Behind the Pages: Where My Stories Actually Begin

People sometimes imagine writers sitting down with an entire book perfectly formed in their minds.

I wish.

My stories usually begin with something much smaller.

A feeling.

An image.

A place.

A character who suddenly appears in my imagination and apparently has no intention of leaving.

Sometimes it's a woman discovering something she was never supposed to find.

Sometimes it's an ancient manuscript hidden away for centuries.

Sometimes I picture two people standing across from one another and immediately know there is an entire history between them—even if I haven't figured out what that history is yet.

And sometimes it's simply a question:

What if?

What if two people had loved each other before?

What if the legends were true?

What if history forgot something important?

What if the person you were destined to love had been waiting for you?

Once that question appears, I follow it.

Characters change my plans. Entire scenes appear when I'm supposed to be sleeping. A character intended to play a small role suddenly decides they're important enough to deserve their own book.

And somehow, slowly, a world begins to exist where there wasn't one before.

That's probably my favorite part of writing.

There is a moment when the characters stop feeling like names on a page and begin feeling real. Their relationships become complicated. Their histories deepen. Their choices surprise even me.

That's when I know I've found the story.

Writing isn't always neat, predictable, or organized.

Neither is falling in love.

Maybe that's why the two work so beautifully together.

And somewhere between the first idea and the final page, the story becomes something I never could have completely planned.

I wouldn't want it any other way.