While reading another writer's blog post about intersecting ideas and how they fuel a story, I immediately thought back to the first time I tried to write my Jekyll and Hyde story.
I read and reread SWhile reading another writer's blog post about intersecting ideas and how they fuel a story, I immediately thought back to the first time I tried to write my Jekyll and Hyde story.
I read and reread Stevenson's story of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde until I knew the story backward and forward. It was while working on an article about Jack the Ripper that the dates the Ripper killed were familiar and brought to mind Stevenson's story. That's when the idea was born to write a book about the three characters that bound them together.
The American actor who portrayed Jekyll and Hyde on the stage during the time Jack the Ripper terrorized London was pulled in by the newly created Scotland Yard to answer questions. The police believed the actor's portrayal had crossed over from fantasy to reality and considered him a prime suspect. He was immediately released, but the trail remained.
In writing Whitechapel Hearts I had to find a voice and a way to tell the story that would transcend Stevenson's story and make it live in a new way. I didn't want a parody and I certain didn't want to write an homage, but nothing I wrote jelled, nothing felt or sounded right, so I put the story on the back burner until I figured out what was wrong.
The motivation was wrong or, rather, the lack of motivation. Every time I read Stevenson's macabre tale I had the feeling something had been left out, just as something was left out of the tales of the Ripper's kills. The facts were there, but the motivation wasn't. What set the Ripper on his bloody rampage and why did Henry Jekyll seek to excise the emotional side of his nature?
Gene Roddenberry used technology to sever Captain James T. Kirk's softer and harder natures, but I planned a novel set in the heart of Victorian London when the Ripper prowled the streets of Whitechapel. Technology wasn't an option and I'm definitely not into deus ex machina. The motivation had to grow organically from the characters, but finding the motivation was like finding a needle in a haystack -- until a conversation with another writer about Victorian morality gave me the answer. I said a quick goodbye, skirting the edge of rudeness in my need to get the idea down on paper, and sat down with paper and pen. I had the intersection of lines that led to the heart of the story. Why does anyone sever their heart from their mind? Love.
Delilah Makepeace was born that day. She was the bridge between Jekyll, Hyde and Jack the Ripper. She was the cause, the reason and the motivation.
What happened after that day is a long journey of research and delving into the past, and into the minds of the characters, to detail the confluence of events and hearts that led to the bloody trail of bodies the Ripper left behind. The story is the stuff of dreams -- and nightmares -- and it is the labor of years and false starts, but that is the way writing works.
Sometimes the stories and characters come seemingly without effort, and other times it takes digging and retracing all the paths until the right one is found and the characters come alive.
Now, if I can only find the one thread that pulls together an apocalyptic tale of vampires, science and nature in upheaval, I can move on to the next world where the stuff of dreams becomes reality.tevenson's story of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde until I knew the story backward and forward. It was while working on an article about Jack the Ripper that the dates the Ripper killed were familiar and brought to mind Stevenson's story. That's when the idea was born to write a book about the three characters that bound them together.
The American actor who portrayed Jekyll and Hyde on the stage during the time Jack the Ripper terrorized London was pulled in by the newly created Scotland Yard to answer questions. The police believed the actor's portrayal had crossed over from fantasy to reality and considered him a prime suspect. He was immediately released, but the trail remained.
In writing Whitechapel Hearts I had to find a voice and a way to tell the story that would transcend Stevenson's story and make it live in a new way. I didn't want a parody and I certain didn't want to write an homage, but nothing I wrote jelled, nothing felt or sounded right, so I put the story on the back burner until I figured out what was wrong.
The motivation was wrong or, rather, the lack of motivation. Every time I read Stevenson's macabre tale I had the feeling something had been left out, just as something was left out of the tales of the Ripper's kills. The facts were there, but the motivation wasn't. What set the Ripper on his bloody rampage and why did Henry Jekyll seek to excise the emotional side of his nature?
Gene Roddenberry used technology to sever Captain James T. Kirk's softer and harder natures, but I planned a novel set in the heart of Victorian London when the Ripper prowled the streets of Whitechapel. Technology wasn't an option and I'm definitely not into deus ex machina. The motivation had to grow organically from the characters, but finding the motivation was like finding a needle in a haystack -- until a conversation with another writer about Victorian morality gave me the answer. I said a quick goodbye, skirting the edge of rudeness in my need to get the idea down on paper, and sat down with paper and pen. I had the intersection of lines that led to the heart of the story. Why does anyone sever their heart from their mind? Love.
Delilah Makepeace was born that day. She was the bridge between Jekyll, Hyde and Jack the Ripper. She was the cause, the reason and the motivation.
What happened after that day is a long journey of research and delving into the past, and into the minds of the characters, to detail the confluence of events and hearts that led to the bloody trail of bodies the Ripper left behind. The story is the stuff of dreams -- and nightmares -- and it is the labor of years and false starts, but that is the way writing works.
Sometimes the stories and characters come seemingly without effort, and other times it takes digging and retracing all the paths until the right one is found and the characters come alive.
Now, if I can only find the one thread that pulls together an apocalyptic tale of vampires, science and nature in upheaval, I can move on to the next world where the stuff of dreams becomes reality.
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