by Katy Munger, 2016 Piedmont Laureate

Sometime over the past two weeks, my staring contest with the unfinished books piling up on my computer’s hard drive ended. It started quietly enough. I woke up unexpectedly at 5:00 AM one morning, wide awake as a lemur, head swimming in ideas, and figured I may as well take a peek at the outline for one of those works-in-progress. Two hours later, a new outline had emerged, I felt blissfully balanced, and I was heading for the shower to start my day.

That morning was followed by a few evenings of grabbing a couple hours here and there… more mornings rising early to dip my toe into the plot that was emerging, only to get swept away in hours of concentration, and even a few glorious weekend afternoons sitting outside in the cool and working on my book.

The barriers to commitment fell away quietly with no resistance, stone by stone, toppled by the subtle but unstoppable force of my love for writing, which is surely written in the ladders of my DNA. It was an unexpected victory. I had lived with the uncertainty of what to do with myself as a writer for a while now, immersing myself in workshops, meeting other writers, giving myself the gift of talking and thinking about writing rather than forcing myself to sit down and actually write.

It was the best thing I could have ever done.

Somewhere along the way, in the midst of talking to, literally, hundreds of writers this year as Piedmont Laureate, I came to understand that there is a self-defeating dilemma inherent in the world of published writers: writers write because they want to be heard, because they have something to say, because they have a deep need to put their stamp on the world. Publishers, on the other hand, are looking for books that can ride the coattails of the bestsellers that have gone before them. They want writers to write as close as possible to everyone else, or at least to everyone else on the bestseller lists. So it’s all too easy to begin your writing career with a unique voice and something to say, only to find yourself pretending to be everyone else a few books down the road.

I think that was what bothered me the most about my evolving writing career: giving up the search to find myself and my voice along the way. I think that dilemma is what caused me to give it a rest. So I thank all of the writers I’ve met over the past nine months for bringing me to this realization and helping me to understand that I need to make a choice. You have helped me crystallize why I write and what I want to write. You have helped me cull out a plethora of ideas and settle on just the right one to give voice to my worldview. You have helped me, perhaps for the first time in 25 years of writing, to get my priorities straight.

Once I realized I wanted to write a book that had my voice in it, the plot came pouring forth. Once the plot came pouring forth, my imagination embraced it and drew me into it, causing me to wake up early in the morning to live in that space, inspiring me to carve out hours to spend with my new characters. I now live in two worlds, the real world and the world I am creating in my head. This is where I like to be. Straddling two worlds in that besotted, Twin Peaks slightly off-kilter way of writers who are heeding the siren call of their own imaginations.

It feels good to be home and to be writing again. If you’re in the same boat I was in earlier this year, here’s my advice to you: once you remember why you write, what you write will follow.

by Katy Munger, 2016 Piedmont Laureate

I am such a nice person. No, really. Ask anyone who knows me. I’m maniacally cheerful (still love you for that one, Andy), relentlessly optimistic, incapable of holding a grudge, hopelessly forgiving of other people’s bad behavior, and pretty much swimming in natural endorphins. My former husband nicknamed me “Skip” because my prevailing mood, according to him, could best be described as, “Let’s hold hands and skip!”

Of course, as any mystery reader knows: looks can be deceiving.

You see, while I walk on the sunny side of the street in real life, it’s only because I have found a way to channel my less worthy impulses into my books. Like all mystery writers (at least the ones who admit it) I can afford to reserve my revenge for the page, where I channel my need to exact fictional karma into motivation to sit down and write. Think of it as a writer’s character-driven catalytic converter.

This is not out of any personal need for revenge, mind you. Like Fern in Charlotte’s Web, I was born with a keen sense of injustice in the world. Or rather, it probably developed soon after I was born due to the fact that I had five siblings. When you are one of six kids, believe me, the injustice of someone else getting a bigger piece of pie than you or hogging the best seat in the car all the way from Virginia to Maine starts to seem pretty damn important. I still have the scars from scratch marks on my arm to prove it. This hyper sense of fairness followed me into adulthood. I try to treat other people with kindness and respect, but there is nothing I like less than people who break the rules and take advantage of other people’s good intentions for their personal gain. So I notice when other people behave badly — and I make it my  job to even the score, if only a little.

