A Good Distraction

By Keith N Fisher

I know, I know. My cookbook is overdue, but a new character actually woke me up the other day. Do you know how long it takes to format a new document while a thirty-eight year old woman taps on your head telling you to hurry?

I woke up after having an unusual dream. It had nothing to do with the new character, but as soon as I woke, her story popped into my head. I typed the first pages as they came. You’re going to love this character.

After that, I felt guilty about not working on the cookbook and went on to revise the first pages of the new story. Hee hee. Okay I created a new breakfast dish, cooked it and wrote the recipe. I think you’ll like it, too.

During my writing time lately, I switch back and forth between the cookbook, Rebecca’s story, Christy’s story, Denise’s story, and the new girl is Claire. Have I ever told you I write women’s fiction? I also write camp cooking cookbooks.

I combined the two mediums once. It was in the sequel to Denise’s story. She attended the tail end of a Dutch oven cook off I cooked in, once. We did very well with our bread in that cook off, but Denise got soaked in the cloudburst that hit just as the presentations ended.

At the risk of sounding crazy, do you remember Robert Duvall’s character in Apocalypse Now? He said, "I love the smell of napalm in the morning."

To paraphrase that quote I’d say, I love the smell of a new story in the morning. I love starting a new book. My senses come alive, and excitement grows. I hope you can feel the same way.

Good luck with your writing—see you next week.