Imitation, Inspiration, and a Thing Called Voice

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I'm not sure if The Trouble with Imitation answered any thoughts writers may have on the subject of inspiration, but I do know it raised more questions!

Joy sent me a sort of follow-up email this week on the subject of, well, "imitation, inspiration, and a thing called voice."  These are all fairly elusive terms - I'm still not sure I could define 'voice' adequately if someone put a gun to my head and insisted on it (although you can bet I would try) - and ones I'm pretty sure we've all wondered about.  I don't know if I will be able to answer all the questions, but I'll give it a shot in the hopes of clearing up some of the muddle that comes with literary talk.

Joy asks...

...I have also been mulling over the trouble of plagiarizing and copy-catting too much the books we cherish and authors we respect vs. going to the other extreme of not reading at all so as not to let our writings be unduly influenced! ...Sometimes I struggle with the whole art of learning from ‘The Greats’ and imbibing the skills and virtues they were masters at, without messing up with my own style and voice and especially the genre I am writing in. 

 And as for my answer, her second question, and my answer to that, you will have to toddle over to her blog.  Be sure to leave a comment if you have a spare moment!  She and I are both very fond of hearing from readers.

The Trouble with Imitation

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Back in September of last year - was it really that long ago? - I scribbled a post for myself and for others on writing as an art.  With so many blogs and self-help books inundating us with tips and keys and the essence(s) of story-telling (I think I saw two different essences in the same week), we can easily fall into the trap of looking at writing as a mechanical process.  Fuse this tricky piece called "a good plot" with this other piece called "good writing" and ta da! Bestseller!

This approach appeals to us because it seems at first blush to offer a quick path to perfection in our writing.  We all want to improve, and the idea that if we just follow three easy steps we'll attain to the literary heights is awfully tempting.  In my post, however, I talked about something we probably all know and must simply be reminded of: the fact that writing is not mechanics, but

a process of growing art.

This current post is something of an extension of that basic notion, for even after we're rooted in it, there is still the difficult issue of knowing how to encourage that growing art to grow. We get to the place where we realize, "Oh goodness.  My writing seriously needs help, doesn't it?"  Maybe the pieces we've written before aren't so bad, maybe they're total rubbish, but either way there ought to come a point sooner or later in time when we realize it is not the best that it can be.  We come to grips with the fact that there are writers out there who just frankly do it - or did it - better than we, and then we begin to wonder how to coax further growth out of our own writing.

"Learn from the best" ought, really and truly, to be trumpeted more often than it is.  Read the Greats.  Don't settle for mediocre writers, the ones who don't do it as well as you, or who write on the same level as you, or who are maybe a little better: digest those writers whose works amaze you, blow you away, and leave you inspired (and perhaps a little jealous) after you've picked yourself up and pieced yourself back together.  "A man of ability," wrote William G. T. Shedd, "for the chief of his reading, should select such works as he feels beyond his own power to have produced."  What ho, Mr. Shedd, you said it truly!

Unfortunately, even this excellent advice can be warped, and writers who do try to "learn from the best" frequently fall into another trap of believing that it is also necessary to copy the best.  I wouldn't say this is always conscious; perhaps the underlying reasoning is mere mistaken logic, where writers suppose that if this man writes this way, and is reckoned a Great, then to be great we must write this way as well.  We're told we are supposed to imitate these people, and to an extent - the extent of a child following in the footsteps of an adult, before that child has learned to walk and direct himself - that is true.  But we've got to be wary of taking the principle too far.

We learn from others, ones who have gone before and ones who are going along with us: true.  We glean ruses, tactics, and strategies from them: also true.  We are not, however, meant to piece together little bits and pieces of authors' styles into something we call "our own" (and if we do, it can only ever be a literary Frankenstein's monster - because no one can forge the original author's signature with the same flair).  Even less are we meant to pick one favorite author and imitate them in all things.  That is to say -

we should not try writing characters like Dickens

we should not try writing romance like Austen

we should not try writing emotion and description like Sutcliff

we should not try writing an allegory like Lewis

and we really, truly, for the love of peachy goodness shouldn't try writing fantasy like Tolkien.

For me, this meant a realization that I am not Jenny and should not try to write like her.  I do not share her poetry-prose flair, and to attempt it would appear forced.  I can certainly look up to her and try to write as well as she does, but always in my own style and what people call "voice."  I admire R.L. Stevenson's descriptions and the masterful plots of Dickens.  Austen's wit is positively hilarious.  Sutcliff can take your heart and wring it like a sponge.  Lewis and Tolkien were masters of their art.  We ought to read them, look up to them, learn from them (and never stop doing so!), but we must also find our own ground, plant our roots in it and say, "This is my place.  I'll gain nutrients from all the writers I come across, but I am confident enough in my own voice not to mimic that of others."

It's a growing art, this writing business.  But it is important to realize that it varies from one person to the next, and we're not meant to try to graft ourselves into some other writer's vine - so that when someone asks us, "Would you rather write like this author or this author?" our response should be, "Um, cake, please?"

Sparks

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Jenny just wrote a post on the elements that have inspired, and continue to inspire, her novel Gingerune.  We both did something like this for our participation in the "next big thing" blog hop back in January, but that was only one question amid several and there was little room for detail; it seemed a good idea to take more space to elaborate.

Since January I have written some 20 or 30k words and I find myself late in the story, staring at what I believe is the descent - ascent, I suppose, but it feels like a descent - to the climactic chapters.  It's altogether mind-boggling.  But at any rate, I am at that thickest of thick parts where just about everything I come across reminds me of the story to a greater or lesser degree.

books

Tempus Regina involves and will involve a great deal of research, since it covers so much time.  One of the earliest to get the story off the ground was, not surprisingly, The Lantern Bearers by Rosemary Sutcliff.  It invoked images of one world I wished to create, giving me the first glimmers of light as I ventured into the writing process, and I would thank Sutcliff for it if I could.  At the other end of the spectrum, Dickens' Bleak House helped sketch the underworld of Victorian London in my mind; I do manage to thank him by letting him make a cameo appearance, albeit not a very flattering one.  And then more recently, and for no particular reason, I found in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew a kindred spirit.

poetry

I don't read a great deal of poetry, but there are a few snatches of verse that fit Tempus Regina: mostly Tennyson, but also Eiluned Lewis' The Birthright and the classic final line from Lord Byron's When We Two Parted:

if I should meet thee

after long years

how should I greet thee?

with silence and tears.

