Today I'm plugging my post on my other blog. If you know of a child (preferrably 8-12, since that's the target age) interested in adventure stories, please check out the interview I conducted with C. Alexander London, all about his Accidental Adventure series (it's tres cool, I'll tell you that much here).
Speaking of accidental adventures, I thought today would be a good day to share stories about how we writers got started in the writing business. My first attempt at writing for children was definitely an accident, in case you were wondering how an accident and writing connected in the real world.
Oh, you want to hear that story? Well, okay. But it's dull. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Here's my accidental adventure/how I go started in the business for writing children:
You see, I'd been writing stories for adults for years, but I couldn't ever finish one. Usually I gave up somewhere in the first chapter or two, most often when I'd hit a brick wall with the plot and couldn't figure out a way forward (then, as now, I'm a pantser). So I was pleased when I had made it to the middle of a manuscript. The problem I ran into this time, however, was that main characters kept acting like children. I was so irritated at them that I flung the story right out the metaphorical window and took a break until I could figure out how to fix it.
Not long after, my young son was being silly with rhymes, and he giggled when he came up with "enormous porpoise." I knew there had to be a picture book in there somewhere, so I wrote a (badly-written) 5,000-word rhyming story about a porpoise, Dorcas, and her tiny friend, Jose. The book was terrible, but I enjoyed myself so much that I realized the best way to fix my problem of writing characters that acted like children was to...wait for it...write books where the children were the main characters.
Yes, I was a little slow on that uptake.
So, you see, a rhyme by a 4-year-old and a manuscript that will never see the light of day accidentally helped me find my true calling as an author of children's books.
Okay, now it's your turn. What's your story? Accidental or other-wise, I want to know!
*pulls up a chair and leans forward to listen*