Faceless Voices

While I'm laid up (recovery is going quite well, thank you), I have an app from the hospital that reminds me of all the things I should be doing, along with an optional reminder for meds and a notes section. Theoretically, I know someone is reviewing my progress somewhere although it feels a bit like journalling. Who would read my journal? I send them pictures of the wound and status updates.  At my presurgical class, they told me I could keep notes on my progress. Yes, the app says the physician will be reviewing these notes but it also says don't expect them to. Imagine my surprise when I got a message back - not one I could track down or save, mind you - that said the wound looked good, and for the additional pain that came from laying in one position all night (a note I'd recorded), I should keep moving. Except as soon as I saw the notification, it was gone. So I think that's what it said before it disappeared. Its a notification, not a message.

Another day I got a notification that asked how I was moving. Probably a canned notification like "don't forget to check in," except it got me thinking about "You've Got Mail" and Cyrano de Bergerac and anonymous correspondence. Oh, and let's not forget "Sorry, Wrong Number." +Teresa Medeiros wrote a story about Twitter (Goodnight, Tweetheart) along these same lines, which I thoroughly enjoyed. A new take on an old trope (and she actually convinced me to venture into the Twitterverse with that book).

My imagination has been bizarre, my dreams fairly vivid - no doubt attributable to the meds. So when I pictured Fred MacMurray leaving me a letter in a post office box today, I started to giggle. (Yes, I'm making reference to a black and white movie made a million years ago.) One of my critique partners has been stuck on the topic of tropes, and how some are overdone, or just plain shouldn't be done.

Do I think there is a secret admirer on the other side of my app? Oh, heck, no. Likely a nurse monitoring and doing her job. But this brings me back to the inspiration of the day. People ask where I get my story ideas. EVERYWHERE! Sitting in a recliner with my leg up and reporting to an app! Authors are a different breed, doncha know. The story can be a saccharine romance or an edge of your seat thriller like Sorry, Wrong Number. An overused trope? Or one that is thankfully not visited very often?

Maybe a plot for the third book of the new series....

And in case you were wondering what to get me for my birthday (yes, its TODAY!), might I suggest you buy one of my books? Or buy one for a friend. Quick links are over there, at the top of the column to the right. Don't forget to leave a review. Best present an author can get!