Frequent visitors to my home office (or, as my impertinent family likes to call it, “the dining room”) will be familiar with my wall of horror: a large cork board upon which 2D victims of my amusement are impaled with thumb tacks. Perhaps not the best preprandial artwork to peruse. Also: the reason we don’t eat in the “dining room”. There, I keep pictures and lyrics, sketches and quotations, scribbled notes and to-do lists that look like I stole them from Dahmer (fix “bone snapped wetly” … corpse would be dry by now). Of course, Dahmer only ever gave me nausea, a Clark Bar (“For Quick Energy!”) and some nightmares in the early ’90s. Just kidding, I don’t have nightmares.

I’ve been asked where I get my weird ideas. My knee-jerk reaction was: “Who you callin’ weird, you fuc–oh, that was a compliment? Ah. Right. I was going to say, focaccia … that old Italian verbal lovetap. I know it’s a bread, sillypants, where do you think they got the name? No-no, no need to Google it. Focaccia translates as: delicious friend. Yes it does. Trust me, I’m a writer, I’m paid to *know* these things.”

Today’s blog is in response to the question of Inspiration. (That’s right, I did it. I capitalized. Again, trust me. I am a writer. I can capitalize all day long if I want to. Sometimes, that’s all I do.) I guess people are worried about writers of horror and dark urban fantasy; if we can imagine such dreadful things, surely there must be … urges? Urges that may be dangerous to the general public. Urges that should be medicated. Can’t she write something nice, they wonder? Maybe there’s nothing nice inside her. <insert concerned head-cock, squinty eyes and lips pursed in thought> Maybe her brain is just a big rotted mat of evil. <insert sage nod>

I can’t answer to that; I’ve never seen my brain, not even when I roll my eyes way up ’til it hurts (warning: don’t do that, it hurts!) What I can say is this: I believe in the two wolves thing. You know, that old saying … inside every man are two wolves, dark and light, in constant battle for dominance. Who wins? The one you feed most often.

So I feed my dark wolf (raw organ meat, door-to-door salesmen). When I don’t, I honestly can’t write horror. I lose touch with it, then I feel like I’ve fallen between the cracks. Once I’m lost, it takes a long time to wriggle back into the grimy crypts and cold dank cellars of my imagination. And that’s where I belong, make no mistake about it. That’s where I come alive; my smile hardens, my eyes sparkle, my family hides the knives (no biggie, you can do a surprising amount of damage to door-to-door salesmen when you’re dual-wielding pickle forks); my Word Count tool heaves and shudders as it attempts to calculate, when I’ve been in dark places. Apparently, I have lots to say, some of it absurdly goofy, most of it gory, and not a page of it “nice“.

So how does this writer maintain that dark wolf? Music, sometimes. And the cork board o’ horrors, which is ever-changing. What’s on there today? 

• the lyrics for “the Derelict”. Sea shanties help me write. “Twas a cutless swipe or an ounce of lead/Or a yawning hole in a battered head … yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!“

• Pictures of mountain lakes north of Boulder, Colorado, where my imaginary town and lake (Ten Springs and Shaw’s Fist respectively) are located. Since I’ve only been to Colorado once, I live off  memory and travel guides and the interwebz. Part of me that loved Denver got stuck there; placing my first person character there made sense, felt right. On my outline for Book 3 in the series, she comes to visit my neck of the woods: St. Catharines, Niagara Falls, Thorold, Virgil, Welland. But she’ll always go home to Denver.

• A picture I cut out of the Sears Catalogue of that blond guy who’s been modelling for Sears for-fucking-ever. He’s wearing a suit. When I was 13, he was my pretend boyfriend whenever I catalogue-daydreamed. I have this fantasy where I run into the Sears Catalogue guy in the produce aisle of the grocery store and I drop my Freudian cucumber and sputter: “holy flaming twatwaffles, it’s YOU, it’s really YOU!”, at which point he freaks out, because other than a deranged stalker, who recognizes a fucking catalogue model? At least the fantasy never includes me dropping to baritone to croon into the cucumber-microphone: “Fifteen men of ’em stiff and stark/ Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!”  That would just be weird.

• A side shot of Jude Law (Do I really need to explain that one, ladies? Do I need to explain the half naked cops and firemen? Do I need to explain why I drew chest hair betwixt their man-nips with my kid’s brown crayon? I didn’t think so.)

• sketches of fallen angels, Leviathan, graveyards, ravens, crypts, abandoned autopsy suites, old plantation houses, Mansard mansions like the house from Psycho, the Paris catacombs, London at night, primeval Serbian forests, sigils and symbols and magic alphabets and conjurings, sketches of Cthulu (with brown crayon chest hair. I couldn’t help myself!)