By now, it’s second nature to me. When I run across someone who deserves a literary slap upside of the head, I catalog their appearance and personal habits, then preserve them in my brain until I need a character deserving of either murder or incarceration. They go into my mental Rolodex under “V” (which stands for either victim or villain) and are forgotten until I need them for a plot. It’s my own personal waiting list of unlikeable characters, populated by people who have committed my least favorite transgressions. For example, I can’t stand rude people and I don’t trust liars — but I absolutely loathe mean people… control freaks and phonies… not to mention self-entitled twits and self-righteous bullies … and, most of all, narcissists. I’ve written entire books about making sure narcissists get what’s coming to them and I’m still not done examining the fascinating question of why some people feel so entitled to suck the life out of others.

My fictional hit list has served me well. It gives my characters life and my plots more juice. Most of all, it keeps me writing. And it’s probably a big reason why people keep reading my mysteries. Bullies often get away with intimidating people in real life. People who cheat and stomp on the rights of others can keep on stomping for decades. And narcissists rarely get what’s coming to them in real life. But in the pages of a mystery, especially my mysteries, karmic justice is always served. It feels good when the cheater gets caught. It’s satisfying when a bully has his power taken away. And who doesn’t delight when a spoiled, self-entitled jerk is finally thwarted for good? Call it the world the way it should be. A world where the golden rule is more of a double-edged sword, where people get what they deserve instead of getting away with murder.

Is this fair play? You bet. People who can’t play nice in this world deserve my literary wrath, at the very least. Is it emotionally healthy? Probably. It’s certainly healthier than keeping it bottled up inside. Most of all, though, it’s fun—so long as you remember that literary revenge is a dish best written cold. You don’t want to hold on to your anger, you want to transform it into the forces of good.

By the way, I take requests. So feel free to tell me about someone who deserves a little literary payback in the Comments section below and I’ll see what I can do. Because, you know: I am such a nice person.

Whenever I give workshops, I often talk about how the growth of television and motion pictures has affected the medium of the written word. Like it or not, the popularity of more visual mediums has changed both the way authors write and the way that reader’s perceive that writing. While I often caution writers about the bad habits that come with thinking primarily visually when writing (see The 10 Worst Habits of Today’s Writers), it may be more useful to some of you to provide a positive example of a popular author who is successfully avoiding the pitfalls of visual writing while still taking advantage of some of the expectations and habits that television and movies have ingrained in today’s readers: JK Rowling. Although, in this case, I am not talking about her famed Harry Potter series. If you are a writer and you want to take a look at what a well-written novel for modern audiences can achieve, pick up Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy.

Is it the perfect modern novel? No, and its mixed reviews make that clear. I myself kept reading, with some bemusement, as she slid inadvertently into a true omniscient viewpoint in one chapter and then had to scramble to find a graceful way out, given she was juggling dozens of characters. But it is a great book for other writers to read, with an eye out for recognizing how authors need to communicate to readers whose storytelling preferences have been shaped by more visual media. Rowling has taken popular story expectations (a plot full of surprises, somewhat iconic characters, and a hero’s myth structure) and she has met them all. But at the same time, Rowling also uses the written medium and her own narrative voice to provide depth that more visual mediums lack, especially when it comes to the characters. She has then, rather fearlessly —given the world’s expectations for her at the time she wrote The Casual Vacancy — overlaid the story with her own personal style and values, creating a book that most definitely has her in it. Instead of imitating other writers or attempting to imitate television or movies, she has created a book that only she could have written and one that is deeply moving in many respects as a result.

