The Persephone’s Garden Series Origin Story
A day trip from Breckenridge to Steamboat Springs and an idea…
Where do creative ideas come from?
Are stories floating around in the universe, looking for a writer?
A question frequently asked of writers is how they get their ideas.
For the Persephone’s Garden Series, the answer is an unlikely mix of ingredients: a Brit Floyd concert, the dystopian themes of Pink Floyd’s music, a little mythology, an acrylic painting course, an afternoon soak in a hot spring and a dreamy drive through the mountains. Also, a bit of something that still feels like magic.
I’m in Breckenridge, Colorado this week, and it feels like the perfect time and place to explain how the idea for my novels showed up on a day in June, almost 10 years ago while I was here with family.
The trip started with a Brit Floyd concert at Red Rocks Amphitheater, just outside of Denver. I could write an entire blog post about that experience alone, but I’ll try to stick to the story. Brit Floyd tours the world playing the music of Pink Floyd and that year, their set list focused on the album, The Wall. The show featured a large screen showing dystopian images illustrating themes from the music.
The day after the concert, we headed into the mountains with those images and songs playing in my head. Several days later, we drove through miles of mountainous ranch country on a day trip to Strawberry Springs hot springs in Steamboat Springs. After luxuriating in the hot spring pools, we headed back to Breckenridge with a stop for dinner in Vail. On that leg of the trip, driving on county highways past sprawling ranches backing up to pine covered mountains, I relaxed in the back seat of the car, my mind drifting, wondering about people who choose to live in remote areas surrounded by these imposing views. That’s when it happened—the story dropped in as an image of a young woman, alone in a pine forest on a mountain. She was digging a hole. As I wondered about the image, other characters emerged: an older woman, a man with a military background, a dog. I knew they had a story that wanted to be told.
To explain, I’ll backup a few months to an online painting class with artist Flora Bowley. I was drawn to her work and wanted to learn about her process, which is tied to journaling and observation of nature. One of Flora’s lessons included a series of journaling prompts, two of which are key to this story: the first—“what would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?” My answer—I would write a book.
It took me by surprise. I was never one to journal, and although I sometimes thought about writing a book, I never tried to do it. But I always loved books, even before I learned to read. I have vivid memories of my dad, reading to me from our full set of Childcraft books when I was a preschooler. He had me reciting entire Longfellow poems like “Song of Hiawatha” and “Paul Revere’s Ride.” I loved the cadence of the words and still remember parts of those poems. Reading and writing were my favorite subjects in school, and I thought being a successful writer would be one of the best jobs in the world.
The second journaling prompt was—“What’s stopping you from doing it?” My answer—I don’t know what I’d write about, I don’t have an idea.”
When the image of the young woman appeared, it felt like a challenge—“you said you wanted to write a book—here’s your idea!” I decided to accept. I didn’t know anything about crafting a novel, but a story took shape around the image, and I started to write it down.
Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love wrote a nonfiction book about the creative process titled Big Magic. In it, she discussed the notion that ideas for creative works—poems, songs, books, movies, visual art… are floating around in the universe. Artists who show up to do their creative work can tune into this sea of ideas. I’ve heard it described similarly by others—poets who speak of “catching a poem” or musicians who describe waking up in the middle of the night with a song. I don’t doubt that this is true.
Although I hadn’t been writing, I’d always been a crafter and made visual art for years. I was involved with communities of artists and worked with an arts nonprofit providing free after school art programming for middle schoolers. I was dabbling in acrylic painting, doing metalsmithing and enameling, and making and selling art jewelry. It seemed “The Muse” was sending me in a new direction.
The writing process felt familiar—much like other creative activities. Start with a rough sketch, add detail, refine. As I revised a section of writing, it felt similar to sanding and polishing a piece of metal for one of my jewelry projects. Adding sensory details to a scene in the book was like adding detail to a painting. And here’s the best thing about writing—I could do it anywhere and everywhere. With my IPad, I could work on my novel in my car—waiting in the pickup line at my grandkids school, or at a coffee shop, in an airplane, sitting on my patio…no wall of tools and art supples required!
I joined a critique group and attended writing conferences where the story was well received by other writers. So I kept writing. Every day for the first couple of years. It felt like my characters, Jessie, Shawn, and Grammie took up residence in my head, telling me the story, correcting me when I got it wrong. A few years into the writing, I realized the book was getting too long, but I hadn’t reached the end of the story. I went back to the beginning, looking for ways to shorten it when I came to a scene where I decided one story could end, and another begin. I was writing a series.
With guidance from writing coach, Kathie Giorgio, of Allwriters Workplace & Workshop in Waukesha, Book One, AspenRidge, found its way to Black Rose Writing and a publishing contract. And Book Two, Bison Valley Ranch is well on its way!
I’m grateful to “The Muse” for trusting me to write these stories and guiding me along the way!