There is also a particular line from Tennyson's Morte D'Arthur that I keep pinned to my corkboard and refer to from time to time:

...the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge,

clothed with his breath, and looking, as he walk'd,

larger than human on the frozen hills.

songs

Everywhere I turn, there seems to be a song that fits one part of Tempus Regina or another.  I think in many cases it is wholly my own bias.  The first ever to be connected with the story was Escala's Requiem for a Tower, and then Street of Dreams by Blackmore's Night.  The march style of Sarabande, also by Escala, is appropriate as well.  Andrew Peterson's lovely Carry the Fire makes a wonderful theme for the story as a whole, and several relationships within it in particular; Maire Brennan's Hear My Prayer fits nicely with Regina.  They make sense enough, but other songs are rather crazier - like Can You Feel the Love Tonight, Falcon in the Dive (Chauvelin swears), and Adele's Set Fire to the Rain and Skyfall.  

It's all about the bias, I tell you.

The Next Big Thing

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A few weeks ago Anne Elisabeth Stengl (who, for the information of newer Scribbles readers, submitted to the grueling process of an interview here way back in September 2011) asked me if I would be interested in participating in an author blog hop.  The idea is to answer a series of questions regarding our "next big thing" - in this case, my work-in-progress.  It seemed a splendid opportunity to introduce Tempus Regina, though I doubt it will be much less nebulous at the end.

Anne Elisabeth posted her own answers last week, featuring her Summer 2013 release Dragonwitch - which I, for one, am eagerly expecting.  This novel will be the fifth in her dramatic fairy-tale series Tales of Goldstone Wood.  There aren't any spoilers, so if you haven't seen the post already, be sure to take a peek and do some ooh-ing and aah-ing.  If you've come from her blog already, then welcome!  And may I introduce...

the next big thing

1. What is the working title of your book? 

Tempus Regina.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book? 

 I think this was one of those stories whose title came to mind first, which is pretty rare for me. I had scraps of other ideas floating around in my mind—lost kingdoms and civilizations and curses and doom and all that jazz—and a few of them appended themselves to the title. Developing it into an actual story was, and is, somewhat slow going.

3. What genre does your book fall under? 

 Primarily fantasy, but to be technical, I would call it historical fantasy.

4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? 

I’m not sure I’ve been rubbing shoulders with the characters long enough to pinpoint actors for them! On demand, however, I’ll do my best. Regina is a relatively easy choice: Katie McGrath would be little short of perfect. As far as looks go, Chris Hemsworth is not very far off how I envision the Assassin, but personality-wise I don’t see it working at all. David Tennant, on the other hand, has most of the personality and few of the necessary looks. I foresee this being a tricky issue.

I confess, I want Jeremy Brett for the Fisherman—which is sad, because Brett passed away some time ago. As a necessary second choice, I would cast Joaquin Phoenix—if he were younger. I’m always about ten years behind the times.

5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? 

Centuries out of time, Regina Winters sets out to return to her own era and the brother who is her charge—no matter the cost to herself or to the world around her.

6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? 

Represented by an agency is the goal.

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? 

It’s a work in progress! I only properly began in November 2012, but I am currently a raw 80,000 words in.

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? 

As far as books I’ve read go, I would say C.S. Lewis’ Space Trilogy, particularly That Hideous Strength; Susan Cooper’s The Dark is Rising; and perhaps some Stephen Lawhead. Judging only by hearsay and back-cover blurbs, I would take an educated guess and say Mary Stewart’s Arthurian Saga and maybe Marion Zimmer Bradley, though I don’t intend to read the latter to find out. However, I tend not to read books that might be similar until after I write my first draft, so as to avoid copy-catting as much as possible. I’ll get back with you at a later date.

9. Who or What inspired you to write this book? 

One of the most important elements of inspiration was a story my sister dabbled in years ago; she never finished, which caused me much chagrin, but the general idea stuck with me and eventually resurfaced. I think I was also inspired by a documentary—I forget what it was called—that I watched years ago on the discovery of underwater antiquities; that is something of enduring interest. A more recent, and more massive, blast of inspiration came from the realization that Tempus Regina was already linked to a novel Jenny is now working on (you can read about it by following the link to her blog below); though the connection was quite unconscious on both our parts, it has been extremely helpful to discover that these two novels are, in a way, “book ends” of one another.

To a lesser degree, I’ve been inspired by pocket-watches, Sherlock Holmes, ancient and medieval science, legends, Howl’s Moving Castle, a heap of music, and a great dose of white phosphorus.

jennifer freitag & faith king are participating in today's blog hop

&

I also tagged mirriam neal.  Keep an eye out! 

Love and Thunder

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The inspiration for The White Sail's Shaking, especially the title, began rather with a poem than a song.  It's a fairly well-known poem and I've posted it before, so most of you have probably read it before.

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, 

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, 

And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,

 And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking. 

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide 

Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; 

And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, 

And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying. 

 I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life, 

To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife; 

And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, 

And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

- sea fever, john masefield

It is not, however, the only poem or song that inspires The White Sail's Shaking; I have a whole heap of those.  Although I have a hard time actually writing while listening to music, there are still many songs that, when I hear them, make my fingers itch to continue writing.  (Especially helpful for times like these, since I would be utterly uninspired otherwise.)  Here are a few on my list.

to the sky (owl city)

There is a great deal of Owl City in this collection; for some reason, perhaps only because I started listening to it early on in the writing of White Sail's, the two are connected in the odd recesses of my brain.  To the Sky was the very first one I heard.  It is Charlie Bent's song, really, but it doubles as inspiration for the first half of the novel - it's too lighthearted and jolly for the second half, unfortunately.  (Happiness?  Goodness, we mustn't have any of that!)

on the heels of war and wonder

there's a dreamy world up there

you can't whisper above the thunder

but you can fly anywhere.

undying love & infinite legends (two steps from hell)

I consider this a terrible name for a band, but they do have beautiful instrumental music - excellent stuff for battle scenes.  That is, in my mind it's excellent stuff, but then when I try to write with the music on my output rapidly decreases...