• various artists’ interpretations of Asmodeus, banker at the baccarat tables of hell. I shoved Him in my books, for as He doth command, so shall I–erm, because I was being creative. Yeah, that’s why. I’m a good girl. *tents fingertips and eyeballs the southwest corner of the room over her shoulder* “Ten fathoms deep on the road to Hell/Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!“

• Pictures of every classic vampire, and by classic, I mean “tear your throat out and leave you in a twitching heap” vamps, not “I’m too emo-vegan for my fair trade bamboo shirt, but maybe, if it’s all right with you, I might softly kiss the back of your hand? But only if you’re ubercomfortable!” vamps. My favourite shot: Bela Lugosi as Dracula, lurking around a corner in half-shadow. Oh, the pure creeptastic delight!

• Many pictures of the goblin shark Mitsukurina owstoni and the vampire squid Vampyroteuthis infernalis, the coolest real monsters currently residing on planet Earth, to my knowledge. I mean, besides clowns. 

• A handwritten lovenote I wrote to myself, to boost my self-esteem: “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I have no faith in you.” It makes me happy.

• Latin words useful in binomial nomenclature, for inventing new plague names for zombie goodness in Book 2. I dig science when it allows me to explain preternatural goodies. I used the bacteria yersinia pestis, responsible for the Black Plague, and altered it to spread an undead plague through bites. Fun! (Ooops, is my nerd showing?)

• a list of possible (mythical? legendary? supposed? partially-logical?) ingredients for raising a zombie via Haitian necromancy. Because I enjoy blending the two types: classic, shambling, risen zombies as undead slaves to a bokor, and infected contagious fast zombies of modern movie thrills. How? Well, that’s where it starts hurting my head, but I’ll figure it out. Book 2 is “first-draft finished”, but definitely needs work. 

• anatomy sketches, names of major arteries, important bones, toe-curling words for innards. Blerg!

• A stick-it note with Christmas ornaments on it that says at the bottom Nice Balls, upon which I have written a warning: Lack of routine is a writer’s doom. I didn’t come up with that myself, I don’t think, but it’s the scariest thing on the board by far.

I hope this helps answer the question. I can’t be the only writer with a cork board, or a wall of Inspiration. (See? I capitalized again. Incorrigible? Who, me?)

What morsels do you feed your wolf?

author’s note: you may notice there are no pictures of clowns on my cork board. *presses two fingers to eye twitch* That’s not because I’m terrified of clowns. *blinks rapidly* I could put pictures of clowns up there if I wanted to. Yes, I could. Shut up. Think you know everything. No, what are you–don’t. Why would you … knock that off. Seriously. I will slap you. Please? God, NO! DON’T, PLEASE! OH GOD, PLEEEEEASE NO, NO, N– *falls off her chair in a dead faint*

There. The answer to your other question: “What could possible scare a horror writer, AJ?” Clowns. Only clowns. Next question?

Warmth has returned to the Niagara wine belt, and with it comes a thousand muse-murdering distractions. How does a writer stay focused on her pages when trilling birds are building nests (ok, maybe they don’t do this yet, maybe they’re only dry humping at this point), the construction guys are out (hellooooo hard bodies!), the untended garden is shaming  me with its drab floral corpses and exposed clay (o, neglected garden, where is thy mantle of mulch?). I have the rare urge to clean everything in this house from sinister cellar to little peaked roof, but that has to wait, because my Word Count tool–that tyrant, that bully, that big doody-head–is informing me that today I have written: 0 words. That can’t be good.

Since I no longer believe in writer’s block (though I have imposed the phrase on my mood in the past) I have been forced to learn some strategies to staying on track. If you do believe in the traditional my-muse-is-silent-therefore-I-cannot-create view of writer’s block, ask yourself if any of these methods might help you command the muse’s attention. If they wouldn’t help, perhaps giving your muse a swift backhand might work (unless your muse is an actual person, then stick to wedgies and nipple-twists).

1. Sharpen the Saw (StS). This is something my husband prescribes for burn-out. He’s not an artist, but he’s lived with one long enough to know the signs. Where he learned StS, I know not, but what I do know is this: it works wonders. In the same way that cutting wood with a dull saw fails, writing with a dulled mind also falls short. Perhaps the ease with which you are distracted today is an indication that you simply need an StS day. Take a walk, read something you’ve been putting off, watch an old movie, crank some tunes, take a snooze, teach your dog to maul pig carcasses in preparation for the zombie apocalypse, cook something interesting. Wait, did I say snooze? Don’t do that, that’s absurd.

