Speak No Evil: Fear

Liana Gardner — Sat, 28 Sep 2019 16:38:17 +0000

What is it about fear? It shapes and molds us, makes decisions on our behalf, builds obstacles and then throws them in our path. It puts up walls and encapsulates us in a prison of our own making. Fear wields an almighty power over our lives … because we allow it.

The result of fear is a life half lived. We will never reach our full potential and we miss out on so much. Example: Hiking through the hills during my scouting years, I strode down the middle of the path, head down, eyes scanning the brush for snakes—due to ophiophobia (fear of snakes). I missed out on enjoying good times and laughs with friends, taking in the scenery, and all because I couldn’t get past my fear and enjoy the moment. My fear controlled me on those hikes.

The idea for Speak No Evil captured me from the moment it arrived. A teenage girl who had been through so much trauma, she became afraid to speak. Every time she spoke out about things that had happened to her, something worse followed. Melody’s silence was her fortress — the walls she put up against encroachment by the outside world. But it became her prison.

To say that I fell in love with the story immediately may be an understatement. I was itching to write it. The characters were fantastic. The story compelling. It haunted not only my dreams but also my waking moments. But other than capturing scenes and making notes, doing research, I didn’t write.

Why didn’t I dive in? I’m no stranger to reaching the end of the story only to realize while the concept is good, the words on the page are a hot mess and need a LOT of editing. I’m one of those writers who actually enjoys most (not all) of the editing process because that is what makes the work shine. But still I wouldn’t write it. I was afraid.

Afraid I wouldn’t be able to handle the story in the way I saw it in my head. Afraid the story was bigger than my talent as a writer. The LAST thing I wanted to do was to fail Melody — fail her story.

Any time I would think about starting a draft, the little gremlin on my shoulder whispered in my ear, but you’re not ready. I had allowed fear to stop me from sharing this story.

Then, after a couple of years and a swift verbal kick up the backside from Italia Gandolfo, I conquered my fear … well, conquered is probably too strong a word. I told my fear to hush because the time had come. Then I put the butt in the chair and fingers on the keyboard.

“You will never learn to fly if you let someone else carry your wings.”

My characters talk to me … and not always about the story. As I got to know Quatie Raincrow, Melody’s first foster mother, she said, “You will never learn to fly if you let someone else carry your wings.” It’s one of the first things she said. The context? A scene that never made it into the book. The scene itself wasn’t important, but the words were. They were meant more for me than for the story at that point.

It’s true. If you don’t strap on those wings and take a leap of faith, you’ll never learn to fly. It’s about having courage to do the things you’re passionate about. So it has become a personal motto of mine. When I hang back and don’t move forward into a new venture because I might fail, I take a deep breath and put my wings on. Am I going to fail? Yes, but I’ll dust myself off, and try again. Usually the thought of failure doesn’t hold me back, but when it does, I know I need to strap on those wings and reach for the sky.

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The Lernean Hydra

LK Griffie — Mon, 13 Aug 2018 13:00:28 +0000

One question authors are frequently asked is, "Where do you get your ideas?" Truthfully, story ideas usually come to us in a variety of ways, whether it be from a news item, an article we read, the blinding lightning bolt where the idea simply occurs, dreams, life … anything really. No matter how I get the original idea, I usually jot it down, and periodically do some research as the story formulates. For my books, I rely heavily on my characters to tell me where the story is going and how we are going to get to where we're going.

Usually, I enjoy this part of the process immensely, because I love getting to know my characters and am eager to go along the journey with them. But just as with story ideas, my characters talk to me in a variety of ways. Things like driving, going for a walk, taking a shower, listening to music, etc. Mostly when my characters talk, I listen and make notes. When the writing is really flowing, I experience things through their eyes. It's one of the things that makes writing a magical process for me. Because as crazy as it may sound, I believe my characters drive where the story goes and my job is to listen and put their story on the page in the best way I know how.

Sometimes, they even show up in my dreams to share a scene, or something that is important. Apparently it is much easier to get my attention while asleep than while awake and distracted by other things … go figure. So it's safe to say I'm always working on my books … even when I sleep. Most of the time, this is not an issue, but sometimes the dreams take a weird turn.

A couple of weeks ago, I had one of those dreams, and I think my heart has finally stopped racing to the point where I can share. I don't remember a lot of the dream because it frankly scared the bejeebus out of me. The kind of dream where you struggle to wake, heart racing, body drenched in sweat, and it takes forever to calm down from it. I have ophiophobia and have had since birth. What is ophiophobia? A fear of snakes. Life-long, never overcome, and no plans to overcome, outright fear. By the way, it has nothing to do with thinking snakes are slimy — they aren't. I don't like the way they move, and have had nightmares about them for as long as I can remember. So … of course they seem to crop up in my writing ALL the time. I don't want them in the story, but they slither in just to torture me.

I'm currently working on the first book in the Homeless Myths series (Secret of the Red Key) and since there will be five books in the series and I need to make sure I'm laying the right seeds in book one that I may need for future books, I'm finding out some things in advance of immediate need. What do I first remember from the dream? Trying to brush my hair. Such a mundane activity, until it wasn't.

My hair was twirled (I sometimes twirl it and tie it in a knot to get it out of my way if I need to quickly and don't want to find a pony-tail holder), but instead of being twirled in a knot, it was sticking straight up. I didn't think much about it, just grabbed my hair brush and tried to run it through my hair. Only I couldn't. The twirled hair should have just come untwirled as I brushed, but instead the brush got stuck. So I leaned over and yanked the hairbrush as hard as I could through my hair. The ends parted and out of the top came a snake!! And not only a snake, but a snake with lots of heads and the "bottom" snakes' heads had more snakes coming out of their mouths. I screamed for help … because I had a snake in my hair. And at that point I woke.

When I calmed down, I realized the snake would have a meaning for the as yet untitled Book Four. The dream snake was symbolic of the Lernaean Hydra from the Labors of Hercules, which is interesting because I am not trying to deliberately bring in Greek mythology, and I will say the use will be a little bit of a twist.

I told my characters Message Received — Loud and Clear but perhaps next time they could convey the message without running the risk of giving me heart failure.

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Fear Archives ⋆ Be the Cat

Speak No Evil: Fear

The Lernean Hydra