I'm still here (treasure planet soundtrack)

This song works as a theme for Tip and Charlie both, but I think primarily of Tip.  It suits his attitude (of which he has plenty) at the beginning of the story, and summarizes some of his motives.  Besides, it makes me think of "space" ships and Robert Louis Stevenson.  Both epic.

and you see the things they never see
all you wanted, I could be
now you know me, and I'm not afraid
and I wanna tell you who I am
can you help me be a man?

storm (fernando ortega)

This is the song I chose for Marta ages back when I assigned a piece to each of my characters, but I've found it works for Marta and Tip's relationship as a whole.  It is not a typical love song; but then, theirs is not, I suppose, a typical love story.  The feeling of rest in the lyrics is especially suitable.

it takes the rain between the lines

to know what sorrow finds

the way a cloud divides sometimes

the clearing and the blue
...I love you.

vanilla twilight (owl city)

This is Darkwood's theme; he has a great deal more backstory than is given to him in the book itself, and this song sums it up.  (Except that I'm pretty sure they did not have postcards in 1803.)

and I'll forget the world that I knew
but I swear I won't forget you
oh, if my voice could reach back through the past
I'd whisper in your ear:
"oh darling, I wish you were here." 

if my heart was a house (owl city)

I would just like to point out that, grammatically speaking, it should be "were".  Were a house.  But I'll admit that "was" sounds better in the song, and I suppose songwriters are allowed to take, er, license with the English language.  At any rate, this is another for Tip and Marta - mainly its chorus:

circle me and the needle moves gracefully
back and forth, if my heart was a compass you'd be North
risk it all cause I'll catch you if you fall
wherever you go, if my heart was a house you'd be home.

What about you?  Do you write to music, and are there particular songs that inspire you?

Reimagination

This past Friday most of my family - my brother, sister, brother-in-law, and cousin, to be precise - went to the theater to see "The Hunger Games." However, my sister-in-law and I not being theater-going people, we opted to stay behind and watch "Treasure Planet" with my six-year-old niece and three-year-old nephew. (I do realize that some of you are thinking, "Good heavens, she gave up The Hunger Games in favor of watching Treasure Planet? Is she crazy?" This was the general assessment among my siblings, too, but that's alright.)

"Treasure Planet," silly children's movie though it may be, is one of my favorite films and was my first introduction to Treasure Island. For years the only reason I knew anything about Stevenson's classic novel was because of "Treasure Planet." Having recently read the book for myself, and not having watched the movie in some time, I was interested to see how closely this re-imagining of the story kept to the plot itself. After all, my reputation is staked as being very much opposed to re-interpretations of classics and I would have to be appropriately outraged if too many liberties were taken.

Because changing a story's setting from sea to space and an island to a planet, not to mention replacing half the characters with aliens, isn't a large liberty at all.

At any rate, we settled in with our pudding parfaits to watch the movie. The first part of it was spent in freaking out over whether or not my niece was going to freak out: she was none too sure about the aliens, although Silver's cyborg eye was much appreciated. My nephew, on the other hand, was all for the movie because he had been impressed with the idea that there were going to be rockets. I don't think the solar-powered "space-ships" quite measured up, but he was excited by them, all the same. The guns got his attention, too; he gave me a water pistol and got a Nerf gun for himself, so we were prepared to take on anything that might come through the screen. The conversations went something like this:

James: "Are you weady?"
Me: "Okay, I'm ready!"
J: "Don't be weady, 'cause they're not firing yet."
M: "Okay, I'm not ready!"

or...

James: "I think he dwopped his gun!"
Me: "No, he just put it back in his belt."
J: "SHOOT! SHOOT!"
M: "They're not shooting, they're talking!"
J: "...Are they gonna shoot?"

B.E.N., the robot interpretation of the marooned Ben Gunn, was another hit with the children, although James didn't quite grasp the idea that he was a good guy. Thus another conversation...

James: "If that wobot comes through the scween, I'm going to SHOOT HIM."
Me: "But he's a good guy!"
J: "...Yeah, but if he comes through the scween, I'm gonna SHOOT HIM!"

In the end we all had a good time - even my niece, although she was rather alarmed at the idea of going to bed afterward. I think my sister-in-law and I had the most fun out of the four, as we were better able to understand what was going on. And I came away with an appreciation for what the producers had done with Stevenson's story. Certainly not everyone agrees with me (people tend to roll their eyes when I mention the movie), but I find "Treasure Planet" to be one of the few instances where the movie-makers have made improvements on the original story. While reading the book there were only two things I wasn't thrilled with: Jim himself and how he relates to Silver. Jim is fairly typical: a decent and well-mannered boy who gets into an adventure and, through it, is forced to become a man. The development of his friendship with and respect for Silver is more stated than shown, perhaps because the voyage to Treasure Island is passed over so swiftly in order for the adventure to really begin.

The screenwriters of "Treasure Planet" changed both these things. In re-imagining the story, they made it less a straight-up adventure (which is what Stevenson wrote) in favor of adding nuances to the characters themselves. Jim Hawkins becomes a rebellious teen, bent on proving himself by finding Treasure Planet; Silver becomes the father-figure Jim has never had. In this the producers were probably pandering to sentimentalism, but the fact is that it works for the story. It gives both characters more dimension and makes the discovery that Silver is a pirate more cutting for Jim. In the process, the movie is made more emotionally engaging.

Re-imagining any story is a tricky business: any major changes, even to subplots, tend to alter the whole thrust of the story. Though "Treasure Planet" is one of the few cases where I have enjoyed these alterations, I still have to admit that those alterations have indeed been made. It is no longer the unfettered, fast-paced adventure that Stevenson tended to write, but rather the sentimental and complex story that most people nowadays enjoy. Pulling Sherlock Holmes out from among the fogs and rattling coaches of Victorian England and plopping him down in the modern world of Google and mobile phones drastically changes the whole atmosphere of Arthur Conan Doyle's mysteries (sorry, Mirriam!). Adding green fog and seven swords to The Voyage of the 'Dawn Treader' turns the whole plot on its head.

Such changes can still be quite enjoyable, and I can't say otherwise. Still, it is interesting (and perhaps even worthwhile) to consider what the authors themselves would think if they could see what has been done with their works. Would Lewis like green fog? What on earth would Doyle think of the internet? And would cyborgs and solar-powered ships totally befuddle Stevenson? What would I think - what would you think - if, years down the road, my story were so drastically altered for the sake of its audience? Perhaps the question is pointless; and yet I think there is a point to taking the original authors into consideration whenever we're faced with some new re-imagining of their work. After all, they were the ones who wrote it to begin with. They deserve, at the very least, to be remembered and given credit for that.

