The music of the words

I love writing fiction. To create an unseen world to have characters who didn’t exist before come into being. To live and breathe and speak first to me, then to others. To have them set down in my office and tell me their story.

I’m aware I will fill the first drift of the short story or novel with errors. The characters may be more like cardboard people with no depth and no personality. Their speech jumbled, slow or incoherent. They may have been in my mind for a few months or years. As I write, their narrative becomes clearer. Each one tells their side of the story. Each one giving an account of themselves and explaining why they preform the way they do.

It then becomes my task to write their story. To bring them together until the story or novel makes sense. To make them real, first to myself, then to my readers. This could take two, three or more rewrites.

As the story comes together, I hear a ping in the distance, then another and still another until it forms a tune. In the rewrite, the melody becomes stronger and clearer until it is a full-grown song.

This may take a year, two years or more. Then the novel sings, and there is no other song like it. Of the books I have written, each one has a distinct melody. If I have performed my work correctly, the one who reads my work will hear the song of the words.