Following your muse…
By Jacqueline Paige
What drives a writer to sit down and write? The love of the written word? Creating worlds and characters? For the reader's entertainment?
It’s most likely all of those, but for me it’s the never-ending nagging of my muse. She will literally deprive me of sleep when a plot needs to be jotted down and will not let me rest if there’s a particular scene she has playing over and over in my head.
I know it’s easy to blame the exhaustion on a fictitious muse… I believe every writer out there has one and will agree that even though they are beyond exhaustion with no time to spare the drive is coming from somewhere inside they can’t identify. That would be their muse.
When I was still working full-time, I was constantly asked how I found the time to write as much as I did in addition to being a mother to five and having a full-time 60+ hours a week job. My answer then was … I don’t know! And I still don’t. I have no idea how I’m able to sit up long past when most of my body has already gone to sleep and write entire chapters. Does it ever catch up to me? Yes. In those few times my muse is otherwise entertained or resting I’m able to take a nap from time to time. Of course, she is recharged much faster than I am and will wake me when a new idea has formed. Picture a hyper-active-never-stops-moving-three-year-old and that’s the equivalent to my muse.
Presently I have a list of plot ideas and characters that are waiting to be written. If I were to sit down and do nothing but write ten hours a day it would keep me with more than enough to do for the next two years – at least.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining – I love my muse. I even gave her my middle name and that’s what we see on the covers of my Jacqueline books or the “J” of my J. Risk books. We have a wonderful relationship, I just need an assistant and another set of hands to type with to keep up with her. I do wish she would learn how to proofread and edit, that would save me hours of stress as I try to get one story to the publishing stage as she’s feeding the next one into my brain.
I may have titled this piece wrong, I don’t follow my muse I hang on tight and hope she stops occasionally so I can eat and sleep.
As soon as I’m done typing this, I have to work on “our” to-do list. Which is: proof the final of The Kinetic from J. Risk’s Alterealm Series, jot down the ideas for my next Animal book- Solace (which I’m trying to save up to write for NaNoWriMo in November… IF she’ll let me stall that long), work on some promotional tasks— oh, all while watching my 2 1/2 year old granddaughter.
I definitely need a clone or assistant…
J
Jacqueline
Paige lives in Ontario in a small town that's part of the popular
Georgian Triangle area.
She
began her writing career in 2006 and since her first published works
in 2009 she hasn't stopped. Jacqueline describes her writing as "all
things paranormal", which she has proven is her niche with
stories of witches, ghosts, physics and shifters now on the
shelves.
When
Jacqueline isn't lost in her writing she spends time with her five
children, most of whom are finally able to look after her instead of
the other way around. Together they do random road trips, that
usually end up with them lost, shopping trips where they push every
button in the toy aisle, hiking when there's enough time to escape
and bizarre things like creating new daring recipes in the kitchen.
She's a grandmother to four (so far) and looks forward to corrupting
many more in the years to come.
Thanks for having me here today
ReplyDelete