The Creative Process

The creative process is probably different for every writer, every artist. I know some authors who write at night, others who write mid-afternoon, still others who write early morning. And their routines often differ. Some like background music playing, others flirt with social media between paragraphs; some light candles, others shut everything down and need silence and solitude to write.

I fall into the latter category. I need silence and solitude to write. I used to write at night, but found I would get bombarded with ideas while trying to sleep and found myself getting up every few minutes to either scribble ideas on paper or just give up on sleep altogether and start pounding away on the keyboards late into the night. In the long run, this strategy affected my ability to sleep so I abandoned it.

Now, I write in the morning hours, sometimes starting at six am, other times at seven or eight. Since I’m not a morning person, I get the coffee going as soon as I wake up, drink a cup or two while catching up on some TV news headlines. Then, when my caffeine-fueled mind begins to feel lucid, I retreat to my office. Before I start writing, I spend a half hour checking my email inbox and checking on social media. Once I’ve completed my personal and promotional posts and responses, I shut everything down. I won’t even turn my phone on and check messages until I’ve completed my daily word count.

Before I start, I usually bring a small tea candle into the office, light it and insert it into a pirate-shaped glass candle holder. The tea candle burns for almost four hours and serves as an hour-glass timer for me. Often when the flame goes out, I go out.

Although I’m more focused on story than word count, I generally write 2000-plus words a day. I sometimes get so involved in a story, I lose track of the words and even lose track of time. I generally envision an entire scene or chapter in my mind before I write anything down.

Toward the end of a story, I get so excited and passionate about the possibilities that I often write six to ten thousand words a day, a kind of sprint to the finish line. I get so involved with the characters I create that I often find myself laughing out loud, feeling sadness, anger, or despair as the situation warrants.

There are at least two kinds of writers, some would say. The plotter, who methodically plots out chapters, scenes and dialogue, determining the end of a novel far before the characters realize what lies ahead for them. I know mystery writers who are plotters and it makes sense for the whodunit genre.

Then there are the pantsers, writers who fly by the seat of their pants. When they start a book, they have no idea where it will go, what characters will be involved, or how it will end. Stephen King is said to be a pantser. He contends that rigidly plotting all aspects of a story may have a tendency to limit the creative process. Maybe the characters you’ve created know better than you do where the story should go.

My style falls somewhere in between the pantser and the plotter. Many of my novels contain a lot of research and I find the pantser style doesn’t necessarily lend itself to weaving painstakingly researched material into a story line. But I don’t like to limit the creative process either. Sometimes I’ll outline ten chapters ahead and compare and contrast ten chapters later to see how closely my prose resembles my outline.

More often than not, I’m surprised at the results. Often the characters, once created, demand that the story follow a different arc.

Many writers are excellent multi-taskers, managing to juggle family, friends, loved ones, other careers and hobbies and a hectic social life while knocking out excellent novels. I’m not one of them. I’m not the best multi-tasker. I tend to develop tunnel vision when I write. Not to suggest the novels will ever replace friends, family and loved ones. If they have a crisis or emergency, I try and be there for them in whatever capacity I’m able to. I’m just not one for a bunch of small talk when I’m trying to work.

And when I’m writing, I become intensely passionate about and focused on my work. My schedule is rigid and self-disciplined. After I write for four or five hours—sometimes eight or nine hours—it is only then that I’ll turn on the communications and check messages from friends, etc. During production of a novel, I generally socialize little and work six days a week. If I want to socialize, I know there will be plenty of time to do that when the first or second draft of the novel is complete. At that stage, I like to leave it for a week or two and then revisit it for revision and rewrites with fresh eyes before I send it down the pipe to my editor.

Much can be said about the creative process. Although at times it is fraught with blood, sweat and tears, writing a novel is richly rewarding in so many ways—ways often difficult to put into words. Creating characters and stories from one’s imagination is nothing short of magical.

In the creation of The Dark Menace, my latest work in progress, I’ve felt the magic, felt the love for the characters, felt their despair and sadness at times. I’m perhaps 10,000 words from the finish line. The ineffable feeling of euphoria, pride, and sense of accomplishment that will inevitably occur when I finally type THE END is what continues to drive me forward.

Here’s a short summary:

Nightmare-plagued Noah Janzen suspects an enigmatic scientist may be responsible for a series of horrifying attacks by the Shadow People and the Hat Man.

Here’s a long synopsis:

Noah Jansen is plagued by nightmares and multiple sleep disorders; night terrors, sleepwalking, sleep talking, and a terrifying sleep paralysis that often invokes chilling images of the Shadow People and the Hat Man.

Determined not to let his nocturnal demons interfere with his successful career and newly formed relationship with Angela Rosewood, he meets her in a local pub. But when he sees a shadowy figure wearing a fedora and a trench coat eerily watching him through a window, he freaks out and battens down the hatches of his apartment.

He soon learns that a hat-wearing psycho has viciously attacked Angela, smashing in her door, trashing her apartment, and nearly killing her. Worse still, Angela suspects Noah has morphed into a conduit for evil and starts distancing herself from him. She might even think he is the Hat Man.

Desperate to save his new relationship and find answers, he seeks the aid of physicist and sleep specialist, Doctor Neil Samuelson. While remaining tight-lipped on his experiments involving the Shadow People and the Hat Man, the enigmatic doctor informs Noah that an old woman has just been brutally murdered at the hands of The Dark Menace.

As blood-curdling reports of Shadow People and the Hat Man begin to escalate, Noah suspects Neil has accidently opened up a portal from another dimension, creating an invasion of evil, shadowy entities, hell-bent on terrorizing and destroying humanity.

He’s thrust into an epic battle to preserve his relationship and sanity and find answers to a strange and mysterious real-life phenomenon that has haunted and terrorized millions of people around the world for centuries.

Expect The Dark Menace on bookstore shelves in a couple of months. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I’m enjoying writing it. THE END, at least of the first draft, is near. As always, thanks for stopping by and feel free to leave comments. Whatever art you might excel at, I’d love to read about your creative process. Remember, your only limitations are self-imposed.