How Stories Come to Life

Andrea here, musing about how my stories come to life. The Wenches were chatting the other day among ourselves about great teachers we had in school (look for that “Ask A Wench” blog on Wednesday!) and that’s what got me to thinking about it . . .

I have a very vivid memory of a school assignment that was my first “formal” introduction to the challenge of storytelling. It was sixth grade English class and our teacher gave each of us a random picture that he had cut out from old books and magazines—mine was a vintage engraving of a young Masai warrior facing down a ferocious lion—and told us to write a short story about

Granted, as a kid I had fooled around drawing crayon pictures and making up little vignettes about them. (And yes, I'm still a very bad speller!) But this demanded that I think of a real story—a beginning, a middle and an end. (I’m not sure my brain thought it through quite that clearly, but I do remember that the assignment really sparked my imagination.)

I can still recall my opening sentence: Beads of sweat broke out on Nemo’s forehead. (I pat myself on the back for realizing that an opening sentence needed to catch a reader’s attention.) The rest of the story has long faded into the haze of the past, but another clear memory is of my teacher taking me aside after the assignment was turned in and telling me that he thought I was pretty good at storytelling.

I guess that stuck with me. Maybe the assignment resonated with me because I was also so interested in art, and the idea of an image sparking a story idea was very cool. I think of myself as a visual person—I’m always looking around and finding myself intrigued by all the tiny little details around me. I pursued art as a profession, thought writing and history were always very important to me, and ended up specializing in publication design. (Clearly, I have a left brain-right brain love affair with the printed page!) I spent a number of years as a creative director before heeding the siren song to turn my hand to storytelling in words only.

All of this is a rather long-winded intro to the main point of my blog today . . . Which is that I’ve thought a lot about my process of storytelling and have realized that visuals play a huge part in how my brain puts together an idea and a story arc.

I am a total “pantser.” (authorspeak for writing by the seat of one’s pants.) I am truly incapable of sitting down and drafting a linear story outline. My idea for a book usually begins with an “ah-ha” moment, by which I mean a small spark of “oh, this would be very cool to use as a plot device.” Usually it’s something visual—an object or a setting.

To show you how strangely my brain works, here’s an example. A few years ago, the Metropolitan Museum in New York had a fabulous exhibit on famous gunmakers of the Regency. In it was a special two-shot pocket pistol— a very innovative design for the time. One could squeeze the trigger twice to fire off TWO bullets without reloading. As I admired it, nose pressed to the glass display case, I began envisioning a scene where a heroine was attacked by a villain. She fires a first shot, and the villain gloats when it misses. He starts forward . . . and BAM.

I can see it all perfectly. Now, all I have to do is build a story around it. (If you’re curious, the scene is in A Tangle of Serpents, one of my Lady Arianna Regency mysteries.) That happens in bits and pieces, too. I have to picture a setting in my mind’s eye before I can make it come to life, whether it be a Mayfair drawing room, with its opulent furnishings and paintings, or a dockyard alleyway. That’s why my favorite way of doing research is to visit museums, especially the esoteric specialty ones like the Horse Guards Museum, the Museum of London or the Docklands Museum.

Art galleries, period houses, and just walking through historic cities like London or Oxford also offer a wealth of inspiration. Details of fashion, scientific instruments, blacksmith shops, military uniforms—all the things I see percolate in my head and somehow manage to come together in semblance of a plot. It takes some coloring in of the blank spaces when I sit down at the keyboard and start putting the ideas on (cyber)paper . . . and at times a lot very unladylike Regency curses as I try to cobble it into a coherent plot. Okay, it’s not pretty, but there you are.

I am the first to admit that it’s not an ideal way to write a book. I wish I had an orderly mind capable of composing a clear outline from start to finish. But I don’t. I need my eyes as well as my inner voice to help me see a story.

I find it endlessly interesting that we all see the world around us in different ways. What about you? Would you describe yourself as a visual person? Do you find yourself constantly distracted by little visual details as you go through your daily peregrinations? Or are you someone who is more focused and sees the bigger picture?

Comments

[Donna H.]

What an interesting post! It made me think back to school and childhood and how terrible I was in arithmetic. When we had homework that contained "problems" I had such a hard time concentrating. An example: If a train leaving a station goes so many miles per hour, covers such and such an amount of ground, how long would it take to reach so and so. I was too busy visualizing all the people on the train, where were they going? why were they going there? And I didn't give a hoot what the mathematical answer was. I frustrated my teacher and got into trouble for "not concentrating". I guess I was visual alright!

