"So, are you gonna put me in your next book?"
I've been asked this more than once, mainly by people I've just met. I find it funny, but it also gets me thinking about how much my writing is affected by the people I meet and the things I do.
I wrote the first draft of Angel Kiss almost five years ago. I wrote most of Eighteen Kisses over the last twelve months, so naturally it feels much more raw. I'm actually amazed at how quickly something is going to go from my head to the shelves. Writing and rewriting Eighteen Kisses has given me a more immediate insight into how my life affects my writing. Like I've said before, I don't write about real people. But some characters are inspired by them; an encounter with someone might spark off an idea for a character. The character will probably evolve into something completely different and they will certainly become totally distinct from that person in my head. But I never forget where a character originated from. People close to me probably have theories about who inspired Nick in Angel Kiss, but I very much doubt that anybody would guess correctly. Mary Reynolds' character was inspired by a women who was in the same typing class as me when I was 17. Joe Clancy was inspired by an extremely friendly man who sold me my first car insurance. The village of Avarna is based on a place I visited when I was younger, and the interior of the Smyth's guesthouse is exactly like the one I stayed in with my family. Likewise, certain characters in Eighteen Kisses have been prompted by real people and some locations mentioned in it are places that I have been. Some places made their way into the book because I happened to visit them, some I would have gone to specifically because I wanted them to be in the book. So not only does my life affect my writing, but the things I write also have a big impact on my life.
With Eighteen Kisses there are certainly tiny pieces of me in there, things that my friends might recognize. But most of it is my imagination. I made up the entire mystery part of the plot and many of the characters are not based on anybody. In fact, some of my favourite ones where built completely from scratch and don't resemble anyone I know.
I think when I write a book it's sort of like a collage of my imagination and my life. It's like there's a stack of coloured paper that represents my creativity and another much smaller stack that represents my experiences. I cut the paper into pieces but only some of these pieces are used in the collage - and they are all jumbled together so that memories are mixed with fantasy and emotions are scattered beneath invention. As the book moves from draft to draft the collage is rearranged and changed, over and over again.
I suppose what I'm trying to say is that my life does affect my writing and my writing also affects my life - in a beautiful, tangled messed up way. Oh and also: no, dude. I'm not gonna put you in my next book :)