The story itself is relatively simple.The equivalent of an American city councilman dies, pitching a small English village into chaos, primarily due to differing opinions on whether a nearby low income housing project should remain part of the village or be forced on the metropolitan area that built it in the first place. Whoever takes the dead man’s place on the local council will likely sway that decision. As various village inhabitants cope with the sudden death of their well-liked neighbor, more than a few begin to view the  vacant seat as a way to fulfill noble and not-so-noble dreams of their own.

The book tracks how a single death can change the undercurrents of a small town, including how people view themselves and how they treat others. The political plot takes a backseat to very real and evocative portraits of people that I suspect every home town includes: the power hungry local businessman who overestimates his importance and joins his wife in kowtowing to minor royalty… the aging sexpot a bit at sea as her sense of self starts to fade with her appeal… unhappy marriage partners… sturdy, overlooked wives who hold the lives of everyone they love together… terrifying domestic abusers… lonely, career-driven women confronted with a dismal dating field… drug-addicted citizens of the welfare state who may or may not mean well, but who always slide back into poverty’s quagmire… and a handful of very unlikely and ultimately very brave teenage heroes.

In fact, it is Rowling’s ability to paint vivid portraits of the town’s teenagers that connect this book the most to her prior Harry Potter work. You meet the smartass class clown, whose wit and sharp tongue make him more of a bully than his more brutish classmates. You meet the less attractive daughter of high achieving parents whose perfect older sister and unfortunate appearance make her the victim of that bullying, as well as her family’s own disappointments. You meet a loyal son doing his best to avoid triggering the vicious temper of a violent father and who tries to find escape in the ecstasy of possible love. And you meet a tough-as-nails teenage girl whom the deceased nearly rescued from a legacy of poverty and who still clings to the moments of high self-esteem his kindness gave her. Rowling makes all of these characters real in a way no script could ever hope to, and especially shows the relationships between children and their parents in heartbreaking detail. This is an author with endless empathy, a very long memory, and remarkable powers of observation.

These relatable characters form the book’s core and stand out as its greatest strength. As she takes turns delving into their lives, including their innermost thoughts, she reveals nuances to their personalities that make them vividly real to the reader and evoke personal memories. Who among us has not suffered the panic of being pinned in the judgment of others? Or known the man who could never quite make a decision about his life, thus dooming him to drift along, unsatisfied and envious of those who have made clear-cut choices? Rowling manages to make them all real, yet still leaves room for the reader to fill in the blanks. She tells us enough but not too much. She conveys a world of regret and longing by describing a single gesture or unuttered phrase, and by choosing those moments carefully: they are moments we can all remember.

Her effectiveness as an author goes well beyond this character-based approach to telling her narrative. Her technical skills as a writer are evident. She achieves a beautiful balance between description, action, and emotional development, and, without being obvious, she has a very strong viewpoint of her own at the core of the story. J.K. Rowling is, as always, fascinated by how being born to a specific station shapes a person’s destiny. In this book, the author definitely has something to say on the subject and she lets the characters she has so vividly created deliver her message for her with extremely powerful results. No one is all good; no one is all bad. That unexpected choice alone forces the reader to stop and confront their own prejudices. It is a very modern plot, but it is never overtold. It shows how a novel can break new ground and speak to audiences that may bring unrealistic expectations about both what a book can do and how problems are solved in the real world.

All of which means, even if you are wary of reading a non-Harry Potter book of Rowling’s, if you are a writer searching for the answer to key questions like, “How can I put myself in my book?” “How do I achieve that balance between showing and telling?” then I would recommend that you check out The Casual Vacancy. Reading it for yourself can tell you more about Rowling’s mastery of modern narrative techniques than I ever could.

By Katy Munger, 2016 Piedmont Laureate

The written word asks more of an audience then visual mediums. All authors must make fundamental choices when creating a narrative: how much is just enough? What words will create the time and place I want to evoke—while still inviting readers to use their imaginations? To use the medium of written work correctly, we must leave space for the reader in what we write: readers who bring their own contributions to a book are more invested in its outcome.

