irritable restlessness boils up inside.

Like some kind of fiend, I have to sate it or it will consume me. Writing a line here or a paragraph there whenever I can keeps me sane.

One of the greatest gifts anyone ever gave me was a Moleskine notebook. I have carried one around with me ever since. It fits in my back pocket and has saved me from forgetting an idea so many times I could not begin to count them. So often, it has helped me, in many ways. Before I start a new Moleskine, I “bless” it with a number of quotes from other authors on the topic of writing itself. The current one I carry around starts with the quote below, which I believe says everything I’ve said in this blog, only she says it better.  

            “Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind, is written large in his works.” –Virginia Woolf

“The only kind of writing, is rewriting.” – Ernest Hemingway

Revisions. The quote above says it all. The beauty of revision is it is exactly that, a re-vision, looking at something again with new eyes. How comforting is it to know that you can redo something as many times as you need? If only we could do the same in life. Personally, I’ve never written anything just right in the first go.

When I first started writing my fantasy novel I belted out over a thousand pages, it was over 200,000 words, and none of it is in my completed work. I had to take another look at it, a hard look. The story wasn’t alive. It had no breath. I’d been typing away and throwing ideas down without giving my characters life. It was devastating to have done so much work and have to leave it behind. The real story wasn’t with the character I wanted it to be with, it was with his mother.

Three years later and I have a completed novel. When I made the decision to focus the story on my previous character’s mother and her story, the world opened up to me. It was amazing. Since finishing it, I have been on the query path, still on it. This is not yet a success story in the traditional sense. I am not an award-winning novelist. I don’t have my own Master’s Class on YouTube. I’m just a guy who wrote his book twice over ten grueling years. I regret nothing.  

I feel fortunate to have taken that honest look at what I was doing, at what I was missing in the story’s original form. Now I have my main character, Izra Moonborn, and though the first book is done, she still occupies my time as no other woman ever has. Since finishing, Mother Made of Iron, I have written a novelette, a sort of origin story for Izra titled, The Wandering Oak. It is out on submission now with a contest and my fingers are perpetually crossed. If I had never taken the honest accounting of where I was in my storytelling, I don’t know where I would be right now. It’s hard admitting you have to rethink things you were previously so sure of. You really have to love a story, love the characters in it to put yourself through that.

Izra’s story was originally a short scene in my first conception of her character, no more than a few pages. Then she went from being in a scene to being in several, then it was a prologue and that prologue turned into a 600-page novel, and one for which I am proud.

There is another side to revision though, and it sneaks up on you sometimes. I have revised stories so much that I rewrote the story right out of them. A balance has to be struck. This is why I think it’s good to have a workshop to go to, or at the very least, another writer friend who understands what you are trying to accomplish and how difficult it can be. Other writers and time away are great for the work. Having spent a few months away from my book after I finished writing it gave me the opportunity to see it with some fresh eyes. There were moments when I found myself saying, “Wow, I wrote that?” It’s nice to find a line or two where I was pleasantly surprised. Then of course, there were the other times when I said, “Wow. I wrote that?” (DELETE)

Second, third or fourth drafts, I think we all go through them to some degree. Time away gives us a chance to see the good and find the bad. Both will be there. Stephen King says in his book, On Writing, that the second draft is where you take out, “all the things that are not the story.”  

In the end, all writing is world building, and all writing is word building. All of us who write are really just kids on a beach trying to make books out of sand. Use the words, build the world, and when you’re done building it, fill it with living things.

Limits, we see them posted everywhere throughout our lives. We see them physically, in signs on the road, or in places, we are not supposed to go. We grow up with our parents saying, “You can’t do this, you can’t do that,” and then there are limits that we apply to ourselves, “Oh I could never do this, I could never do that.” Some boundaries are good to have, some we need to get over in order to grow. What about your imagination, or your ability as a writer, do you know what those limits are? (Hint: you should not.)

What stories can or should you tell? I believe whatever story sits down with you when you get to the business of writing is the story you tell. It’s good to know what your limits are in terms of how much you can carry, how many people fit in an elevator, but when it comes to creativity the word ‘limit’ has no place. If a pregnant woman from another world wearing armor sits next to me, or a Korean dictator, a boy afraid of the Devil, or my father, I don’t ask questions, I write.

Don’t let the lack of knowledge on a topic deter you. When in doubt, research. We live in the information golden age. The more you learn the more you can relate to your chosen topic, or not, but you’ll likely know where you stand. If you still have something honest to say about it after you’ve done the research, then go for it. When a story has your ear and won’t let it go, you write it down, no matter what it is.

In my opinion, the most important qualification for writing anything is truth. The author has to be honest with their readers. Even if you write fantasy, horror, crime fiction, or children’s books, just be true to it. Whatever you write is going to be a part of the human story, even if there isn’t a single human in it. Stay true to the writing and the why, the reader will know when you lie.

