The awesome co-hosts for the August 3 posting of the IWSG are Tara Tyler, Lisa Buie Collard, Loni Townsend, and Lee Lowery!
Every month, we announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG post. These questions may prompt you to share advice, insight, a personal experience or story. Include your answer to the question in your IWSG post or let it inspire your post if you are struggling with something to say.
August 3 question – When you set out to write a story, do you try to be more original or do you try to give readers what they want?
This doesn’t have to be an either/or question. The best answer is both—that being original is what your readers expect. But the more realistic answer lies somewhere in-between. It depends upon the story.
For the Harmony Duprie Mysteries, I wrote each book to meet certain expectations. Each story would have an element of humor, there’d be little in the way of blood and gore, and Harmony’s peculiar style of logic would somehow lead her to solve the mystery. In the Free Wolves books, I tried to make each story original, with only a vague tie-in across the series. The main theme between them lay in a strong female lead, and that left a lot of area to be explored.
Then there is The Fall of Jake Hennessey. Written as a prequel to the Harmony books, it pays frequent tribute to the events in the series, but is written from a different point of view. (Jake’s.) It was an interesting challenge—how to be original when the ending had already been written and I couldn’t take liberties with the timeline?
One more point. Most authors want to write a story they enjoy. They are writing for themselves as much as they are writing for their readers. If they enjoy the story, they’ll do a better job writing it.
Don’t forget to check out some of the other authors on this loop by following the links below. And, as always, please stay safe until the next time!
