Coming this Christmas from Montag Press, The Big Cinch, a supernatural noir adventure by Kathy L. Brown. Sean Joye, a fae-touched young veteran of 1922’s Irish Civil War, aims to atone for his assassin past and make a clean, new life in America. Until he asks the wrong questions. . . 

Writing keeps me centered, especially in the hard times. The dark times. 

Writing in the Dark

And thus we enter the wistful time of year. In the northern hemisphere, plants bed down for the winter, and they sure looks like they’re dying. The sun lies abed later each morning, and the day fades earlier each afternoon. I’m going to blame my mood on that: seasonal affective disorder. Nostalgic, I mourn the seasons long gone, the people lost, and the times in my life I’ll never experience again. 

Oh, wait, I suddenly remember. I’m a writer. 

Writing as Time Travel

I can redo my life over and over again. Until I get it right. Or fail in a marvelous spectacle of my own imagining.

As a writer I can pull apart my memories, file off the serial number, and put them together again in infinite new configurations. I will always be the young child, the new mother, the nervous nurse, and the data-crunching researcher. 

I can return to any location for which I feel homesick or visit, in my imagination, all the places I’ll never go.

Easily, I can summon the people who’ve moved on through death, circumstances, and choice and re-invent those relationships. Things might go better or worse, depending on the needs of story. But those feelings are all still accessible.

Writing for me is quite simply the power to bend time and space to my liking. It is time travel. And it keeps me rooted to my own story.

Does writing get you through the winter? Comment on the blog.   

 

If you enjoyed this journal entry, you might like to read about Motivation.

I started this blog thread on the gritty details of the writing process over on my Facebook Author page, @kbkathylbrown, but think I might be better served putting it over here. If you’re interest in following my writing process in an informal way, you’ll find a few posts on Facebook that might interest you. You can subscribe to the blog from the website landing page (scroll down).

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St. Louis Writers Guild recently published Love Letters to St. Louis. This adorable letter-shaped volume of short stories, poems, essays, and illustrations included my first science fiction story, “Welcome to Earthport Prime: A Self-Guided Tour.” A perfect gift and profits benefit the guild’s young writers’ program.