We can’t worry about what will or won’t get published. I say that as much for my own good as anyone else’s. Writing is hard, but when it has a hold of you, it’s as necessary as breathing. Technically, I’ve written three books. The first one was to see if I could string a story long enough to call it a “book,” I did, but it is terrible. I wrote the second one out of spite and anger fueled by my political and social sense of justice. It was better than the first one, but also terrible. Unless I someday dust off those old manuscripts and try to breathe new life in them, they will be old book-bones in a chest. I didn’t know who I was as a writer yet. I also wrote an awful, didactic epic poem. One-hundred-and-fifty pages of iambic pentameter later, it too sits in a box gathering dust. My third novel is fantasy fiction and I have never been more in love with writing than I was typing away for a decade on that book. I worked my full-time job, kept strong relationships with other humans, and wrote as much as eight hours a day, every day. That story and the characters in it simply would not let me rest.

Twenty years ago, I would have laughed if someone told me I’d be writing fantasy fiction. Back then, I was going to write the next literary masterpiece though I stuttered and struggled to write consistently. Now, I write every day. I have further to go, and I am not by any means satisfied or finished trying. But I know my voice and I write with confidence because I know who I am as a writer. There’s something to be said for that.

Writing is exploration. It is a walk alone and unarmed in a wilderness that creates itself as you go. Like going on a hike, you start on a path that is worn and well known. Keep putting one word in front of the other. Eventually, you feel the pull to veer off the path and see what you can find. Explore. There are times when you might get lost, but more often, if you let it, you get found.

Story. What is there without story? What would we be if we did not indulge ourselves in the tales of others from far off places, times or even worlds? What would life be like if we never had books or film? We would be ants. Our lives would be an endless droning from one task to another without question, thought, or care for anything but the task itself. No disrespect meant to the ants of course. I have no idea what stories they might tell each other. Perhaps they huddle together in their homes after a hard day of work and talk of giants who block out the sun, or warn of others who harness it to burn them. Who knows? The point is, without the element of story life would be a bleak affair.

I think of all the stories that I have heard in my life, how many still have an effect on me. One of my earliest memories is of my grandfather telling me a story that changed how I saw the world itself. I was five years old and I would never look at a thundercloud the same from that day forward. He gave me my imagination, or at least, he lit the fire that keeps it going. I believe that we need story. Stories make us human, make us relate, depend on, and trust one another and bring us together.

A film came out in 2009 called, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, directed by Terry Gilliam, who also wrote the script with Charles McKeown. In the movie there is a scene that has stuck with me ever since. The movie is beautifully and brilliantly done. I recommend seeing it. One scene that I truly enjoy is one where Dr. Parnassus, (played by Christopher Plummer) is visited by The Devil, (Tom Waits) in a place where ancient monks deep in the earth constantly tell stories to keep the universe intact. Without them, Dr. Parnassus states, there would be no universe. I love this concept, it is so beautiful. I also believe it bears some measure of truth.

The human mind is the most amazing thing there is. I remember a few years seeing an article saying that scientists had mapped the neurons of the human brain and that it looked very similar to a picture of the known universe. You can read more and see the pictures that inspired me here: https://www.crystalinks.com/brain.universe513.html. I find it truly fascinating. I like to imagine that this proves that we are capable of amazing things, and that the possibility we hold within our minds is ever expanding and not limited just to the corporeal world we know. I think the same applies when it comes to stories. There is no limit to the human imagination.

I have friends who are expecting their second child any day now. A little galaxy is growing in my friend’s belly. Galaxies are growing in bellies all over the world. When her first child was born, I couldn’t wait to tell him stories. I am the kooky uncle who spins tall tales and yarns at a moment’s notice. I have known this little person since the very first day he was born. I remember the first time I saw him. He looked like a little wizard in a white robe with a tiny orange hat. That little guy has inspired a number of stories from me. Mostly, he has inspired me to come up with stories to write down and tell him and that is kind of magical. If I can make him laugh or wonder, or think then my job as a storyteller is fulfilled. I don’t know if I can hold up the universe with any of my tales, but maybe I can entertain a galaxy or two.

Every day, for ten years, I would get out of bed, turn on the laptop, start the coffee, and sit down to write. I did not need an alarm. My characters woke me. It was as if they were all crammed into my little apartment, tapping their toes and leaning on broadswords and axes waiting for me to get up. My every spare thought was spent on my world, and the lives of the people in it.

In 2018, I finished my book, Mother Made of Iron. I’d been through all the edits and revisions, the moments of bare-faced self-doubt and crippling questions of my choices in life and survived. After writing and writhing around in the world I’d created, it was time to promote it. I had to find representation. I started researching literary agents and drafting query letters to send them.