2. Refocus the Lens. Say you’re writing an historical romance novel about moss monsters invading 17th century Earth from a rift in reality originating in the Paris Catacombs. You might want to consider a good psychiatrist, because that’s weird. Also: you might want to look up the word “romance” as it applies to genre fiction, because you might be in trouble unless those moss monsters are dreamy alpha males invading Earth in some sexy swashbuckling fashion (roses and a reach-around? Clearly I know nothing of romance and cannot help you). But while you’re waiting to see that shrink (hint: don’t tell him you have lurid sex fantasies about little green plant people) you might want to Refocus your Lens with research. Surely, there’s more you can learn about the Paris Catacombs that would make a difference to a subplot? No? You’re an expert? You were born there? In the Catacombs? Oh, just conceived. Well, that doesn’t count.

Try using your thesaurus to make a list of possible words you might use to describe moss men (no, moss men would not have rippling abs, but they might have lichen infecting their bush. Investigate, researcher!). While this Refocus the Lens day might not be writing per se, it’s vital in helping you remember what’s important (and fun) about your story. Fleshing out details is never a waste of time.

3. Jackknife! This might be my favourite non-writing-day activity; since it’s fluff writing which probably won’t be used, the pressure of saying the Right Thing is negated completely, and your creative center can trip happily along, buzzing with some fresh perspectives on a novel that might be starting to feel more like work than fun. Middles have this meh effect on me, so I use the Jackknife to stir the shit (boy, that didn’t sound right at all. Please don’t quote me on that). The Jackknife involves taking the last thing you wrote, just the end of it, and throwing it in the opposite direction to see what would happen. Fold it like a tractor trailer accident on the QEW, spilling characters out of the cab, slicing plot lines like fuel hoses, busting relationships like windshields (enough? Did I hear an “uncle”? OK), until it’s all kinds of wrong. Don’t be afraid: you’re probably not using it, so it’s fine to mess around. Ask the “what if”s. Fiddle with the “she’d never do this, but …”s. Occasionally, Jackknifing leads to surprise developments that can be used in your work. More often, it reinforces that you were on the right track all along, and the uncomfortable bend in plot forces your attention back to your original outline. 

4. Dreamworks. No, not the movie production company. I’m talking about your subconscious, and putting it to work for you overnight. Your moss monster novel (which you’ve now changed to an erotica novel, tentatively entitled “The Grass is Greener”, you cheeky bugger, you) has hit a point where you’re not sure whether to stick to your original outline, or follow an intriguing tangent. Or, perhaps you had no outline, and you write like I do–willy nilly and hoping for the best. You have ideas, and options, but commiting to them on paper (or virtual paperspace) is making you feel squinky (Squinky: (adj) altogether icky, as in “I just saw Saw 3D and now I feel squinky, please pass the brain bleach.”). Jot down all of the possibles just before bed, and put them out of your mind. Your subconscious will ruminate on the problem while you sleep. It’s like having a little grey writing coach in your skull. Actually, that would be terrifying. How would you get him out? Could you hear him up there, whispering plot ideas to you? Would his plots become schemes for his escape involving a garden claw and some pliers? Oh great, now I’ll never sleep tonight …

5. Read. Read, read, read. And this time, I mean your own words. Take a time-out to go over what you’ve already accomplished. Are there places in the book that really shine? Try to remember how it felt to write that. Were your fingers flying? Did the words come out before you even knew what you were going to type? Are there places in the book that fall flat? Can you improve on them today, while you’re not making strides to add to the meat of your novel? Take your story somewhere else: a park, a friend’s house, a coffee shop, to prison, to bed, to the back porch. Read it out loud. Does it flow well when spoken aloud? Are there phrases over which you stammer? Does the dialogue ring true? Do your characters sound distinct from one another? Mark for later those places you feel need a boost or a rewrite (and yes, I do work in hard copy when I do rereads. This wee author loves a nice fresh red pen and some stick-it notes). 

I hope this helps/inspires my writerly friends and my readers from blogland. Do you have favourite methods for getting around the distractions and doldrums, the stagnations, slumps and stallings?  When do you find you have the most trouble writing? Is it seasonal, based on personal commitments, or something else entirely?

 (Author’s note: AJ Aalto is currently seeking agent representation for Touched, Book One of the Marnie Baranuik Chronicles, while completing the first draft of her second novel, Death Rejoices, Book Two of the same. She may also be standing in front of her bathroom mirror, snort-giggling at exploratory homemade zombie noises, like all horror writers are wont to do.)

