Tag Archives: Characters

The Reasons Why I Write What I Write

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The Insecure Writer’s Support Group

November 4 question – Albert Camus once said, “The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.” Flannery O’Conner said, “I write to discover what I know.” Authors across time and distance have had many reasons to write. Why do you write what you write?

The Reasons Why I Write What I Write

I write because I have to. I need to share. I need to express. I need to get it out of me—it being the need to vent, to give advice, to share something I’ve learned, or just to share a simple observation.

I write because I need to get all that stuff out of my head. The irony is that the more I write, getting it out, more of it flows in!

I write because I have people—characters—and topics, asking me, When is it MY turn? I’m surrounded by a crowd, all clamoring for attention.

My reasons for writing are that simple. So many ideas, so little time.

—

Insecure Writers Support Group BadgePurpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer – aim for a dozen new people each time – and return comments. This group is all about connecting!

A Valentine for You – With Love

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Movies + Romance = The Key to My Heart

I’m a romantic in so many ways, it would take another blog to explain all of my many connections to Venus, the moon, nature, and more.

As a romantic, I adore love stories, both bittersweet and happily every after. Yes, I’m a Hallmark Channel junkie.

Combing Valentine’s Day this year with my love of movies, I’m sharing my top favorite romance movies in no particular order. These are my go-to romance movies, thus I’ve seen each of them multiple dozens of times.

Dangerous Beauty – With Catherine McCormack and Rufus Sewell. This is the movie where I really fell in love with Rufus. Based on a true story, it’s a movie about an aristocrat and one of the last courtesans of Venice. Just hearing the music score makes me want to go watch the movie again. In fact, I bought the music soundtrack. It’s that good.

The Love Letter – A Hallmark Channel movie with Jennifer Jason Leigh and Campbell Scott. A letter written in the 1860s is received by a man in 1998. Thus, begins their communication and a love story that transcends time. I fell in love with Campbell Scott.
The full movie can be viewed here.

Bridal Wave – A Hallmark Channel movie with Arielle Kebel and Andrew Walker. Laugh out loud funny and the very best of the best that Hallmark offers. Yup, I fell in love with Andrew Walker.

A Bride for Christmas – A Hallmark Channel movie. If you enjoyed Bridal Wave, you’ll enjoy these same two actors in this wonderfully funny Christmas movie.

Love Actually – With Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson, Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, Colin Firth and more. Great actors, great scenes, funny moments, and there’s not a bad story in the bunch. I’ve always adored the men of this movie: Hugh, Liam, Alan, and Colin.

Pillow Talk – A classic with Doris Day & Rock Hudson. There’s one scene that makes me laugh out loud every time I see it. Every. Time. Another movie that I’ve seen dozens and dozens of times. How can you go wrong with Doris Day & Rock Hudson? And, who didn’t love Rock Hudson?

Possession – With Gwyneth Paltrow, Aaron Eckhart, Jeremy Northam, and Jennifer Ehle. Two stories, two time periods. Modern-day literary scholars are searching for any documentation on two different Victorian poets after one scholar happens upon some old papers where the second is mentioned. Could there be a connection? The second story features the two elusive Victorian poets and their forbidden secret love story. Book by A.S. Byatt. Yup, I fell in love with both Aaron and Jeremy.

Somewhere in Time – Christopher Reeves and Jane Seymour – He travels back in time to be with the woman he fell in love with through a picture on a museum wall. Filmed on Mackinac Island, Michigan, my all-time favorite vacation spot. Movie was adapted from the book, Bid Time Return by Richard Matheson, who also wrote the screenplay. I totally fell in love with Christopher here. Starting to see a pattern?

The Woodlanders – with Rufus Sewell and Emily Woof. Based on Thomas Hardy’s book, a story of two people—Giles and Grace—friends and childhood sweethearts destined for marriage. She’s now returned home from school wanting more. My favorite of Hardy’s stories.

Out of Africa – With Robert Redford and Meryl Streep. Her strength and determination and his…well everything combined with the majestic of Africa makes this movie unforgettable. I fell in love with the movie seeing the opening scene as the train, seen from a distance, is crossing the plain with the soundtrack music in the background. Another soundtrack CD that I own. Rightly so as the movie won Best Picture; Best Director; Best Screenplay Adaptation; Best Cinematography; Best Music, Original Score; Best Sound; and Best Art Direction-Set Decoration. Streep was nominated for Best Actress. Actually, I fell in love with Redford in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Way We Were. This movie just reinforced my why.

And finally, from Jane Austen’s books:

Pride & Prejudice – The 2005 version with Keira Knightley and Matthew McFadden. My most favorite of all the versions produced of Pride & Prejudice. Needless to say, I fell in love the Matthew McFadden.

Persuasion – The 1995 version with Ciaran Hinds and Amanda Root. The movie where I fell in love with Ciaran Hinds and absolutely adored and could relate to Anne, Amanda’s character.