Today it is 2019 and it has been one long year, and one short year of actively querying agents. I am still going, and why shouldn’t I be? It’s only been a year. It was a long one yes, but then, I am not a patient man. It’s been a short one because how many writers have gone so much longer? I’ve heard the stories, some authors go through hundreds of rejections – hundreds. Some have waited twenty or more years to finally be published. Why should I feel special? Of course, I do feel special; like I should have been published already, but it’s that dab of necessary narcissism that probably keeps me from giving up. Despite the denials, I have come to appreciate the journey even though my folder of query rejections continues to grow.

Years ago, I started a practice where I would go to my local bookstore in Tempe, Arizona and take a picture of where my book will go on the shelf. I do this every couple of months. Between Patrick Rothfuss, and Rena Rossner, my debut fantasy novel will one day live. I take those pictures because I have to, because this process is not easy. Every writer has to go through the gauntlet of rejection. Some get through it quicker than others and some don’t. I’m still in it. The point is to keep going. Do not listen to doubt. Do not give up. Do not stop writing.

One thing that has helped me get through this query process with my fantasy novel, is writing something other than fantasy. Despite my desire to jump right into book two of the intended series, Mother of Light, Father of Shadow, I had to stop and address things that I had to write in this world, more specifically, my world. I write fantasy because the genre saved me growing up through difficult times in my life. I don’t particularly relish going over the things that made me turn to fantasy but that’s where the writing is telling me to go, and I go where the writing takes me. Most of the time, it takes me to lands where dragons sleep under the earth, but sometimes I have to walk back from a scorched childhood to find my way home.

Writing brings me places I never knew existed and some I wish never did, but I am kept warm by the fire it creates. Like some modern day caveman, I hunch by its flame to scrawl the contents of my mind on this digital wall.

My First Blog

I have been writing for more than twenty years now. In 2008, I came to a crossroads of sorts as I was trying to write the, “great American novel,” but as I wrote, fantasy elements would appear. At the time, I thought I had to be a “serious” writer. I’d had a great teacher in college and I’d taken all the literature courses. I’d gone to the Cannon Beach writer’s retreat in Oregon. I’d won a few minor awards for poetry in my college’s publication. I was determined that my work would one day be studied in college courses and sign books with a glass of bourbon in my hand like a Poet Laureate I once met, I was serious. So, when a fantasy element or magical realism popped up in my great American story, I deleted it. I was killing my own imagination despite that reading Tolkien, Brooks, Weis and Hickman and others got me through traumatic and difficult times as a kid. I learned from those authors how to use my imagination, and here I was as a writer, avoiding it.

On December 12^th 2008, I had taken the day off work solely to write, I was working on my great “literary” debut when I felt like someone was holding me under water. This pressing need to write some great piece of literature was suffocating me. I stopped typing and made a guttural sound, as if the caveman in me had woken up and wanted to smash something. “Fuck it!” I said. “I’m going to write what I want to write.” As I spoke those words, I became free.

There I sat, at the kitchen table, my dogs looked at me as if I was losing my mind and in a way, I did. My mind opened to itself and I felt like I could see the world from where I was sitting. By the time I was done that day, I had drawn a map, written a creation story, came up with main characters and the names of gods and goddesses. I was writing, really writing. For me, “really writing,” means that I actually had something to write. I couldn’t stop it. I had discovered a new world, one that was real and had people in it, animals, land and oceans.

From that moment on, the people in this world I was creating woke me up every day. It was as if there was a tall, northern woman dressed in armor tapping me to wake up and get to the computer and start writing. Every time I walked my dogs then I could hear the little girl with the crow’s feathers marked on her arm asking me when I would get back to it. At work I couldn’t sit in my cubicle and work without a knight and his barbarian friend drinking ale and constantly poking at me to tell their stories.  

The writing took over my life and I loved it. It got me through every awful, stressful day and every wonderful one. You can call it the muse or creativity or whatever word makes you feel right, I had a story to tell and it was alive. Ever since I finished that book I’ve been chasing that very same feeling. I still need to publish it, which is an entirely different chase all its own.

I have not gone back to that world but a few times since, writing what amounts to be a few short stories and a novelette. I miss it, and I will return, but I had to embark on some other writing, the kind rooted in this world, carved in the rock of my soul. All of it is important, all of it serious. I may never be read in textbooks but everything I’ve written, be it fantasy or memoir and everything in between, is no less important than the great literary pieces of the world. Those works, the “great American novels,” and the classics, they teach us about humanity as a whole, and that’s crucial. For me, writing has taught me about myself, it is the roadmap to my soul. I would be lost without it.