Two Questions Answered

Here’s two questions I get asked often: Where do writers get their ideas? And, Why do I write supernatural suspense?

First things first, where do I (and other writers) get all those crazy ideas. Allow me to let you in on a little secret. In my basement, in a hideaway room protected by a rusty sliding bolt lock and old wooden baseball bat, lives a little man I call
Norman.
Norman stands about three feet high, is as round as he is tall, and has a face like a bulldog, complete with killer underbite. He’s a friendly chap most of the time, except when I forget to feed him (that’s what the baseball bat is for).
Norman’s one skill and purpose is to feed me story ideas up through the gaps in our wooden floor. His imagination is endless. When he comes up with a winner, I reward him with a bucket of his favorite treats. This keeps him happy, which keeps the ideas coming.

I’m being facetious, of course. There is no little man named
Norman living in my basement.

He lives in my head.

Story ideas come from a wide variety of places. For my novel, “The Hunted,” I got the idea from an old newspaper article from the 1920s. For my next novel, “Scream,” the idea came from an incident that actually happened to my mother-in-law.

A writer is always on the lookout for story ideas. News stories, local happenings, the testimony of others, even legends and hearsay. An idea, that one inspiration that sparks a full-blown story, could be hiding anywhere. The attentive writer will be ever alert, always looking and listening for that one flash of insight, that one nugget of information that reveals a thick vein of gold.

I know writers who spend hours scouring the internet, bouncing from site to site, in search of that nugget of gold. Others are news junkies. Others are people junkies, talking to anyone and everyone, hoping that one story, one experience, will be the catalyst to a successful plot line.

But in the end, story ideas come from the mind of the writer. Imagination is a gift, but it’s also an aptitude that needs to be practiced and honed. Writers have acquired the unique ability to set reality aside and entertain fictitious thoughts, to take one bit of information and nurture and coddle it until it has matured into an full-grown story.

Oh, and by the way, Norman’s favorite treats are hot dogs and cream-filled donuts. Feed him well and keep the ideas comin’.

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s deal with the issue of supernatural suspense. Some folks think suspense is enough to handle, but supernatural suspense? C’mon.

My take on it is this: Why not write about the supernatural? We are surrounded by supernatural elements every day. What’s the Bible say? We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against rulers and authorities and powers and spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms (Eph. 6:12 if you’re interested). And we also know that God is on our side, battling these forces for us, working in strange and mysterious ways on our behalf. Writing supernatural suspense is simply bringing the unseen into the world of the seen, bringing that struggle of good versus evil out of the shadows and into the light.

Some writers of supernatural suspense like to focus on the unseen battle of heavenly forces (demons vs. angels), some like to bring out the mysterious ways God works (that signs and wonders stuff), and others zero in on the battle that rages within each of us. Whatever it is, as a writer, it’s an exploration of forces beyond us, as a reader, it’s a chance to experience something “otherworldly” but totally real.

Yes, supernatural suspense causes the reader to step outside that comfort zone and set reality aside, but what’s wrong with that? A little stretch of the old imagination never hurt anyone. And besides, you may learn something about yourself or your God that will change the way you see both.