“How do I create something out of nothing? I think it is by questioning.” ~Amy Tan
Last post I shared about how I go about naming my characters. That includes animal characters too. I posted a picture of my sister’s cat and you all suggested some neat names for him. Most of you thought he was so pretty that he must be a girl. In answering your comments, I shared how my sister’s granddaughter gave the cat, then a kitten, a name. Fluffleupagus or something like that. She was young at the time. But this cat was not a Fluffy. He needed a name like George or maybe, as one of you suggested, Prince. Actually, you came up with some great cat names. I may drop a cat into this new story and if I do, I’ll remember all the great names you suggested. Or who knows? If I do, I might ask you to name a cat again once I decide what the cat looks like. It’s more likely that this story will have a dog. Not one exactly like Scout in These Healing Hills, but a dog is always fun to drop into a story.
That’s where I am with this story. Questioning everything. Trying to answers questions about everything. The history of the time period I’ve picked. How my characters look. Or even before that, what characters I need. Who are they and what do they want? What spiritual thread will run through the story? I usually don’t sit down and figure that out before the story, but it seems to come as a natural part of my characters’ stories.
Sometimes prayer is the underlying spiritual theme. That certainly turned out to be true while I was writing River to Redemption. Inspired by what I read about my true life character, Louis, I had him often telling other characters in the story to “pray believing.” Prayer was also the spiritual thread in my last Shaker story, The Innocent. In it, the main character, Carlyn, keeps remember her mother telling her to “pray anyway,” no matter if the situation she found herself in was good or bad.
In These Healing Hills, my Appalachian mountain story about a Frontier Nurse midwife, the spiritual thread turned out to be that the Lord opens opportunities up to us even in the midst of what we consider the ruin of our hopes and dreams. Francine decides that perhaps the Lord leads her to a place right where she’s supposed to be.
I never intend to be “preachy” in my books, but my characters’ faith and their questions about that faith generally find a way into my stories. In a recent review on Amazon of my book, Angel Sister, the reviewer says my story is a pretty good sermon. I don’t think the reviewer meant it as a compliment. I don’t intend to write sermons. I haven’t been called to preach, but I am a storyteller. I like answering questions about my characters, and since I think what we believe matters, I feel that what my characters believe matters too.
I’ll keep asking questions and imagining answers until I get this story written. All the questions won’t be answered or even asked at the beginning. Maybe not even at the ending since life can be like that. We rarely ever have all the answers. But along my story road, I’ll find a few answers for these people I’m imagining.
This is your last chance to leave a comment to enter my book giveaway. I’ll be drawing for the two winners on Sunday and contacting them via e-mail and also have their names here. First place winner gets the lighted nativity scene pictured in last Wednesday’s post and his or her choice of one of my books. Second place winner gets his or her choice of one of my books. You have to be at least 18 years old to enter.
Thanks to all of you for reading my posts and leaving your great comments. You make writing more fun.
So what do you think? Do you like to see faith threads and journeys in the stories you read? Do you feel as though you’re reading a sermon when you read an inspirational novel?