Whoops! I can’t believe it’s been so long since I last posted here – where did the time go? I’ll tell you
where it went; it was swallowed up in the black hole that is a publishing
deadline. The horrible irony is, I’ve been too busy writing to write my blog about
writing! But I’m back now and I’ve got loads of fun writing exercises and tips
for you. Including, today, how making a collage can be the perfect preparation
for your story, novel or poem.
But first, let me offer a
grovelling explanation for my long absence...
This year I found myself in the
massively lucky position of having not one, but two books to finish for publication next year. As
someone who once wondered if I’d ever have a book deal again I was totally
grateful to be faced with this mammoth workload (and I’m living proof that you
should never, ever give up on your writing dreams!) but it’s been a tough old
slog. And sometimes, when you’re writing a novel, or two, you just have to get
into the zone and focus solely on the work in progress.
But I’m chuffed to be able to tell
you that both books are now finished. Finding Cherokee Brown will be out in March 2013 and Shipwrecked will be out in June.
Shipwrecked is a top secret project I’ve been working on for the
past year. It’s been top secret because a TV series is being developed
alongside the books. This is the first time my publisher, Egmont, have embarked
upon a project like this – normally a TV adaptation would take place after the
book has been published and completely separately – so I feel honoured to be
the writer chosen for the job.
As Shipwrecked is a series, I’ve just started work on the second
book – I know, no rest for the wicked! – and I’ll be honest with you, when I
first sat down to write it I felt a little overwhelmed.
Do you ever feel like that when you
start writing something new? Like the story seems so frickin’ huge you just
don’t know where to begin? Or maybe the setting and characters haven’t quite
come alive in your head yet so when you try to capture them on the page they
seem stilted and two dimensional?
This is exactly how I was feeling
the other day – and then I remembered the one fail-safe, fool-proof exercise guaranteed
to bring your story to life before you even start writing it – making a story collage.
A story collage is pretty much what
it says on the tin – a collage, made up of pictures of characters, settings, and
any other images that symbolise what you want to write about. It’s a lot of fun
to create and, as you get busy attacking stacks of magazines with your
scissors, or printing pics from the net, you’d be amazed at how many extra
ideas you start getting for your story too.
When I sat down to make my collage
for Shipwrecked 2 the first thing I did
was look for pictures of my new characters. As soon as I had these I found they
gave me endless clues and ideas for the characters’ back-stories. Then I had
fun searching through the travel sections of newspapers for suitably tropical
pics – and found one photo in particular that gave me tons of ideas for the
plot. Within an hour I’d gone from complete overwhelm to can’t-wait-to-get-writing.
 |
| My collage starts taking shape... |
The photo above is of the start of my collage - it will get a lot bigger as and when I find inspirational pics. I’ve stuck it on my
cupboard door so that I’m facing it when I write. That way I feel fully
immersed in the world of the characters and location.
I seriously can’t recommend this
exercise enough, and would love to hear how you get on if you try it too.
Till next time,
happy writing!
Siobhan x