Day 1

Early morning, and everything is calm. The ocean is sibilant against yielding white sand, and there is but the softest of breezes rustling the palm fronds. I lift my head from my scribbling long enough to sip a banana daiquiri and frown.

AJ: Wait, did you say magnets, or maggots?

Heather (removing chocolate muffin from her mouth with a grimace): Please stop writing horror.

I consider this through a fog of travel weariness and booze. It’s never going to happen, me not writing horror: I may venture into other genres for a bit, but I will always return to my first love.

Aj: I could try writing romance? I do a decent sex scene.

Heather: Indeed you do, however you write violence better. On a completely unrelated note, how’s your marriage? 

Aj: Violently romantic?

Heather: Is that a thing?

Aj: If it’s not, it should be.  And anyway, how do you figure I’m not romantic?

Heather slaps the page she’s editing for me.

Heather: Right here! She wrenched the pen out of his ruined forehead and sent it in a bloody arch across the asphalt. How is that romantic?

Aj: Well, would it be more romantic if she left it in?

Heather: Hun, you can’t kill off half your characters in a romance novel. They frown on that.

Aj: I’m flexible. I could totally write a book where no one dies.

We face off, unblinkingly, over a pile of beach towels, snorkeling gear and mutual disbelief, both slack-jawed with shock that I even suggested such a thing. Later that night, over red caviar, shrimp and white wine, she imitates my injured croak under her breath; yet again, we laugh and laugh and laugh.

Day 2, hot afternoon

Heather: That parasailing looks like a lot of fun.

Aj: Pretty sure that’s the most fun you can legally have.

Heather: No, that’s the most fun you can legally have.

I peer over my sunglasses to follow her gaze to the cresting waves, where a half-naked Frenchman (I’m assuming, only because of the hotness factor, and the cigar still nonchalantly–and soggily–clenched by a perfectly vulpine smirk, as though by his sheer fiery Frenchness he can deny the ocean its ability to de-smokify him) has surfaced from the ocean in a black speedo, his glorious bronzed body slick and perfect. If he claimed to be a spy working for Covert Op: Brain Melt, I wouldn’t doubt him for a heartbeat. He pauses in rinsing sand off his chiseled midriff to grin at us.

I casually lean over, pluck the remains of my melted brain out of the sand, give it a kneading-dough squeeze, and shove it back into my ear where it belongs.

Aj: We’re supposed to be working.

Heather: I’m working real hard at not running over there and tackling him into the surf.

Aj: At writing. Although, I will admit: my hands are shaking too hard to write actual words at the moment. Shouldn’t it be illegal for him to walk around like that?

Heather: Like what?

Aj: Assaulting innocent brain cells with his hotness. He’s going to be shimmying those narrow hips and cut abs in my dreams tonight, against my wishes I might add. Why, that’s tantamount to dream thievery.

Heather: That’s not a thing.

Aj: Then it’s fantasy invasion!

Heather: That’s pretty thin, too, but nice try. Have another drink. You need to loosen up, have some fun.

Aj: I had fun this morning.

Heather: When you broke the sliding door and got stuck in the bathroom?

Aj: Before that.

Heather: When you tried to high-five the breakfast waiter and slapped him in the nose?

Aj: After that.

Heather: When the peacock ambushed you from the tree?

Aj: That was kinda epic, wasn’t it?

Heather: It really was.

We clink our plastic glasses together; she returns to editing, and I bury my nose in the outline of book 3.

2 hours later:

Aj (running full-out, flapping my hands over my head): Gaaaaaah! The egret! The egret!

Heather: Awww. You’re making friends.

Aj: Waaaaahalp!

Heather:  See? I knew you could loosen up and have fun!

Day 3, late night, watching TV

Heather: You’re scowling at the commercial. Whatcha thinking?

Aj: If the Dyson guy made vibrators, would they be see-through with tornado action?

Heather: I should really never ask you what you’re thinking.

Aj: You learn great things from me. And you are welcome.

Day 4, over dinner

Heather: You’re quiet … whatcha thinking about?

My pencil breaks.

Aj: Balls.

Heather: Well, then. Not sure the women at the next table need to hear your obsession with–

Aj: No, not balls, you ninny. (I turn to the women at the next table, to assure them) I’m not talking about testicles.

Heather: That was nice of you.

Aj: I was thinking about how I missed my husband, you know? How he could be sharing this with us. I wish he was here.

Five minutes of amicable silence pass, while we enjoy our steak and watch the flamingos in the pond. The waiter fills our wine, and Heather eyeballs me suspiciously over the rim of her glass.

Heather: Just to clarify … you’re not thinking about your husband’s balls?

Aj: Well, now I am.

