'Write what you know.' Everybody—especially writers—have heard this adage. So why do I always find myself writing about sisters (I have three brothers), old houses (my house is less than five years old), and activities I've never even planned on pursuing (cooking, gardening, sailing)?
I'd like to think it's more than just 'the grass is always greener'—I mean, don't we all wonder what it's like 'over there' regardless of how hard we've worked to obtain 'over here'? Or maybe it's a sincere desire to learn something new, to try on a life (ie. one filled with sisters) that for whatever reason have been denied me by birth or by the sheer virtue of lack of time.
I believe it's a cool mixture of all the above. In The Memory of Water I write about two estranged sisters. Granted, my only experience with sisters was watching my mother (the oldest of 5 sisters) with my aunts chatting at my grandmother's kitchen table. But to me it was that intimate mystique of girls growing up together in the same family; something I didn't understand yet felt its absence in my house full of boys.
But why make the sisters in The Memory of Water be avid sailors? Not only have I always been afraid of deep water, but I'd never been within fifty feet of a sailboat. I'd like to think it's because I wanted to finally face a life-long fear. Maybe even shake myself out of my comfort zone (a place I rarely leave). Or maybe it was that part of me that calls itself 'writer' demanded that I pursue my craft with honesty. If I expect my readers to identify with my characters, then I'd better be able to fully know my characters—their likes, dislikes, peculiarities, and what in their lives makes their souls sing. Which brings me to the art of sailing.
The Memory of Water is set in the South Carolina Lowcountry in a town on the coast called McClellanville. It wasn't too much a stretch of my imagination to see Marnie and Diana Maitland, the two sisters at the heart of the story who were raised in this small town, on a sailboat, and to have one of the sisters feel more at home on the sea than on land.
As tempted as I was to write all scenes while safely on terra firma, that 'writer' part of me wouldn't allow it. So I dragged my entire family with me while I signed us up for sailing lessons. Granted, we weren't on the open ocean, but we were on a sailboat in deep water, moving our sails at the wind's whim and coming closer to understanding two fundamentals of sailing: how to trick the wind to make our sailboat move as fast as it could, and how the flapping of crisp sails and the gentle thrum of water against the boat's bow could make a person's soul sing.
Can I call myself a sailor now? Not at all. It would take years spent on a boat to become a proficient sailor. I think I'll have to be satisfied with just writing about it. That's what I do best, after all. At the moment I'm sitting in my car at my daughter's horse barn where she takes horseback riding lessons. Surprisingly (or not!) my next book will have a character who was once an avid horsewoman until a devastating accident. I don't know if I'll be climbing into a saddle anytime soon, but at least I'll have a readily-available research source and I won't have to throw on a life jacket to interview her!
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The Memory of Water is a story about two estranged sisters and how life brings them back together. Karen White is the featured new author in the Sisterhood Group. Click here to join the group today.
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Comments: 31
All of my books are like my 'children'--it's hard to pick a favorite. Well, okay, sometimes with my children it's a bit easier picking a favorite sometimes depending on who's giving me a headache but you know what I mean!
Anyway, The Memory of Water is a special book to me. I always feel my characters 'speaking' to me but in this book it was more than before. It was actually emotionally and physically exhausting to write it and I had to take about two months of not writing a word to recuperate. Sort of like giving birth---you're so overwhelmed and exhausted with the labor, but then you have this beautiful 'child' as a result.
Of course, my books will never talk back or ask to borrow the car keys...
Just wanted to stop in to tell you congratulations for being featured on Gather's homepage right now!
Here's a 10 rating & have a nice day. :o)
Good article for discussion, Karen.
As for "writing what you know", I don't usually write things that I know personally, as I write historicals and fantasies and paranormals, but I do write "how would I react?" to certain situations. If I put myself in these situations, it's easier for me to write them. If I want a male perspective, I'll ask myself what would my hubby do? Or something similar.
So there is a nugget of truth in the saying, but you don't always have to adhere to it.
~~Becka
That is what I wind up doing though - I'm a journaller rather than an actual writer, because I can't make up a story to save my life. Thank gods for people who can!
i would love to review this...
Thanks for your very kind words! Again, I write what I _want_ to know or experience--which brings me face to face with how little I know of the world again and again.
Again I look forward to reading your book. Good luck.
By the way I've had the good life so to speak, contry clubs, big houses, big cars, private schools for my children, etc. You know what? Now, there is just me living in a tiny place sometimes thinking of those past days of glitz and glamour. I'm happier now with my computer, writing, doing what I want to do, following my passion.
I have no idea where my own deep water fear comes from--but I remember being very young (3 or 4) and my mother taking me to a shopping center that had a 'modern art' type sculpture in the middle of the parking lot that look a lot like the upended hull of a ship. It scared me so much that I threw a fit and my mother had to take me home. I still find it difficult to look at the bottoms of boats. Strange, isn't it?
My life right now is busy with two children, husband, writing career--and everything that goes along with that. I'm in the middle of planning my daughter's 'sweet 16' party and enjoying it because I know that in two more years she'll be gone from home. I'm glad I have my writing--it's my sort of constant since I know it will (hopefully) always be with me.
Before I wrote THE MEMORY OF WATER I don't think I'd ever been within 20 feet of a real sailboat, and certainly not with any expectation of actually being able to control it! I realized I had to actually get on a boat in the water with real sailors if I had any real hope of making my characters in this book come to life.
I was very lucky in finding an expert (he owns a sailing academy here in Atlanta and has been sailing for most of his life) who was so generous with his time in not only literally showing me the ropes on a boat, but also in reading my book with an eye for accuracy. I was so thankful that I wrote him into the book as a character in the last scene. It was the very least I could do!