Let Us Be Elegant or Die

The immortal words of Louisa May Alcott (or Amy March, to be precise) ring true for most women - hence bobby pins, curling irons, corsets (!), and high-heels. Most of them look a lot like torture devices to me. But torture or not, fashion has always played an interesting role in society and, of course, in literature as well. It is one of the things that can be used to distinguish the various cultures of a fantasy world, while in historical fiction it creates an authentic atmosphere.

A few days ago Rachel posted about the styles she has been creating for her novel The Scarlet-Gypsy Song, and as it seemed to me like a good idea, I thought I would follow suit. Pun rather intended. So without further ado, here is a glimpse of the fashion in my most recently completed and my in-progress novels.

wordcrafter

Justin isn't exactly a fashionable sort of fellow; he is comfortable in his blue jeans and sweatshirts, and suits are agony for him. In Tera, however, the styles are quite different. Ethan's people are horse-centered and the men tend to spend much of the day on horseback, so their clothing has been adapted to that purpose. The tunics are of light fabric to allow for easy movement, and the sleeves can be bound back if necessary in order to give the wearer fuller use of his hands; sashes are worn around the waist, tied to the left if the wearer is still a boy, to the right if they have reached manhood. Breeches are padded along the inner leg for comfort while riding (the Horsemen use neither saddles nor blankets), and they are tied about halfway down the calf, above the wearer's boots.

As for the women, the only thing about their clothing that really strikes Justin on his arrival in Tera is the veils. Every girl past the age of ten covers the lower half of her face, and only her father and eventually her husband is allowed to see behind it. All colors except white are acceptable for unmarried women; white is worn by the married women alone, setting them apart.

the white sail's shaking

And with this we go from fantasy to historical fiction. I must admit that the fashion here is much simpler than it was in Wordcrafter: all but one of the characters wear uniforms. Even here, though, one can add spice. The distinctions between ranks was reflected in the amount of trim and the number - and position - of epaulets on the uniform. Midshipman, for instance, were fairly plain with blue cloth and gold buttons, although in the American Navy they managed to get gold trim on their hats as well (as far as I can tell, the Royal Navy was much duller and didn't allow their midshipman such frivolities). Lieutenants had a single epaulet on the left shoulder, although if they were commanding a ship, they switched it to the right - this would have been the case with Stephen Decatur during his command of the Enterprize. Captains got the distinction of having two epaulets and a lot more gold banding on their uniforms. (Sailing masters didn't get any gold at all - poor them.)

All this is pretty generic, but I doubt that men would have dressed in exactly the same manner simply because they were peers. Tip Brighton and Charlie Bent are both midshipmen, but Charlie, being by far the more refined of the two, has much more "frill" to his outfit; Tip is just a backwoods young man from a none-too-wealthy family, uncomfortable enough in his uniform itself without adding decorations to it.

So there you have the styles in Wordcrafter and The White Sail's Shaking. Naturally it is possible to overdo in this area; but then, it's possible to overdo in any area. You can always go too far and burden the reader with unnecessary and unwanted details, and you can also show the reader nothing and thereby rob them of the ability to experience that element of the story. A good thing to do, therefore, is to create as you write (or before you write, depending on how you like to plan) and let your imagination run, and then later you can edit the descriptions as you like: move them, space them out, polish them, or even delete them if you find you no longer want or need them.

don't forget to enter the new year contest!

Things That Inspire

On You Haven't Got an Appointment! Yaasha asked about the things that inspire me most. I've done posts before on the things that have particularly inspired my novels Wordcrafter and The White Sail's Shaking, but I thought I would do a post just on the little things that inspire me in general. So, in no particular order, here goes!

1. books

How could I write without books to inspire me? There's so much beauty and power in the written word - so many emotions they invoke, pictures they paint. I just love books.

2. teaching

The teaching of the elders at my church frequently convicts me and doesn't always give me a warm and fuzzy feeling - I should be alarmed if it did - but it does inspire me as much as anything else. It is such a wonderful thing to see some of God's Word come alive and to understand something a little better, even if only a very little bit better. After all, Christ is the supreme Word through Whom the world was made and by whom all things are held together. It would be rather silly not to be inspired by the revelation of the Word of God.

You and me we use so very many clumsy words.
The noise of what we often say is not worth being heard.
When the Father's Wisdom wanted to communicate His love,
He spoke it in one final perfect Word.

- The Final Word, Michael Card

3. music

Especially dramatic, thrilling music. I don't always write while listening to songs, but I do find them invigorating and sometimes I'll find one particular style that seems to fit a story. For instance, the music from Escala always turns my thoughts to Tempus Regina.

4. autumn

I do believe I write best and most in the fall, whether or not I do NaNo. The cool weather just gets my blood flowing and inspires me to actually sit down and write after the heat and lethargy of summer. It's my favorite month, hands down.

5. history

Sometimes crazy and funny, sometimes not so much. Certain periods I find especially thrilling: the Age of Sail (in case you couldn't tell) but also eras like Roman Britain and the Plantagenet dynasty, to choose two random ones. Currently I have a couple ideas of stories that have almost nothing but a setting, but which will hopefully percolate into worthwhile novels.

6. the random

Or you might say "miscellaneous." Sometimes I can't pinpoint any particular inspiration; I might suddenly have an image in my head of a girl with a cross (The Soldier's Cross), or a man injured in a wolf-hunt (Wordcrafter), and a story may or may not build from there. I'm sure there must have been something to bring about those ideas, but I couldn't tell you what it was and so I take the easy way out and label all such thoughts "random."

