… and the rest, as they say, is history. Or, in this case, a new novel.
For the past week I’ve been feeling rather lost. I miss the characters in my trilogy, as though they were old friends who had moved away without leaving a forwarding address. I find myself wondering what they might be doing if I were still writing about them.
Such is the life of a writer – or certainly one as obsessive as this little fluffy duck!
Our characters can become as real to us as the people who populate our daily lives. We know their intimate secrets, their virtues, and their failings. We watch them grow as they respond to the experiences we create for them, and we share their victories and their struggles.
I have developed an enduring fondness for them and can picture them as clearly as any of my friends. Perhaps this is because I’m a very visual person and tend to see each scene unfold like a movie in my imagination.
I’d thought to take a break from writing – perhaps to work on the song cycle for my poems – but the lure of the novel was too strong. Would I follow the request of some of my readers and transform the trilogy's female protagonists into amateur detectives? Well, perhaps I shall, someday. But for now, something else is drawing me back to the computer.
Some years ago, I began a humorous novel about a retreat house and the quirky individuals who visit its sacred portals. On rereading the few chapters I’d written, I fell in love with the concept once again and will now complete it. After years of research for the dramatic plot of The Children of Myth, it will feel like a vacation to write something light and indulge my sense of the ridiculous which I’ve been obliged to restrain for so long!
And so … a Vicar and a Rabbi walk into a bar … and the results of this incongruous friendship will keep me amused for a few months. Ultimately, when published, I hope they’ll do the same for you.