Unfortunately, finding the right way to frame your story, and sticking to your guns about it, is not always an easy task. Primarily because we now live in a time when virtually every writer has been raised on television and motion pictures. This has fundamentally changed the way we approach and create the written word as well as the way our brains work while we are writing. For most of us, when we are in deep in a story, our imaginations are unfolding a sort of mini-movie in our heads, providing a visual track we describe as we write our books. But, unfortunately, by rooting our narrative in a primarily visual base, we leave ourselves open to bad habits that can limit what we ask the reader to bring to our writing. Since the last thing you want as a writer is a disengaged reader, it’s important to recognize these writing tendencies and root them out. To help, here is a list of the bad habits I have noticed in myself and in other writers, many of them identified during my time as a book reviewer for the Washington Post.  

Too many adjectives and adverbs

This is the number one bad habit of writers today. In our desire to make that mini-movie in our head more real, we put way too much page space into adjectives and adverbs. The problem with this approach is that, not only do we drag our stories down with bloated word counts, we rob the reader of the chance to bring their own life experiences and imaginations to the story. We risk describing the appearance of a romantic lead, for example, so thoroughly that the reader has no chance to bring their own desires to how that protagonist looks. Taming this habit requires time and discipline. When I finish a chapter, I go back through it and cut out at least 25% of the adjectives and adverbs I have used (although my aim is to cut 1/3). If you are a writer, I highly recommend you do the same. You want enough adjectives and adverbs for your book to feel alive, but not so many that you dictate the experience for your readers.

Minute-by-minute action descriptions (the film reel effect)

Much like the overuse of adjectives and adverbs, many writers fall into the trap of describing every move a protagonist makes to get them from Point A to Point B. Readers don’t need to know that your protagonist woke up, got out of bed, brushed their teeth, took a shower, and made coffee… See what I mean? I almost fell asleep just writing that sentence. Identify the essential actions and emotional epiphanies of every chapter before you begin to write then concentrate on those moments. It may feel a little clunky at first, but you are doing your pacing a favor and keeping readers engaged when you learn to cut out the mundane.

Slippery viewpoint

Remember that you are a writer, not a movie camera. You must make deliberate choices about the viewpoint you use in your book, and if you choose to mix your viewpoints, then you must be very, very careful to stick to a single viewpoint within a chapter. Otherwise, you risk confusing your reader and muddying your story.

I find that many writers today use a limited omniscient approach by adopting the viewpoint of a single character within each chapter, but using the viewpoints of different characters across the arc of an entire book. Done well, I think this can give a story more depth. However, be careful how you use this technique, balance the use of multiple viewpoints, and, again, never mix viewpoints within a single chapter. In fact, my basic advice is this: mix viewpoints at your own peril. Most editors hate this technique because many readers do. It’s a tough act to pull off, even when you’re Barbara Kingsolver (Poisonwood Bible) or JK Rowling (A Casual Vacancy), so it’s not one I recommend until you are experienced enough to be extremely confident in both your characters and your approach. I could show you my own (unpublished) book as an example.

If you find you have chosen a viewpoint that limits your ability to develop the story, consider taking on the voice of the different, more universal character… or divide your books into sections, each section devoted to a different character… or take the plunge and choose the omniscient viewpoint. But whatever you do, choose deliberately and stick to your guns. Slippery viewpoint is jarring to the reader who has embraced your book and the narrator’s voice.

Uneven pacing

Most people today fit time for writing into their otherwise busy lives; few of us have hours a day to devote to working on our books. Because we must write in what amounts to fits and starts, I think that many of us end up with uneven pacing. That’s because, each time we write, we are like a car in first gear gradually revving up to go faster. This can make for very uneven pacing in a book, and its risks losing readers to boredom or leaving them behind when you rush. You can help mitigate this habit by working off a precise plot outline that guides you each time you sit down to write. If, on the other hand, you write organically and don’t like to be hemmed in by an outline, then be sure to put your book down for a long enough period of time to clear your head, then go back to it with one and only one goal in mind: would a reader brand new to your plot feel comfortable with your pacing and the way your plot unfolds?