7. family

I love my family. I love the Saturday evenings we spend together, the joking and the serious conversations. I love just being with them all. We're not the sort of family that novels are made of, I suppose, and yet I find inspiration and encouragement in our kinship.

and that, dear readers, is a peek into the things that inspire me.

art from flickr

Day Four {Inspiration}

"You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club." (Jack London)

day four: an author or novel that has inspired your writing style

These are all difficult questions, primarily because they seem to imply that there should be a single answer. But unfortunately, there isn't. I read and enjoy a number of authors and I daresay that they have all influenced my writing in one way or another, but there is no particular one who I can point to and say, "That person inspires me. That is what I want my writing to be like." If I had to pick one, however, it would have to be my sister

Jennifer Freitag

Jenny inspired me to start writing. For as long as I can remember she has been creating stories. Whenever we would play outside, she was the one who made up the stories we would act out (sometimes under duress; she often tried to foist it off on someone else, but that never worked). Then she got her awful hulk of a computer and would spend hours writing stories that I thought were works of genius. I would always contrive to read them, and I always adored them - with the exception of the time she killed off my favorite character and wouldn't bring him back to life no matter how hard I pleaded. I think I'm scarred for life.

Eventually I decided that I wanted to write, too. I wanted to have the same magical hold on words that she does. I wanted to be a creator, an artist, to be able to hold something up and say, "This is mine." It took me some time to be certain that I really was a writer, but I think that despite the wonderful books I have read since that time, it is still Jenny who inspires me most.

When I sat down to write this post I wasn't sure what answer I would give to the question, but there it is. The prize goes to Jenny.

Imagination Limited

When writers write and when readers read, they often explain their love of stories by saying that the words take them away to other times and places. Their imagination is fueled by stories and, in the case of writers, finds an outlet in stories. While it is true that very small and seemingly inconsequential things in daily life can inspire a novel, books and the written word continue to be the prime medium for the activity of the mind; reading promotes some degree of intelligence.

To have a well-rounded mind, however, it is necessary to not focus on a single genre of literature. You shouldn't read only fantasies and fairy tales; you shouldn't even have a steady diet that is 53% fantasy and fairy tales. You shouldn't have a steady diet of romances, "Christian" or secular. Nor should you wear a track from the library door to the historical novels. Histories should not gather dust while fiction is being constantly pulled off the shelf. There is no genre that can be indulged in to the exclusion of all others; the mind will be stunted if fed the same thing day after day, just as the body would if you only ever ate carrots or potato chips.

Oddly enough, one of the bits of advice most promoted by many writers today is that you should read extensively...in the genre of your choice. If you want to write historical fiction, read historical fiction. If you want to write fantasy, read fantasy. Never mind that this may very well mean that your plots, characters, story arcs, and what-have-you are being fed to you by authors who have come before, or that you are stuck in the rut of one genre both as the source and outlet of your imagination. 'Read in one genre, write in one genre' is the rule of the day, and so authors are pigeonholed into specific fields of writing to develop themselves there until they are ready to expand (if not forever).

This is not wholly ridiculous. From a marketing standpoint, it is true that if you write and publish a historical fiction, then write a fantasy and want it published, you will likely have to seek out a new publisher. I speak from personal experience; I am currently querying Wordcrafter, a fantasy, and it is almost like being an entirely new author. I have no guarantee of acceptance. But I wouldn't trade the time I spent writing that story for the certainty of publication, and I would far rather have been writing Justin's story than grinding out another historical fiction. Of course, I am writing a historical fiction now. I simply didn't want to then, because I didn't have the inspiration for one.

Writing is an art, although it must be balanced with the more "practical" side of marketing, and some of the most renowned artists are those who experimented in many different mediums. Michelangelo was a sculptor as well as a painter and architect; Leonardo da Vinci dabbled in a dozen things, from sketching to painting, from writing to inventing. In the realm of writing, Agatha Christie is most famous for her mysteries, but she also wrote romances. C.S. Lewis wrote essays on faith and philosophy as well as fantasies and "science fiction." Rosemary Sutcliff, acclaimed for her Romano-British works, wrote children's books, stories set in the Middle Ages, some nonfiction, and retellings of The Iliad and The Odyssey.

These artists were never equally lauded in all mediums, but that was not their purpose; their imagination was fired in many different directions, and so they followed that and did not remain inside the box of their own especial genre. Their minds were well-rounded, so that they could and did tackle fantasy as eagerly as nonfiction, sculpting as readily as painting. Practically speaking, if you read widely, it is unlikely that you will be able to stop your mind from developing tales in many different genres - and this is not a bad thing, even if you are not as skilled with one as with another. It's good for the imagination to expand, and not to be allowed to stagnate in a single medium.

Characters and Music

Music is like painting without paint, description without necessarily using words. In a way it transcends both of those in its power to evoke emotion; it has an otherworldly aspect. I know some people are more geared toward it than others, and I'm not one of those who cannot survive without it, but I find it fascinating how linked music is to the human soul.

So with that said, I dug up some of the music that either inspired my characters or novels, or that I found especially applicable to the characters or novels, and here it is.

The Soldier's Cross

Fiona - Daughter of Grace by Twila Paris. The spirit of the song, the coming to the end of one's self and finding that Grace is the only thing to save, characterizes Fiona's search for peace and her loneliness through The Soldier's Cross.

She sat down inside to wait, to rest her mind awhile
No use trying to fight with fate, or fake a smile
There she found the end of herself
Heard a small voice crying for help

Leah - Windows in the World by Andrew Peterson. The way these lyrics reflect what C.S. Lewis called "sehnsucht" - a joyful, heartbreaking longing for something beyond this world - is perfect for Leah's nature. Fiona's first thought on meeting her is that her soul seems to be shining through her body like a star, and Andrew Peterson's song captured that idea.

It’s the way the clouds are burning from the angle of the light
as the earth is slowly turning you to meet it.
And you’re watching at your window at the ending of the night--
it’s as plain as day so any fool could see it: it’s a window in the world.

Pierre - I'm not sure Pierre really has a song, but the nearest I could come up with was Boy Like Me / Man Like You by Rich Mullins. It isn't perfect, but it reflects to some degree Pierre's boyishness and the way he grows into a man.

Did they tell you stories about the saint of old?
Stories about their faith?
They say stories like that make a boy grow bold
Stories like that make a man walk straight.

Wordcrafter

Justin King [the wordcrafter] - Justin gets two songs. Just because. His first would be Brother, Stand Beside Me by Heather Dale*. That song, although it concerns King Arthur's last stand, captures, in a way, the whole thrust of Wordcrafter (because no one has set Kipling's "The Thousandth Man" to music). His other song is instrumental: A Gift of Thistle, from the Braveheart soundtrack*. The soft sadness of it has an element in it that reminded me of Justin at times.

