Never underestimate a writer's ability to not know what they're writing about

We have some excuse, of course, as for many (most?) writers, writing is a torturous path that rarely stretches straight from start to end. There are side tracks (good-bye cuttings), loop-de-loops, backtracks, and more—and that's when things are going well!

When all's said and done, though, creative voices are . . . well . . . creative. They can take any given array of ingredients (starting points, characters, plot ideas, inspirations) and turn the resultant story into something where all those ingredients are still there and yet the story has shifted to be quite different from initial expectations.

Yes, I “speak” from experience.

I know exactly where and when inspiration hit for How Full of Briars.

I was sitting listening to music and playing simple computer games, when I happened to queue up Giselle. Just in case there's someone reading who's unfamiliar with the story of the ballet, it's a variant on the usual girl falls for boy, boy deceives girl, girl dies when she discovers the truth—because in the second act the girl rises from the dead to join the wilis all of whom died in some way after being betrayed by men and want revenge. They get it, although this particular ballet being the product largely of men's imaginations (male composer, male choreographer) the “hero” escapes because Giselle still loves and protects him.

That particular night, my brain got stuck on the wilis—ghostly creatures in the woods who prey on men. I write fantasy (hence my appearance on this blog) and this provided an excellent jumping off point.

If anyone who reads this blog winds up reading the novel, you may well recognize elements of that scene (and, indeed, maybe a wee bit more of the ballet story, but not much) in the book. I don't consider it spoilers to lay this out.

Because that's not what the book is about.

For weeks (months) I thought it was. It's set in the 1950s in middle America (Ohio, a part I know well because I might sorta-kinda have lived here off and on over the years), but in an alternate version of the world with magic (natch).

I chose the 1950s for a variety of reasons. One, the politics and restrictions suited the story I wanted to tell (any resemblance to certain current political hot topics was only partly coincidental). Two, it let me pull in other elements that I wanted to tackle at a reasonable remove. Three, easier to research because the decades been over long enough for a lot of historical analysis to be written but I can also readily find images and primary sources. Four, I had people in my family who'd lived through the 1950s and I could consult about life back then, namely my parents (indeed, the first viewpoint character is partly inspired by my maternal grandmother, but with fewer children and a different job). And last but not least, the dresses in the performances of Giselle sort-of remind me of 1950s fashions.

And I was sure and certain that I wrote about women suffering from the misdeeds of men and getting their own back. (Yes, yes, I know not-all-men, and not-all-women for that matter either.)

I was wrong.

I didn't realize how wrong until I was nearly done writing.

This despite having a life-changing event take place in the middle of the writing process: my mother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died within a month. She lived very near me, and her death hit me hard. Those of you who've lost beloved parents can understand, and those who haven't may well be able to imagine based on your own experiences.

My mother, may she rest in peace, was not a reader of fantasy although she did read one of my novels (and liked it, which threw me, because yes she's my mother and that's a general parental expectation, but she's also never been shy about offering writing critiques on my non-fiction writing). My father (who's still alive and kicking, may he remain so healthily for as long as he wishes) is where I got a good chunk of my love for fantasy.

Nevertheless, within a few weeks of my mother's death, as I plunged myself back into writing with a hard external deadline looming, I realized I was memorializing my mother just a wee bit in the book. Not by writing her in as a character (I shudder at the thought) but by making parental relations a sub-theme.

I kept telling myself this until I started closing in on the climax—and realized it wasn't the final confrontation. That while I'd been telling myself the book was about women resisting men's control over and abuse of their sexuality, with a side-helping of parent-child relations, my creative voice had swapped things around. Oh, there's plenty in it about efforts to control sexuality (read the content warning), but that's not what it's about.

In the end, the book explores parents' ideas about their children versus children's ideas of themselves.

I like to think my mother would approve (whether or not she'd ever read it).

Post by A.R. Henle