Stephen King on writing, his fears and his new book 11/22/63

by Karen Harrington, author Janeology

Last Friday, I had the privilege of hearing Stephen King speak to a 1,000 member audience in a Dallas suburb. Now I know this month's blog series is about exploring our day jobs as writers, but since mine is currently all about meeting an actual writing dead-line, I hope you won't mind if I share a post I just wrote for my own blog about Mr. King's inspiring talk!

I was delighted to find him optimistic, charming and entertaining throughout his entire 45-minute event. Like so many established writers, King is not only a talented writer, but also a natural oral story-teller.


Fears and First Recognition


Dressed in a relaxed t-shirt and jeans, King began his talk by stating he most often gets asked what scares him. Good question. He replied that his fears include "spiders, snakes, the elevator in his hotel room and death." Then he followed this subject by scaring us with the fact that "1 in 75 people will leave their homes unlocked allowing a psychopath to get in." He said that probably 50 people in the audience had left their cars unlocked and how we might want to check our backseat before we got into our cars. This drew a laugh from the audience, though I'm sure some folks laughed with unease. He went on to talk about his life as a writer, recalling the first time he was ever recognized in public. He was in Pittsburgh promoting a little book called The Shining. There, the men's room attendant recognized him and asked him for an autograph, all while Mr. King was, well, on the john. 


A few years later, he said, he was at a dinner with Bruce Springsteen when he noticed a young girl approaching their table. King prepared to demure to the singing idol, but was elated when he discovered it was HIM she wanted an autograph from!


Researching The New Book


After a few minutes, Mr. King read from his new book 11/22/63, which features the infamous Kennedy assassination and poses the question what if you could change the past? In the novel, his protagonist uses time-travel to do just that. But before setting out to write the book, he did research. He said that writing "is a visual process for me. I need to know what's on the left and on the right" when writing about a place. He came to Dallas and spent a good bit of time in the School Book Depository, even getting special permission to sit in the perch where Lee Harvey Oswald fired the fateful shots. 
Here's a short interview where King talks about this new book. 



Writing And Rituals


In the end, Mr. King concluded his talk by revealing that while most people might say, oh, he's a professional, he's a hot-shot writer, they would be wise to remember that even he approaches a new work and "has a feeling of inadequacy" at first. But he said when he gets going and "warmed up" it's as if he's under some kind of hypnosis and the work begins to flow. He shared his writing rituals, which include making hot tea and setting out his toothpicks before diving back into a story and employing that powerful admonition that a writer's job is to "get the words on the page." 


Memorable Quotes And Notes


"The worst day I had in that [writing] chair was still terrific." 


"I've never texted in my whole damn life!" 


"I feel like Rick Perry at the Republican debates." [following a forgetful moment on stage.]


He was 17 when JFK was assassinated and heard the news on the radio while driving home from High School.


He's finished the sequel to The Shining.


The new Dark Tower book will be out in June 2013.


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Bravo, Mr. King! I'm looking forward to reading this new book. 

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Visit me at www.karenharringtonbooks.com 

Lucky me! I got a signed copy.

Writing Like a Hummingbird

By Augusta Scattergood

The aging oscillating fan in my office has cried uncle, given up in the relentless heat. The fan no longer rotates. Like that fan, this summer I’ve spent a lot of time sitting very still.

On the day the temperature inside my house never got below 84 at my writing desk, I happened upon Nicole Seitz’s post about thinking.  

Nicole validated my quiet activity, or rather, inactivity. Sitting and thinking creatively is different from just sitting with your face in front of a fan. Different and oh-so-necessary for writers.

Sometimes, when I’m faced with deadlines, too many projects piling up on my desk, or when—like now— one big project is complete and another awaits judgment, I buy the most captivating notebook at the stationery store, find a comfortable chair, and I begin thinking and scribbling.

Then I open my favorite writing book.

Like many writers, I have an entire shelf of craft books. I refer to them when I’m stuck on a plot issue, pondering point-of-view, muddling around the middle. Sometimes.

But I mostly avoid books with “Inspiration” in the title. I’m not that great at writing prompts. I don’t enjoy books that push me hard out of my comfort zone while I'm in the thinking stage of writing.

My favorite book, THE POCKET MUSE, is different. Every time I open it, something new jumps off the page and into my notebook. Monica Wood’s book is subtitled “ideas and inspirations for writing.” Even with that subtitle, I love it. This is why.

It’s compact and solid. One terrific bookmaking job!

I often smile just holding  it.

A soothing shade of green—the only color in it or on it other than black and white—frames the outside and the inside.

More things pack the pages than you’ve never thought about. Photographs, author quotes, (fake) horoscopes, fonts- wonderful fonts!

So many good things that turn sitting into creative thinking before you can say “Where’s my iced tea?”

Today I’m thinking about hummingbirds, and not just because they are flitting and fighting over our feeder. Here’s what Monica Wood says about them:

During the first draft of anything I write…I find myself getting up and down continually, almost as if the work were too bright to look at directly. I used to consider this approach to the blank page a flaw in my character, but I have come to refer to it affectionately as the Hummingbird Method of Writing.

Hummingbirds approach flowers in much the way I approach a first draft: sip, draw back, sip draw back…

I also like hummingbirds because they hibernate. In hostile conditions they can enter a torpor, their breathing nearly indiscernible, their reactions either very slow or entirely lacking.

Another hummingbird fact writers can relate to: twenty percent of its body weight is heart.

I just love that.

I love so much of this little book.  I even love the prompts, like this one that took me right to the heart of one of my characters:

Write about the last time you got your wish.

Or this:

Imagine a coat. Imagine the pocket of that coat. Imagine what’s in the pocket.

I understand Southern writers of yore did a lot of pondering on their wide, blue-ceilinged, wrap-around porches, iced drinks in hand. As huge ceiling fans turned the hot air around, Mr. Faulkner, Miss O’Connor and their cronies cranked out a creative thought or two.

Sitting in a big chair, dipping into THE POCKET MUSE, watching my hummingbird flit—all while thinking quietly— will do just fine this summer.

Here’s a link to Monica Wood’s website, with a few of her writing prompts. And what a treat I discovered there- a second edition, in blue! 

And almost before I added the newer book to my wish list, a very thoughtful person bought it for me. 

(Note the stickie notes in my green book. I can’t bear to scribble in it, but I do put an occasional, tiny underlining or check mark.

As of now, the blue edition is pristine.)

Augusta Russel Scattergood spends her summers writing in the northeast where it’s supposed to be cooler than her home in St. Petersburg, Florida. Her first middle-grade novel, historical fiction set in 1964 Mississippi, GLORY BE, will be published in January, 2012, by Scholastic and is already available for pre-order.