I know many people use charts and
other visual aids for plotting, but this one is new to me. It’s not a new
concept by any means, but my TBR stack of articles has been there for quite a
while and the printouts of Jennifer Crusie’s blogs just came to the top this
week. Take a look at these two:
When I read these, I realized I
had done this, somewhat, when writing my Neanderthal mystery. I needed a lot of
help visualizing the people for this novel. I wanted to keep in mind what they
looked like--that they were not modern humans, but not animals either. I found
the best pictures I could and even assigned some of the pictures to the
individuals.
I’ve never done so much research
for anything in my life. I wanted the story to be as accurate as I could make
it. I set it in North America 30,000 years ago, as the last Ice Age was
approaching and as the Neanderthals were living their last days on earth as a
separate group of people. The Mississippi River didn’t exist, so I had to know
what the terrain was like. I had to find out what an approaching glacier would
look like, since all of them are receding now. Plants, animals, climate,
housing, clothing, I had pictures of it all. Plus, I drew a map of the
settlement and the surroundings, after figuring out how far a bunch of people
could move in a day. Whew!
Fast forward to the FAT CAT
series I’m writing. I had to spend a few weeks away from it to finish up my
project for Barking Rain Press, and I was very worried about getting back into
it. Crusie claims that a collage is a cure for that. If it really is, I’m all
for it. As I read her articles, I thought, “This is great! It will solve my
problems.”
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Then another light bulb lit up! I
already have a bunch of pictorial helps--on Pinterest! I started some boards as
soon as I got the deal, just thinking they might do some good. I have a Dessert
Bar board and one for Fat Cats! If you glance at my boards (http://pinterest.com/kayegeorge/),
you’ll see they all relate to something I’m writing in some way. I’ll need one
on Minneapolis, or maybe Dinkeytown, the setting for the series. Or maybe I
should combine all of those for myself. Since Pinterest just announced the new
Secret Boards, I can experiment and see what I come up with. I’m looking
forward to this!
(Just found this: http://pinterest.com/volpane/for-collage-public-domain-images/)
However, I can’t find any
illustrations of collages. Oh well. Click on some of the fantastic ones on the
second Crusie link--they’re super duper!
Lightbulb & Glacier from Dreamstime