Brother, stand beside me - Brother, lend your arm
Brother, stand beside me - Brother, lend your arm
See the weakness in the world
And choose to be strong
Let them sing, let them sing our praises when we've gone.

Ethan Prince [the hound] - And Ethan gets two as well, because Justin got two and of course one must be fair. The solidness of If I Stand by Rich Mullins makes it Ethan's first, but it has a joyful theme as well that also fits him. In Wordcrafter I did not get "inside" Ethan's head, as the story unfolds from Justin's perspective, but this song depicts his mindset, his foundation, quite well. And then his second song is the instrumental The Blood of Cu Chullain by Mychael Danna and Jeff Danna. It is perfectly wild and vivid - and is also one of my favorite songs.

So if I stand let me stand on the promise
that You will pull me through
And if I can't, let me fall on the grace
that first brought me to You.
And if I sing let me sing for the joy
that has born in me these songs
And if I weep, let it be as a man
who is longing for his home.

Jamie Fairbairn [the vixen] - When the Coyote Comes by Fernando Ortega. The bouncy, slightly dark tune fits Jamie and the coyote in the lyrics is a good analogy to her.

The night heats up when the coyote comes
He won't rest till his work is done
Critters flee when he comes around
Some won't make it home...

Copper - Love Theme from the Merlin soundtrack. I couldn't find an actual song that fit her, and her quiet nature is better suited to an instrumental piece. The sweetness of the Love Theme is just perfect.

The White Sail's Shaking

Tip Brighton - Let Mercy Lead by Rich Mullins. Something of an odd choice for the kind of character he is, but the tune and the chorus seemed to fit. Perhaps because it is a "growing" song, and Tip does a lot of that through the story. Perhaps because the concept of mercy worked itself more into the novel than I was expecting at the start. Anyhow, it fit.

Let mercy lead
Let love be the strength in your legs
And in every footprint that you leave
There'll be a drop of grace

Marta Rais - Storm by Fernando Ortega. Much of her story is her coming to grips with life, now that so much that was "life" for her is taken away. I love the tenderness of the song, and the way it is both a love song and something more. I love it so much and all of it is so fitting, I had a hard time deciding which bit to use here.

It takes the rain between the lines to know what sorrow finds
The way the cloud divides sometimes
The clearing and the blue...
I love you.

Charlie Bent - He got two. So much for "fairness"; the main character didn't get two. Anyhow, one song that particularly reminds me of Charlie is Owl City's To the Sky. I'm not a big fan of most of Owl City's songs (the lyrics don't make any sense, and I like lyrics to make sense), but for one reason or another the synthesizer-strong tune and the optimistic feel suits Charlie - when he is feeling upbeat. His other song, however, goes down to the other end of his mood-spectrum: After the Last Tear Falls by Andrew Peterson. The sadness and the almost (but not quite) hopelessness captures his other side.

After the last tear falls
After the last secret's told
After the last bullet tears through flesh and bone...
There is love
Love, love, love
There is love
Love, love, love
There is love.

Jo Darkwood - Sweet Grace by Fernando Ortega. Because Darkwood left a sweetheart back home, and because he never really wanted to go to sea in the first place.

I thought I heard your voice last night
Carried on the wind
Singing lines from old songs,
Calling out all our names again.

So, what songs are especially fitting for your characters?

*I don't recommend all of Heather Dale's songs, nor have I watched Braveheart; I just like the soundtrack. The image for Brother, Stand Beside Me is from the Front Street cover of The Mark of the Horse Lord by Rosemary Sutcliff. All usual disclaimers apply.

The Thousandth Man

It appears to be poetry day - or at least that was my thought when I saw that Liz on Awake and Rael on Reflective Beauty had both posted poems. I was planning on doing another post, but I decided I would go with the flow and post the poem that is perhaps my all-time favorite, and the inspiration for Wordcrafter.

Rudyard Kipling's The Thousandth Man:

One man in a thousand, Solomon says,
Will stick more close than a brother,
And it's worth while seeking him half your days
If you find him before the other.

Nine hundred and ninety-nine depend
On what the world sees in you,
But the Thousandth Man will stand your friend
With the whole round world agin you.

'Tis neither promise nor prayer nor show
Will settle the finding for 'ee;
Nine hundred and ninety-nine of 'em go
By your looks, or your acts, or your glory.

But if he finds you and you find him,
The rest of the world don't matter;
For the Thousandth Man will sink or swim
With you in any water.

You can use his purse with no more talk
Than he uses yours for his spendings,
And laugh and meet in your daily walk
As though there had been no lendings.

Nine hundred and ninety-nine of 'em call
For silver and gold in their dealings;
But the Thousandth Man he's worth 'em all
Because you can show him your feelings.

His wrong's your wrong, and his right's your right,
In season or out of season.
Stand up and back it in all men's sight
With that for your only reason!

Nine hundred and ninety-nine can't bide
The shame or mocking or laughter,
But the Thousandth Man will stand by your side
To the gallows-foot - and after!

What Do You Read?

Reading has somewhat gone out of vogue nowadays as more and more people spend their time in other, quicker pastimes, such as watching movies and playing video games; reading good books seems to have lost even more charm. The classics are still revered as classics, but few people dare to open one. Biographies and histories are considered pretty dull things. Theology, philosophy, sermon-collections, and the like seem to be the most disliked of all categories, even among believers. If people do read, they generally turn to the action-packed, romance-stuffed, gore-filled, often plotless novels produced in mass quantities today.

This is unfortunately true of many writers, as well. Reading is not considered necessary for someone to be able to write. However, what you read, and if you read at all, will color your writing - for good or ill. If you want to write, it is important to read, and to read extensively. Just as some people don't read at all and other people read only the latest vampire novel, others lock themselves into a certain category - be it Christian fiction, mystery, romance, or any other genre - and read very little outside this appointed comfort zone. However, this is almost as bad as not reading at all; your writing (and your whole outlook on life) will be so affected by this one genre that it is likely that there will be little originality and little of yourself in your work.