Slow passages/not enough reason to keep turning the pages

Today’s readers have also been raised on television and motion pictures. Because of this, they bring certain expectations to the medium of the written word and you would be wise to meet those expectations if you want to build a following for your writing. One of those expectations is the idea that readers like to be kept in suspense and surprised. Without resorting to contrived plotting, it can help to identify the fundamental challenge of every chapter in your book and see what you can do to add smaller pockets of suspense to what should be an enthralling overall plot.

Superfluous characters

Just because a movie has extras in it, doesn’t mean your book has to. If you have to list your characters and describe them at the front of your book, then either you have too many characters or you have not devoted enough time to making them memorable. There’s nothing wrong with a minor character orbiting in and out of the book to add color or, perhaps, provide a clue or crucial plot transition. But, in general, if a character does not play a distinct role in your book, think twice about making them a part of it. It’s hard for readers to keep track of the secondary characters and it can lessen their enjoyment if they have to keep stopping to flip the pages backwards to figure out who the characters are. Just ask anyone who has read the fourth book in the Game of Thrones series.

Character names that are too similar

This bad habit, I think, comes from the peculiar tendency of our brains to store memories in the same place as specific emotions. As a result, many writers will give their characters names that are so similar it is tough for readers to keep them apart, especially at the beginning of a book. I think it’s a good idea to even avoid naming characters of the same gender with names that begin with the same letter. You may have two friends named Cathy and Caitlin, and understand that they are completely different, but your readers are going to have trouble keeping them apart, especially before you have had time to make each character unique. To combat this habit, I recommend choosing all names before you even begin writing your book, and even creating a short back story for each character. This helps you choose exactly the right name for the type of character can have in mind and allows you to consciously adjust your characters’ names when they slide too close together.

Out-of-character actions

Don’t be that desperate writer who has paid so little attention to how your plot unfolds that you end up throwing the equivalent of a Hail Mary pass to one of your characters. Unless you give the reader a reason why someone is behaving out of character, don’t do it. Part of creating authentic characters in your book is establishing the boundaries of their psyches and actions. When you violate those parameters, you are impugning the integrity of your writer’s voice. Again, I recommend a separate reading of your draft solely so that you can ask yourself the question, “Would the character I have created act that way?” about every major action they take. Characters who suddenly behave differently are jarring to the reader and disrupt the imaginary world you have created.

Too much nuance

It kills me to write this but we all need to face it: nuance is dead. We live in a world where people are instantly labeled as heroes and villains, and there is little middle ground in between. If you are writing for that last, blessed slice of humans who treasure nuance and love creeping up on a realization, then have at it. But if you are writing for a larger market, always err on the side of the obvious. You’d be amazed how often your obvious is interpreted as someone else’s nuance. If you’ve got a sleazy character, don’t be shy about showing their sleaziness. If someone is secretly unhappy, make sure it’s not-so-secret to the reader. People today are used to being spoonfed their emotions. They are used to being told how to react and they are definitely used to having their emotions manipulated. You will risk losing some of the perceived depth of your book if you decide to be too subtle.

Breaking the “rules” of your genre

Very few fiction writers today write outside of a specific genre. Whether it’s crime, romance, speculative, women’s, historical or what have you — marketing considerations put virtually every fictional piece in a box. These boxes come with expectations. Every genre has its informal rules. You don’t solve a mystery by bringing a character in at the last moment; that’s cheating. You don’t end a romance novel by having the two protagonists engage in a roaring fight and break up. That’s just plain mean. In other words, readers bring certain expectations to the genres they love and it’s not a wise idea to disappoint them. Learn the rules of your genre by reading in your genre. Pay attention to the common structures and plot devices employed across your genre. Follow them. Sure, you can be different — I, personally, always applaud the different — but know that you are being different at your own peril and that it will decrease the likelihood that you will be published by a mainstream house if you break your genre’s rules.