[Andrea Penrose]

Ha, ha! That's a wonderful anecdote. I was terrible at math, too. (Though I now understand the beauty of it, though my brain just can't see it.)

I think you're right in that it may be because we need to see visuals in our heads to reinforce a concept. And I just can't do that. And yet, I have friends who wax poetic about the symmetry or intriguing concepts that they in certain equations. Our brains all work differently!

[Mary T]

I have a pretty good imagination and can make up a lot of really good stories in my head. But putting those stories on paper is another matter. During my school years any kind of writing assignment was torture to me. The odd thing is - I always made good grades on what I finally did turned in. But I always thought that if I had to make a living as a writer, it would kill me.

That's why I have such an appreciation for you guys.

[Andrea Penrose]

Trust me, Mary, writing is HARD for all of us! And it doesn't get any easier with practice. Putting what's in your head into words on a piece of paper is very demanding—one fusses constantly about language and rhythym as well as plot and characters. It's a complex puzzle to put together—very challenging, but ultimately rewarding However, it is WORK!

[Mary Jo Putney]

Andrea, I don't think there is an ideal way of writing a story! We all suffer no matter what our process. *G* Even though I'm an art school graduate and my first career was as a designer, I'm much more a word person than a visual person. And stories are apt develop from thinking of a complicated character and what terrible thing I should do to him!

[Quantum]

I once tried to write a novel so know from experience how difficult it is to do well. Portraying character through words seemed most difficult to me. I definitely tried to visualize my characters to capture personality, looking for all the quirks, habits etc but the results somehow seemed robotic ..... you guys have my deep admiration!

On the beauty of mathematics, Richard Feynman famously would visualize complex mathematical processes with his Feynman Diagrams. Each line in a diagram represented a Green Function describing particle propagation, and the diagrams were powerful tools in QED (quantum electrodynamics) and also in statistical physics (many body theory).

[Andrea Penrose]

Even if there were an ideal way, I doubt many of us could force ourselves into the mold of following it. The creative process is messy, and I find it fascinating that so many writers have their own unique way of doing it. It's no suprise, I suppose, since we all write our own unique take on whatever genre or trope we choose.

[Andrea Penrose]

Quantum, creating characters through words is a real challenge. One builds layers through dialogue with others, through interior thought, through having other characters react . . . not easy. You are very kind with compliments to the Wenches.

That's fascinating about Feynman Diagrams.

[Kareni]

What a fun post, Andrea.

I'm not a visual person, nor am I someone who is more focused and sees the bigger picture. May I have door number three, please?!

[Andrea Penrose]

Ha,ha!

You're clearly a "Word" person, because your monthly reading list is a constant source of awe!

[Annette N]

I want to thank you for this post. It is fascinating learning how you create your stories.

I am not capable of doing what you do and I thank you for what you do.

Hope everyone is well and safe and happy.

[Andrea Penrose]

So glad you enjoyed it, Annette.

And thank you for the kind words. The Word Wenches really appreciate hearing that our writing brings enjoyment to you and all our readers.

[Anne Gracie]

Andrea, I, too, have tried to plot a book out in advance, and you know what? I can, easily, and it looks fine. But I invariably subvert the plan when my characters take over, and start driving the plot in a different direction. They will say or do things that I didn't predict, but make absolute sense fo who they are and how they've developed. So I stick with pantsing, because I think it makes for a more interesting book.

And perhaps I should mention that all the wenches are pantsers, as was the late great Jo Beverley. At my first Romance Writers of America conference, some 20 years ago, there as Jo, giving a talk entitled "Fly Into the Mist" which is a much more elegant name for being a pantser.

Jo wrote a pice about it here: https://www.jobev.com/fim.html
And writer Alison Stuart wrote about it here:
https://www.alisonstuart.com/moments-in-history-blog/flying-into-the-mist-with-jo-beverley

[Andrea Penrose]

Thank you for making me feel less wooly-headed, Anne! I actually do believe that the characters have minds of their own and guide us through situations and plot twists that simply aren't apparent from just trying to map out a succession of scenes. I just wish I could be a little more buttoned up in making a skeleton structure from which to hand my "pants"!

And thanks for putting the links here. Such good thoughts from wonderful writers!