Good morning and happy Monday. I’ve been getting a number of emails from unpublished writers asking me about the writer’s life…so in response to these inquiries, I’ve decided that on Mondays I’m going to blog about writing.
Writing for me is like breathing, I have to do it or I wilt. Before I wrote full time, I would write on weekends or late at night when I couldn’t sleep, to help me relax. According to my husband, long ago, before becoming a full time writer, the weeks that I didn’t write I became cranky and unbearable to live with. This is still true. The cranky part. I never go weeks without writing anymore, but sometimes I may go a couple days, due to illness, parenting responsibilities, meetings, travel, book tours…and by day three of not writing I am definitely impossible to live with.
When I write, I feel like I am most me. I am alone, in a world that I created. I’m not sure what that says about my personality…probably something unpleasant. But often times I prefer the world I’m creating to the world I inhabit in reality. Or perhaps, I prefer to escape to the world I am creating. Either way, it is here at my computer, listening to the characters tell me their story that I feel most comfortable.
So characters. A number of emails ask where do they come from? I don’t know. When I finished Hollywood Girls Club one of my producer friends mentioned that he saw a piece of me in each of the characters. And perhaps that’s true. Really, for me, I start to hear a voice. A voice that tells me a story. And I take dictation….on a good day. On a not so good writing day, the voice is far off and I have to listen really hard, sometimes I can’t make out everything, and I need to fill in the blanks.
Anyway, a little peek into my world and my life. Hope I haven’t frightened anyone off. We’re a quirky bunch us writers…sitting alone for hours and hours tapping away at our keyboards. But, really, I wouldn’t want it any other way.
xoMaggie