As always, the advice above comes with a caveat: take what you feel, in your gut, might be useful to you in your writing and discard the rest. You are the captain of your own ship. But first take the time to step back and at least evaluate whether you have any tendencies toward the bad habits listed above. Read your work deliberately to look for them in your drafts as you work. If you find yourself engaging in any of them, rip out the offending passages as if you were weeding a garden. Your book or story will be the better for it.

By Katy Munger, 2016 Piedmont Laureate

As the entire reading world obsesses about the new Harry Potter — certainly, the first time in my life time that so many people have cared about reading the script to a play — my thoughts have turned to Gone With the Wind, not only because it was the blockbuster of its day but also because, when you think about it, it is a sort of sorting hat for literary tastes. I have found that how you react to the characters in GWTW can not only tell you a lot about yourself, it can also tell you a lot about the direction you should go in as a writer or reader. I have cleverly tested my theory in bars across America as I meet with other book lovers and I am pretty sure I am on to something.

Let’s start with the obvious: Scarlet. Here is a narcissistic, spoiled woman-child who toys with peoples’ emotions, treats her maid abominably, is equally dismissive to her own mother, manipulates her father in an über-Freudian fashion, obsesses over the one man she can’t have, and blithely steals her sister’s lifelong suitor for a little bit of change in the bank. Certainly, Scarlett had strength and determination. And held her family (if not the entire county) together after the Civil War. If her strength and quest for romantic fulfillment is what captivates you about her, then chances are good you are either a romance writer or into women’s fiction. On the other hand, if all you can see when you think of Scarlet O’Hara is a long line of victims toppled behind her like bowling pins and cannot help but think that she would have made an excellent serial killer, chances are good you are into crime fiction. As for myself, I can only tolerate Scarlet by pretending that we finally find out what happens to her in Streetcar Named Desire, when Blanche DuBois is led away in a coquettish delusional state by a version of the proverbial men in white coats.

Ashley Wilkes is another good litmus test. It is safe to say that all southern women fall into one of two categories: those that swoon over Ashley Wilkes, and those who prefer Rhett Butler. For me, the choice is easy. Sure, Ashley Wilkes is genteel and noble on the surface, but he doesn’t have the cajones to tell Scarlet to leave him alone, he sits around moping an awful lot for a man in the middle of a major war, he’s atrociously unhelpful when Melanie is dying, and he even gives in and kisses Scarlet when he knows that he may as well have been waving the starting flag in front of Dale Earnhardt. In short, he is too indecisive and weak for my taste, and though I loved him when I was very young and found most men loud and scary, I have little patience with him now that I am older. I prefer the Rhett Butlers of the world, though I have no illusions as to their essential character. At least Rhett was honest about who he was, recognized quickly that his love for Scarlet was toxic, stood by Belle Watling with an admirable loyalty, and could get the job done. If you are an Ashley Wilkes fan instead, I am going to go out on a limb and suggest that you are a big fan of either young adult fiction or most men active in progressive politics. We Rhett fans will be over here in the corner enjoying our thrillers and spy novels.

Melanie is another character who inspires revealing reactions by readers. She is generous and selfless, impossibly good, and thus clearly doomed from the start. How could anyone not like Melanie? But there is a difference between admiring her and wanting to be around her for too long. Melanie makes you feel inadequate. Melanie makes you feel mean and small. Melanie would make for an awesome character in a mystery book. Think about it: what if someone was actually lousy enough to whack her? Who could do such a thing? Now that would be an interesting puzzle. Melanie represents the essential good in human beings, and as such probably appeals to readers of all genres. After all, doesn’t every book explore whether people are essentially selfless or self-serving at their core?