Just like with any diet, reading demands variety. While I'll never recommend reading a trashy novel for the sake of "something new" (that's kind of like eating a tub of lard for the same reason), there are plenty of novels that are not specifically Christian, yet are clean, inspiring, and thought-provoking; take many of the classics, for instance. A good dose of nonfiction can not only be very enjoyable, but will also enlighten you and make you think - and, too, histories can easily inspire a story in undeveloped territory. A knowledge of history, as a whole and in detail, will give your stories depth. Something more than a glancing acquaintance with the writing styles of "the Great Ones" will help your own writing progress.

What are you reading? What are some of your favorite books?

Inspiration for The White Sail's Shaking

Awhile ago I did a post on what inspired me to write my novel Wordcrafter (the rough draft of which is now complete and going through edits). Since I am now fairly deep into my story The White Sail's Shaking, I thought I would do the same for it.

1. It started with this history of the rise of the U.S. Navy after the Revolution, Six Frigates by Ian Toll. I was far more interested in the British Navy during the Age of Sail than with the American before reading this, but the colorful history, especially that of the original six frigates, intrigued me. A story was brewing before I finished this book.


2. The most interesting part of Six Frigates was, I thought, the period of the First Barbary War. It was fairly small and gets much less press in history texts than the War of 1812, but all the same, it had some grand exploits, plenty of drama, and a gorgeous setting on the Mediterranean - perfect for a novel.


3. Stephen Decatur was a fascinating character. However, since writing a novel actually based on a historical figure, no matter how obscure, is very risky, I had no desire to try it out with Decatur; he does figures prominently in The White Sail's Shaking, since my character serves under him.

4. The Age of Sail, though quite bloody and, when one gets down to bare facts, unromantic, still thrills me. I love the old sailing ships and the British Navy during this period of time has long interested me with its assortment of famous ships, battles, and men.



5. I have a difficult time remembering when I didn't enjoy the first four Hornblower movies (The Duel/An Even Chance, The Fire Ship/Examination for Lieutenant, The Duchess and the Devil, and The Wrong War/The Frogs and the Lobsters). I used to watch them just for the sake of rewinding the VHS after someone was shot, to watch them "fall" upright again. While I don't enjoy either the books or the newer movies as much, I still love those first four and watch one when I need inspiration.

6. The sea is mysterious and enchanting, and frightening. The yearly trip that my family takes to the beach has made me grow to love the sound of the waves on the shore and the smell of salt, and the grey days that hang over the water like a cloak, and the feel of a storm off the water. There are few settings that could be more inspiring than that.

7. As I have some Sicilian blood, Sicily's history interests me more than the boot of Italy does, inspiring the character of Marta and some of the scenes during the novel. Also, the beauty of the Mediterranean is a huge plus.



8. The Prince of Egypt soundtrack is wonderful for writing, as it has a wide variety of tunes - epic, haunting, bittersweet - and the vocalization is just right for the setting on the lower Mediterranean.




9. John Masefield's poem Sea Fever inspired the title - "I must go down to the sea again / to the lonely sea and sky / and all I ask is a tall ship / and a star to steer her by, / and the wheel's kick and the wind's song / and the white sail's shaking, / and a grey mist on the sea's face / and a grey dawn breaking."

Post inspired by K.M. Weiland's Fifteen Degrees of Inspiration.

Guest Post - K.M. Weiland

K.M Weiland, authoress of novels A Man Called Outlaw and Behold the Dawn, recently released a CD on how writers can cultivate a life of inspiration instead of waiting for a lightning bolt to strike them. This is a reposting of a great article she wrote some time ago about inspiration on her blog Wordplay - Opening Yourself Up to Inspiration.

If you’re like most writers, coming up with story ideas is rarely a problem. More than likely, your brain bubbles over with more ideas than you’d be able to use in two and half lifetimes. I’ve yet to meet a writer who decided Hmm, I’d like to be an author—and then sat down to brainstorm ideas. Instead, I suspect most of us first turned to writing as a way to release the pressure of all the ideas already ricocheting around in our brains.

For many of us, the problem isn’t that we have too few ideas, but rather that we’ll never live long enough to write the ideas we already have. Of course, that really isn’t a problem; it’s a tremendous blessing. And if a little blessing is good, a lot of blessing must be even better, right? If a little bit of inspiration has us soaring up near the ceiling, why not go whole hog and open yourself to inspiration in every possible way?

Ultimately, inspiration is an intensely personal experience, unrepeatable and often unresponsive to conscious prodding. You can’t force inspiration. It either happens or it doesn’t. You can’t sit yourself down at your desk, squeeze your eyes shut, and demand that inspiration appear in front of you complete with drumroll and a puff of smoke. Inspiration is a gift, and like all gifts it must be treated with gratitude and responsibility.

But none of this is to say that we can’t position ourselves in the path of inspiration. Instead of just waiting around for the muse to hit us in the head with a lightning bolt, we can ingrain in ourselves the habit of “opening” ourselves to inspiration.

So (as if you didn’t already have too many stories to write), here’s a handful of tips for composing an invitation that Madame Inspiration won’t be able to resist.

Pay Attention to the Details

Writing is the details. Without these little garnishes, most stories could easily be summed up in a sentence or two. (Don’t believe me? Check out Book-A-Minute Classics.) People read fiction because they want to experience life. They want to see the way the dust motes turn to gold in a shaft of sunlight, and they want to smell the delicate spray of an orange rind as it is peeled back.

In order to share all these minutiae with readers, we first have to notice them ourselves. But don’t just notice it; experience it. In the end, a story is about the little things as much, if not more so, than the grand scope of life and death. So pay attention to the color of the sky right before the sun dips below the horizon, notice the way the bass in a sound system thrums in the soles of your feet, absorb the smell of rain so deeply that you can describe it without even trying. Not only will paying attention to the details plump up your prose, who knows when you’ll stumble upon some inconsequential and heretofore unnoticed facet that will spur your next story.

Look Beyond the Cliché

Keep your eyes wide open for the unexpected. Look beyond the obvious in search of surprising juxtapositions. Broaden your horizons; start searching for esoteric and little-known nuggets. When you find yourself with an idea for a story that could easily turn into a familiar plotline, hang onto it for a bit and go in search of some unexpected ingredient you can throw into the mix. Say you want to tell a mystery story. Don’t just settle for a tale about a hard-boiled cop in an inner-city district. Dig deeper. What would be unexpected? What would be out of the ordinary? For me, a story isn’t ready to be written until I’ve been able to add at least two or three layers of juxtaposition.

