Writing from the Heart

Every budding writer gets told to "write about what you know". We all know something about affairs of the heart so the rest should be easy.  But it doesn't work like that.  Theory and practice are always two different things.  Authors who set their stories in the past or in a future world are writing about what they can imagine.  Imagination is another word for creativity in my book. As long as you don't have heroines in their pretty crinolines taking a taxi to a neighbour's dinner party you are on the way to being credible. In fact, writers of historical novels have to do a great deal of research. The same goes for novels set in the future. They have more than a basis in current scientific developments.

Do you always need to do a bit of research before you write a novel? When I wrote Spate of Violence I was writing from my experience gained in the community I lived in at that time. None of the characters in it are based on people I knew. But I did know a lot about the darker side of urban crime.  For a few years I worked as a volunteer for an organisation which helped the victims of crime. This brought me into contact with many different people and their problems. As in all my novels, Spate of Violence is based on the "what if".  What if some outraged citizens decide to form themselves into vigilantes? It is not a moral judgement on society it is just a story from a few different points of view. I hope my readers enjoy it.


 Link to Amazon.com if you want to have a look.
Available from all Amazon sites as a Kindle e-book.