Other lesser characters, and how you react to them, can reveal even more about your reading and writing tastes, if not your soul. Let’s take the Tarleton twins. They’re like a pair of dumb Labrador retrievers, tongues hanging out as they pant around Scarlet, fetching her barbecue and vying for a pat on the head and “good boy” from her. You just know that they will be the first to charge into the fray, without stopping to think whether it’s the smart move or not. You know they won’t make it halfway to Fort Sumter, much less Gettysburg. This cynical reaction to the Tarleton twins should have told me, early on, that I needed to go into crime fiction. If you, too, saw it coming but, unlike me, found it a little noble, may I recommend any book by Stephen Ambrose?(Although Stephen Ambrose is one of my all-time favorite authors, just for the record.)

Meanwhile, Aunt Pittypat is the litmus test for whether you are a fan of southern women’s fiction or not. If you find her iconic and endearing, please do not read Flannery O’Connor anytime soon. If you mostly want to slap her and hand her off to the Symbionese Liberation Army, welcome to the dark side. Start with Stephen King and go from there.

My reaction to the death of Bonnie Blue Butler was another clue that I like to avoid the sunny side of the street. The very fact that I could entertain a smidgen of relief that the pony did her in clearly labels me both a horrible person and a crime writer. (Although in my defense, the young actress who plays her in the movie version of GWTW is so abominably coiffed and overly cute in that saccharine 30’s kind of way that I think probably everyone should get a pass on cheering for the pony.)

Finally, we must discuss the characters of Mammy and Prissy, the O’Hara family’s house servants (and by that, the ending credits designer surely meant SLAVES). I never understood the need for comic relief in an otherwise utterly serious tale — I almost threw tomatoes during Keeper of the House in Les Miserables — and I certainly do not understand making these two, of all people, the comic relief in GWTW. I think the only sane reaction to their characters is to watch Django Unchained every time you watch GWTW in order to balance out the moral scales of the universe.

Try this literary sorting hat for yourself. Think of the characters in Gone With the Wind and your reactions to them. Then stop and marvel that fictional characters can reveal so much about you. Stop and give homage to authors who are able to create such iconic and evocative characters that people talk about them for decades, if not centuries. Then give those authors the due they deserve, whether it is Margaret Mitchell, JK Rowling, Shakespeare, or someone else whose characters haunt you. Because characters capable of striking deep chords within readers are the hallmark of great books. If you’re a writer, remember that. Take the time to build and get to know your characters before you even start to write your book.

How do you feel about the characters in Gone With the Wind? Who are some of your most memorable characters in literature? Your favorites and your least favorites? I’d love to know which characters speak to you and what they tell you about yourself or the world.

By Katy Munger, 2016 Piedmont Laureate

Whenever I conduct a writer’s workshop, I always learn something from the experience. Whether it’s an attitude or a question or, perhaps, an unexpected answer from the audience – I always leave having realized some new truth that helps me in my own writer’s journey. This past week is a great example. It was a busy week for Piedmont Laureate workshops. I conducted a workshop for elementary school students, another for high school students, and still another for adults. When I was done, I was left with the realization of how very personal imagination is, how much it fuels a writer’s need to write, and how big a role it plays in making a book your own. The week left me with a healthy respect for the connection between a writer’s imagination and their voice.

Each workshop was different, bringing a new realization about how we view imagination. The youngest children were brimming over with creativity, their boundless energy sparking idea after idea after idea. But they had something else, too: fierce pride in their own imagination, pride that sometimes spilled over into outrage when their suggestions were not adopted. I began the workshop by explaining the different elements of mystery writing and asking the children, as a group, to give me ideas for settings, motivation, plot events, and characters, especially heroes and villains. They did not need much explanation, beyond a brief discussion of those same elements as played out in the Harry Potter book series. Soon they were coming up with places to set our group mystery (college was a popular choice), heroes (many nominated themselves), and villains (they preferred their villains to be as different from themselves as possible, ideally big, bad, and easily recognizable). With nearly 30 kids in attendance, it was impossible to use everyone’s ideas—and not all of the children could cope gracefully when their suggestions were not chosen. In fact, when it became obvious how important their own ideas were to their sense of self, I changed plans and had them complete the story on their own to give all of them the opportunity to write exactly what they wished.