Subconscious

Never underestimate your subconscious. When you’ve come to a snarl in your plot, don’t think too hard. You can only push your conscious brain so far. On more than one occasion, after I’ve backed myself and my characters into a seemingly insurmountable corner, I’ve sat at the keyboard for hours, racking my brain for an answer that just wouldn't come. But when I return to the problem the next day, after my subconscious has had a chance to mull over the matter for the night, the solution is practically staring me in the face.

When you come across an interesting snippet of an idea that you aren’t quite certain how to develop — toss it into your subconscious for a while. Sometimes ideas stew in the back of my mind for years before suddenly reappearing on center stage as something worth pursuing.

Conscious

Nobody says you always have to wait for inspiration to come to you. Put your conscious mind to work and brainstorm. Give yourself “idea deadlines” (e.g. I’m going to come up with a new story idea every day). Buy a book of journaling prompts (such as Jack Heffron’s The Writer’s Idea Book) or google the Web for one of the hundreds of websites that offers prompts. Schedule idea-hunting day trips and sally forth with notebook and pen in hand.

I will admit that most of my best ideas have not been the product of a conscious effort. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t benefited from brainstorming sessions. Even if I don’t walk away from every session with a viable idea, at least I’ve given the ol’ brain a good workout.

Don’t Wait for Inspiration

Finally, and most importantly, don’t wait for inspiration. We’d all like to take up permanent residence in that rarefied atmosphere where the “inspiration high” is a constant state of being. But, as all writers discover sooner or later, that high will inevitably run dry. If we allow our writing to dry up with it, we’ll never so much as finish a story, much less be read by anyone.

Inspiration is much more likely to strike when your mind is active. So even on the days when the mental well seems to have evaporated and blown away in clouds of steam, sit yourself down at your desk and keep writing. Inspiration, after all, is really a very small part of the big picture.

- Check out K.M. Weiland's blogs Wordplay and AuthorCulture for more posts on writing! -

Fantasy: Creating Worlds

I received a couple of questions on my last post and on my Inspiration for Wordcrafter about how to create a solid fantasy world and how to do the research for it. I was really at a loss how to respond, at first, seeing as the parallel world in Wordcrafter was one of those things that came into my head and needed little help; but as I thought about it, a few ideas occurred to me.

For starters, you have to be willing to take the time to make your world like one of those that I mentioned in my last post; because if yours isn't one that was fully formed already (most aren't), it will most likely need research and brain-storming. Just like a historical fiction, fantasies take planning. What happens when a person jumps out of a plane without a parachute? He goes splat. And what happens when a writer jumps into a story without any forethought? Chances are, the story goes splat. So you have to be dedicated enough to the story to not skimp on the hard parts.

Now on to the actual suggestions. Chances are, your fantasy realm is tied to something in our world - probably English history and culture. Only God can create ex nihilo; we build off of things we know. And for Americans, what we know is largely our own history: that is, the history of the United States and the history of our mother country, England. It's no wonder, then, that most fantasy worlds in modern novels have some basic themes in common, such as the existence of a ruling king and queen. I mentioned in my last post that Tolkien fashioned Middle-Earth largely on the old legends of Britain and the myths of the Norse, and a few writers have followed his lead (such as Christopher Paolini). Considering how fascinating English history is, it's not a bad or strange thing that writers utilize it in crafting their own worlds; but that leads to my first thought -

Think outside the box. The realm you're making is your own and so is the story itself, so you know best what kind of a world will fit with your plot and the feel of the novel. But if you're going to have a fantasy set in a Medieval sort of world, then do your homework; read books on life in the Middle Ages, because knowing your material will give you what you need to manipulate and bend those facts to spice up your story. You might try delving into cultures more foreign to American readers, such as ancient Asian empires or the Aztecs. Don't limit yourself to the culture of the Western world just because most authors do.

Surface research. This is what I suggested to a friend of mine when she asked me about ideas for world-crafting. It's basically just skimming books on a wide range of subjects to see if anything catches your eye. Children's books are great for this, juvenile as they may seem, because they give the reader a cursory look at different cultures and don't take an age to look over; plus, they usually have pictures, which are great helps to some. So if you're seeking inspiration, you could try getting one small book on each culture that even remotely interests you - Mayans, Japanese, Chinese, Greeks, Phoenicians, etc. - and looking over them. You may either find a variety of things from each that would all work together to inspire a fantasy world, or you may find one culture specifically that interests you. And then...

Read. This is probably where most who call themselves writers lose interest, but it's imperative. If you don't read, you won't know how or what to write. Once you find a culture that catches your attention, look into it more deeply and pick out those features that you think you would like to weave into your fantasy. Read books and look up internet articles on it, and then brainstorm.

Brainstorm. Brainstorming is especially important to the writer, because here is where you make sure that those tidbits from history that you fell in love with will actually work in the story. It's no good to have fascinating points that don't work or that stand out garishly from the context. Brainstorming is one of the parts of writing that polishes ideas, as well as creating them, so don't leave it out of the process.

The Ten Levels of Inspiration

K.M. Weiland on her wonderful blog Wordplay wrote a post on the fifteen levels of inspiration that led to her current work in progress, called The Deepest Breath. I couldn't pull out fifteen from the dumps of my memory, but I thought it would be fun to do the same for my work in progress, Wordcrafter.

1. It started with either a nasty headache or a cold, I forget which. Not a promising start, but when one is in pain, it is very easy to be inspired to write about someone else who is in pain; so I tottered upstairs to my computer (which really helped my headache...) and wrote a section about a man who had been attacked by a wolf during a hunt.



2. Which then led to some inspiration arising from this magnificent bit of artwork, done for a book that I have never heard of before.


3. Then there was some inspiration from Lawhead's Song of Albion trilogy.












4. Add to that some of the features of the Middle Eastern cultures, including the Arabian horses...











5. Then the rampant illiteracy of the Middle Ages...















6. Then the historical struggle between humans over the color of skin, specifically the antipathy toward Gypsies...



7. Andrew Peterson's song 'Nothing to Say.'









8. The movie Amazing Grace, about abolitionist William Wilberforce, inspired me with some themes...












9. Ceylon tea.










10. Then the friendship of David and Jonathan, which only occurred to me after I had several things in the story that tied into the Biblical account. This is probably the strongest inspiration, as it helped me flesh out the story a good deal.