Persuasion – The 2008 BBC adaptation with Sally Hawkins and Rupert Penny-Jones. I totally fell in love with Rupert here. There’s a second longer trailer behind the first one.

Sense & Sensibility – The 1995 version with Emma Thompson (won best actress Golden Globe award giving the best speech ever!), Alan Rickman, Kate Winslet, and Hugh Grant. I wish the screenplay’s actual music was playing in the background, but alas.

Sense & Sensibility – The 2008 BBC version with Hattie Morahan and Dan Stevens (of Downton Abbey fame). Screenplay written by Andrew Davies, one of my favorite screenwriters.

Sigh. If only…

Personal Traits and Deepening Characters

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The Insecure Writer’s Support Group

July question: What personal traits have you written into your character(s)?

Personal Traits & Deepening Characters

Currently writing a romance series of seven novellas, I’m starting the first draft of the fourth novella, Buried Hearts.

The first one, Shattered Dreams, is already published, with first drafts for the second and third, Burning Desire and Arrested Pleasures respectively written.

Because I’m writing the last first drafts of the last six before any more are published, it meant plotting the stories and creating the characters all at the same time.

Seven couples, seven romances, seven stories, with either the hero or heroine, if not both, all went to school together. Most were in the same graduating class, with two of them a class ahead of the rest. Some are best friends, some dated in high school, some wanted to date the other in high school but didn’t.

In Buried Hearts, Clint Anderson, a life-long resident of Laurel Ridge where all the stories take place, is giving a fiftieth wedding anniversary party for his parents and has hired balloonist, Gabriella (Gabby) King. He gets to know Gabby during the flight with his parents, and he’s smitten.

A long time ago, I learned when developing strong and interesting characters, I need to go deep. Down into the dark where their secrets are hidden. Secrets they haven’t talked about and feel ashamed to let others learn.

I learned that those secrets, those wounds drive that character. That secret determines how they act, what they do, what they wish for. Because I know all these things before I write word one, I’ve become a monster plotter.

Because all seven novellas take place within the same time period, I’m now in the process of plotting out their events on a monster spreadsheet. Did I tell you how much I love spreadsheets?

Plotting spreadsheet

Insecure Writers Support Group BadgePurpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds!

Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer – aim for a dozen new people each time – and return comments. This group is all about connecting!

 

If My Characters Feel So Real, How Can They Be Imaginary?

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My life as a writer has provided me many meetings—some fun and some strange.

Fun meetings involve other writers, some best-selling authors, new authors, and many writes in between. Many have become friends.

Other fun meetings involve readers. Their enthusiasm is catching, and they always have great ideas regarding my characters, which always leads me down a path of thoughtful consideration.

I’ve met and become friends with lots of characters, too. Many of these characters that I’ve read about were created by other writers, and some of these characters came into my life via my hand. I wish I could say that I fully created them. They mostly just pop into my life, fully formed, wanting me to write down their stories.

Such was the meeting of yesterday’s character. Only this character is dark and sinister—not the usual, traditional, likeable character that I want to get to know. Generally, I have to probe to learn about my characters—particularly the wounds they are struggling to overcome, which creates the conflict in the stories. Just as in real life, the wounds are buried deep, so it takes time—often weeks—to reveal these wounds.

But this guy was different. He wasn’t hiding a thing.

So there I was, at one of my favorite restaurants in this small community. The place was crowded, every booth and table taken with people standing at the door waiting.

While waiting for my order to arrive, I was reading, as I typically do when dining alone. I was reading Gillian Flynn’s Dark Places, a thriller for sure. Most definitely, it’s a dark story, and I was hooked, oblivious to everyone else around me.

All of a sudden this imaginary character—a drop-dead gorgeous hunk of a man with dark hair and dark eyes—sat down opposite me and said, “I know you.”

And then, he just stared. Waiting. Watching. And sharing his story.

The story, which includes a shocking ending, spewed from his mind to mine telepathically and with a gaze that never wavered. Seeing the end of the story, I broke out in goosebumps and felt my skin crawl.

I have other commitments, I argued.

He didn’t care. He’s wasn’t interested in knowing what I’m already working on, what my plan of writing projects looks like for the rest of the year.

Nope, it’s didn’t matter.

His wound was easy to see. No digging needed on my part.

He’s scary. He’s dark. He’s shallow and yet deep. He’s the bad boys of bad boys, but not in a good way or a fun way. He’s not someone you want in your house at all. That kind of scary.

Looks like I’ll be working on several projects, simultaneously. I have no choice. To get rid of him I have to write the story, and I’m not willing to postpone or abandon the others—even if for a short time.

A story that is going to lead me into the dark, spooky corners of an individual or two, who feels as real as any breathing, talking, blood-in-their-veins person in my life.

I can hardly wait.

::shudder::