The Girl is Calling
I came up with a new idea for a book. I think the central premise is pretty original (as original as anything can be--hasn't everybody thought up everything?). And I know who my main character is--a woman very much like me, only childless (which, with four kids, is something I can barely imagine, but she longs to have children, and that I CAN imagine). This main character is very, very much a part of me--I know this woman.
But the dead body--and there is a dead body in chapter one--is a discarded girl. I don't want to say anything more. But it is her . . . SHE is calling me.
Maybe, in this character, I see all the unwanted children in the world. All the discards. All the kids in foster care. The little boy from HeadStart I took in for part of the summer two years ago. The babies I visited in the projects. The children abandoned by a broken system.
Whatever it is, for the first time in a LONG, long time, this girl, this child, will not be silenced. She is there when I wake up. She is with me now as I am blogging. She is my last thought when I go to bed. She pops into my head as I am driving. And she is in my garden with me.
For people who do not write, I probably just sound nuts. For people who do write, you know this happens with special books or special characters. This one is an ache in my heart. I wish I could describe what this feels like to people this never happens to, but this child, this discarded little girl, is real. To me.
I wanted to blog about her because this is what writers mean (I think) when the Muse comes to visit. It is that story that wants to invade your current work in progress. The story that HAS to be written NOW. The story that is with you at breakfast and taking up a seat at the dinner table. This is what it feels like when the Muse has you and won't let go. When a novel has to be written.
I am resisting the girl. Not that I don't want to write her story, but I know, already, this is one of those books, like The Roofer, that will be difficult to write, that will filter through every part of my life. But believe me, the girl will not be silenced and I will likely, just to exorcise her a bit, start a little of her story today.
So tell me . . . do you have a girl calling you? What is it like the the Muse has you in her grips?
But the dead body--and there is a dead body in chapter one--is a discarded girl. I don't want to say anything more. But it is her . . . SHE is calling me.
Maybe, in this character, I see all the unwanted children in the world. All the discards. All the kids in foster care. The little boy from HeadStart I took in for part of the summer two years ago. The babies I visited in the projects. The children abandoned by a broken system.
Whatever it is, for the first time in a LONG, long time, this girl, this child, will not be silenced. She is there when I wake up. She is with me now as I am blogging. She is my last thought when I go to bed. She pops into my head as I am driving. And she is in my garden with me.
For people who do not write, I probably just sound nuts. For people who do write, you know this happens with special books or special characters. This one is an ache in my heart. I wish I could describe what this feels like to people this never happens to, but this child, this discarded little girl, is real. To me.
I wanted to blog about her because this is what writers mean (I think) when the Muse comes to visit. It is that story that wants to invade your current work in progress. The story that HAS to be written NOW. The story that is with you at breakfast and taking up a seat at the dinner table. This is what it feels like when the Muse has you and won't let go. When a novel has to be written.
I am resisting the girl. Not that I don't want to write her story, but I know, already, this is one of those books, like The Roofer, that will be difficult to write, that will filter through every part of my life. But believe me, the girl will not be silenced and I will likely, just to exorcise her a bit, start a little of her story today.
So tell me . . . do you have a girl calling you? What is it like the the Muse has you in her grips?
Labels: the Muse
posted by Erica Orloff at 7:00 AM
7 Comments:
Yes. She's 16, a classical guitar player and she's dying to join her cousin's rock band.
Love it! What a great, fun idea.
E
My muse is a guy. He wears a black Fedora, has a three-day blue-black beard. Lucky Strike dangling from his lips, bottle of Cutty's in his bottom desk drawer.
He doesn't come around very often, but when he does I perk up and listen.
He won't say things more than once.
Gotta give the little girl what she needs, Erica. Embrace her.
God knows her name.
Jude:
Yes, God does know her name, just as I feel fairly sure he knows all discarded little children's names--and knows the names of the people who done them wrong.
Your Muse sounds like a cool guy. I'd like to toss back some Cutty's with him and pick his brain.
You'll have to put up with all that cigarette smoke, of course. ;)
my muse seems to be invisible... but it throws whole ideas (scenes, chapters, poems) at me and then runs away.
my best course of action is to sit down at the moment and write it out as much as I can... and then fill in the blanks later.
which leaves me with loads and loads of ideas... unfinished, scrappy, but there waiting for me to get to them.
lets not even talk about how they invade and take over my dreams. some nights I can't sleep for the blitzkrieg happening in my head.
I do what I can to consolidate them into one document so that I can keep them organized. Sometimes I can pull several of them together into one story... but not always.
ewoh:
Interesting . . . I ALSO sometimes pull multiple threads into one book.
And yes, the blitz is raging right now. Despite the fact that I have rewrites due on my next Nocturne.
E
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