To Be A Writer You Have To Be Like A Sponge

I try to soak up every molecule around me, even the murky unpleasant details. The more I take in, the more believable my characters will be. Movies are a good source to take you to places you most likely haven’t been; such as period pieces like, Braveheart, Pearl Harbor and Titanic to name a few.

For instance in the movie Braveheart, we experience the horror William Wallace endured in the years 1272 through 1305 in Scotland; you felt his injustice, his need for Scotland’s freedom from England’s tyranny. As for Pearl Harbor with Ben Affleck and Josh Harnett you feel the scope of WWII and Kate Beckinsale’s character’s agony of choosing between the two men in her life. And at last Titanic; you not only feel the difference between the way the classes were treated, you feel the panic, the fear and heartache as the ship sinks.

There’s a lot to be said about these period pieces. In truth, I haven’t watched these movies in years but they stayed with me. And that’s exactly what I want to learn from them; I want to capture these feelings and write them down so that when my story is finished it will linger in the hearts of readers.