Later, after I had talked to two much older groups, I realized that this sense of ownership over our imagination is what creates writers. The need to give voice to our imagination, and to organize and sort it out as we see fit, is why many writers choose the solitary life of sitting in front of the computer, living with fictional characters rather than real human beings, spending hours and days and lifetimes marshaling their imaginings into stories.

In a separate workshop that same week, I taught a group of attentive teenagers a range of techniques that writers can use to organize their books and inspire compelling plots. I was amazed when, having gone through the fairly complicated process of identifying a basic book structure that appeals to today’s readers, every attendee immediately set to work creating a book timeline of their own by overlaying their own ideas onto the generic structure. Even the teenagers who walked in that day without any work in progress immediately came up with an idea for a book and steadily fleshed out that idea for over an hour. But unlike the younger children, they were almost unanimously private about their ideas. Although I encouraged them to get feedback from their desk mates, most were content to work quietly, with one-on-one help from me on how to build out their narratives. By the time we were done, I was struck by how seriously they took their ideas and envious of how they still retained an intimate connection to their imaginations. Clearly, most of their ideas came from a very personal place inside them, they recognized that, and they were instinctually driven to protect them. I started to wonder if maybe maintaining that connection and exploring the more private places of our imaginations wasn’t the key to writing a book uniquely my own.

Finally, I ended the week by conducting a workshop for 10 adults, all of whom are part of an ongoing national writers’ movement. They were intensely focused on what I was saying as I led them through my process for creating the bones of a book and using a combination of brainstorming and different outline techniques as the foundation for a strong first draft. It was clear from their questions that they were relating what I was saying to their own work in progress. As they took notes and asked me more questions, I was struck by how much they respected their own work and, by extension, their imaginations. They understood the challenges of their books and seemed eager to learn any new techniques that might help them build a better book and make it their own. Many of their questions had to do with my own choices as a writer, inspiring me to look at my own influences in more detail. I walked away from that workshop with a much clearer understanding of what drives me as a writer: my distant past, my life’s experience, my successes and my failures, my disfunctions and my strengths, my disappointments and my joys, my ideas about fairness and justice, my hopes for a better world—they are all there in my imagination, feeding the books I write. I need to understand that, and to respect that, if I hope to write books that are uniquely my own.

I used to think that it would be fascinating to be a psychiatrist for writers, that by listening to them speak as honestly as possible in the confines of a safe, treatment room, and then poring over their work to discern the unspoken pain of their lives, that I could make the connection between my own subconscious and the books I write. But now I realize that there is an inherent judgment in that scenario, an assumption that there is something in me  that needs fixing that will be revealed by my writing, an assumption that encourages a desire to hide behind words rather than use them to reveal truths (an impulse I think many other writers feel). I am going to reject that notion. I now see that attempting to scrub traces of ourselves from our imaginings is a mistake. Because our imaginations are a lot like our dreams: a stew of desires, impulses, fears, deeply rooted need, and an overwhelming drive to control our own destiny and connect to others. It’s just that, when you writing, you are given the opportunity to bring order to the chaos. Unlike dreams, you get to define how these very personal forces unfold as well the ending. But both our dreams and our imaginations are deeply, deeply personal and the only way to make what we write truly our own is to understand and respect that.

In the end, I came away from each workshop with valuable lessons that will make me a better writer. Going forward, I’m going to take fierce pride in my ideas, like those elementary school children so connected to their imaginations. Then I am going to acknowledge the connection between my ideas and the forces that drive me in this lifetime, shaping who I am. After that, rather than fearing that these inner drives might be divined by my readers, I am determined to respect the personal foundation of my imagination, honor myself, and write a more authentic book the next time I sit down to write.