Wednesday Inspiration
As a writer, I’m always learning from other best sellers and doing my homework to improve my writing. This week I’ve come across some inspiring authors and resources.
My first class recommendation is the MasterClass with Dan Brown in Writing Thrillers. I shared some of his advice from the beginning classes in yesterday’s post but what what I didn’t get into was his charisma and energy. The way he shares his experiences and advice will keep you engaged and leave you feeling inspired. His energy spills into his words and you can tell he has a passion for writing. The feeling boosts your mood and you feel like getting to work on your own novel to apply what you’ve learned.
The second resource I’m sharing is from Diane Callahan. She’s a writer who offers great videos about writing. There are plenty of videos that you can refer to when you feel writer’s block around the corner. Her voiceovers and quotes are the words you need to hear and that will transport you into the world of writing.
I’m using her advice to plan a trip this Spring to bring more life into my current novel. I’m going to take the road trip to the small Iron Range town of Ely, Minnesota. Following her advice, I’m going to learn more about the town, talk to the locals, and maybe a few tourists to see what brings them all the way up to the border town of the Boundary Waters. I may or may not share the fact that I’m going to turn their town into a shifter world, where some of the wolves at the International Wolf Center do more than howl in the middle of the night.
Being able to see what buildings look like, how people talk, and tourists behave will only help my story. I don’t have to imagine what things look like or create new pictures of characters. I think this will also help the reader feel like they’re actually there. Having a clear setting will help me focus on the location, so that my own mind doesn’t wander away.
Does this mean that it might change my introduction? If you read my previous posts, then yes. You knew it was coming! No shocker here. Let’s say David Mamet’s words on having location sickness was stuck in my head. I need focus. Concentrating my story into one opening setting will create the small town feeling I want to create. Wish me luck!
Finally, I want to leave you with a quote from Diane Callahan, The Quotidian Writer. You can find the video I watched at https://youtu.be/evNccOFk760.
“Don’t write what you know, write what you want to understand. I write from a place of deep curiosity about the world.” -Aminatta Forna
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