People always ask where a writer’s story ideas come from. There are brilliant answers to this, bright and funny stuff about creative wells and tending one’s idea pastures. Sadly, I never have any of those answers ready —because I have absolutely no clue. I just sort of hover, waiting for ideas to appear and praying they won’t stop. I sometimes imagine my mind as a vast warehouse of memories and experiences, with a little rainbow-coloured forklift truck whizzing through the aisles, selecting things and bringing them to the surface. So far, it’s all been working fine. The forklift driver might take an awful lot of lunch breaks, reappearing when it’s least convenient, in the shower or at the dentist, but it’s kept trucking on for most of my writing life.
Until I sat down to brainstorm ideas for Book 3 a few weeks ago. Some things I knew I wanted to write about (the London Blitz, childhood abandonment, an English country house in autumn), other things were a given (a contemporary and historical plot and something to link the two). But beyond that I suddenly found myself at a loss. I came up with a bundle of old letters as a link between the two stories. Only, how would this bundle survive seventy years? Where could it be stumbled upon in a realistic manner? And, while I was at it, what exactly would be happening in the historical plot? What would motivate the characters and how would they change? I had no idea where to even begin.
A lot of panicking and a considerable amount of chocolate later, I realised two things. One, don’t get up from your desk and Book 2 on a Friday and sit down at your desk with an empty notebook labelled ‘Book 3’ the following Monday. Two, if you’re lacking story ideas, there’s only one place to go. The bookshop. Or the library. And not necessarily for historical research, which I had already done some of, but, more crucially perhaps, to read up on people’s experiences and memories. What would it feel like to run down the grand staircase of a beautiful stately home, with air raid sirens howling above and bombs starting to fall. What would you take? Photos? Jewellery? Or … a bundle of beloved letters? What would make you put on an evening gown and go dancing when you didn’t know what buildings would still be standing when you surfaced in the early hours of the morning? What did the air smell like, what kind of music would be playing in your head, what would you feel?
So even though I was desperate to get going on the actual writing part, I spent most of April away from my desk, patiently restocking the shelves of my creative warehouse. I read novels, memoirs and biographies. I watched TV-series (love my job!); I looked through books on country houses in the war and what women did in the Land Army and where children were sent to escape the horror of it all.
