Inspiration

Q. Where do you get your inspiration?
A. Um . . .

Have you all been asked this question as many times as I have? Do you have as many different answers?

Sometimes an absolutely awesome title comes to me and I try to write a story around it. Such was the case with The Dream Thief. Once I even concocted a tale around a heroine’s name I thought was beautiful and unusual: Amarantha. I was cruising a dictionary for names and came across that one. It is derived from Greek and means "immortal." Thus began my story of reincarnation and eternal love in The Circle of a Promise. My upcoming release, Blaze of Lightning, Roar of Thunder, sprang from quite a different source: my love of the western U.S. and its native peoples.

Once, while traveling in France, I swear I actually had a character tap me on the shoulder and whisper in my ear, “I have a story. Please tell it.” I was in a cold and drafty chateau in the Loire Valley on a gray February day. The character, who became Honneure Mansart in By Honor Bound, was as real to me as my physical surroundings. Her tale unfolded seamlessly.

Ellie and the Elven King evolved from my love of horses and a truly amazing time my daughter and I once shared with a herd of semi-wild mares. Call of the Trumpet came from roughly the same place. Wondering what to write about one day, I went back to that old, familiar saw—Write about what you know and love. It has always been horses, and at that particular time it was Arabian horses. The character Cecile Villier was born in my head, and the epic adventures of her travels through the Sahara to find her mother’s Bedouin roots were created.

Inspiration comes in many forms, many ways. I’m sure your sources are as varied as mine. But there is one thing all inspirations share in common: passion that translates onto the page.

As an editor, this is something I look for but too rarely find. Quite frequently I come across a good query that prompts me to read the synopsis, and the story sounds wonderful so I go on to read the first three chapters. All too often they are disappointing. Sometimes the writing simply doesn’t hold up, or the pacing is bad. There are many, many things that can go wrong—or simply not be right—with a manuscript. But the one thing that always shines through is passion: an author’s love for what they are writing. It might be as simple as the era, the characters, the location, or merely a great plot. Regardless, it is identifiable. It is what draws in and holds a reader. It is what publishers are looking for every day.

This monthly column has largely been devoted to the craft and technicalities of writing. I have been amiss not to mention the most important ingredient of all. Perhaps I thought it went without saying.

Not any more.

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