Day 5, on the patio over coffee

Heather: There’s a serious frown on your face, what are you thinking?

Aj: What if Megatron and Smurfette had a filthy night of passion?

Heather(deadpan): Uncanny … I was thinking the same exact thing.

Aj: Their baby would be a giant evil blue robot who would fuck Gargamel’s shit up.

Heather: Or a very tiny blue robot who would drive Azreael bonkers.

Aj: Have you learned nothing from me, grasshopper?

Heather: I learned more than I ever wanted to know about glory holes.

Aj: And you are welcome.

Day 6, early am

Aj: Are you going to help me out of the bathroom or not?

Heather: You’re almost tragically retarded, aren’t you?

Aj: You can hold a telethon for me later. Put the goddamned camera down and help me!

All in all, I would have to conclude that two writers unsupervised on a beach in Punta Cana might not lead to disaster per se, but it certainly offers fodder for the creative process. At least, that’s what I’m claiming on my T4.

Greetings to my new readers. Before we begin, I offer you the following pro-tip: Zombies can’t crouch, and they’re piss-poor climbers. How do I know this? I have bad knees. But AJ, what the crap does that have to do with zombies, you ask? Follow my logic: zombies are reanimated dead people. I am alive. Therefore, no matter how bad my knees are, they must be better than dead knees, no? Humour me, or rub this Ben Gay clockwise on my kneecaps. Choose wisely, my friends.

Point of View: First Person

As the author of a deeply-flawed protagonist, I’m compelled to dig pretty deep into the crudpuddle of humanity to get my head around some of her knee-jerk reactions. Many writers will tell you, sometimes a character shocks the hell out of  her author. My main character, Marnie Baranuik, is an ex-pro psychic,cookie addict and the reluctant guardian of a fussypants vampire. She’s more Mr. Magoo than MacGyver, is under no illusions about it and makes no apologies for it. I try to make her more heroic, I really do, but it never feels right. And bihourly (or, on a day when I’ve indulged my vein-shuddering need for 13 X-large Tim Hortons teas and a 6-pack of Apple Fritters, on an every-other-minute basis) she manages to make me choke a little on my tongue. 

(Side-note: wondering for the first time if there’s a measurable relationship between author’s caffeine intake and character’s use of the word “fuckspigot”. Will investigate presently.)

I’ll sit down to write a triumphant scene of her kicking evil in the gonads, and mentally will tell this character: “OK, Marnie, bust that shit open and drop his ass!” But by the time I’m done the scene, she’s managed a brief, screaming trip down a hill on a stolen motorcycle and executed a textbook face-plant into a hedge. The bad guy is dead, but only because she accidentally plowed through him. She did have a fist-fight. It was with a shrub. This does not in any way resemble the mission I sent her on. 

After a nerd-raging author tantrum (which may or may not involve a dutiful slap across my own face), I reread, struck silent in awe: once again, my character has expressly disobeyed my direct orders and power-slid toward self-destruction. How? How did this happen? More troubling, how did this happen without my permission? If someone started a dead pool on the likelihood of my character biting the big one, I’d be able to participate, having no prior information of nor control over her misadventures.

(Side-note: wondering now if there’s a measurable relationship between the degree of free reign Marnie has in these stories and the size of the drooling hole in my brain.)

Friends who have beta-read my first/third/eight hundredth drafts of Touched, Book One of the Marnie Baranuik Chronicles will tell me “uh, that’s so you” (kindly imagine if you will their grand rolling of eyeballs; they are disgusted by my failed attempts at coolness). I’m blown away, because while Marnie is geek-smart and funny, like yours truly *cough*, her personality is often horrible, horrible! This makes me wonder, if I’m as crass and avoidant as Marnie, why are these people my friends? How do they put up with me? Guess I’m not the only fan of jerks.

It also leads me to wonder, if Marnie is some form of me … do I secretly want to go kamikaze on a Kawasaki, get drop-kicked by little old ladies and pelt down a dark road pursued by a zombie dentist with a dick-hole in his chimp suit, punting aside the defiled husk that was my pride?

Actually, who doesn’t? That’s kooky talk.  

(Author’s note: AJ Aalto is currently seeking agent representation for Touched, Book One of the Marnie Baranuik Chronicles, while completing the first draft of her second novel, Death Rejoices, Book Two of the same. She may also be standing in front of her bathroom mirror, snort-giggling at exploratory homemade zombie noises, like all horror writers are wont to do.)

(UPDATE: AJ Aalto is no longer seeking agent representation, as the novel ~Touched~ was launched in eBook format in September of 2011. http://amzn.to/pR0ifw )