The truth is out there

I'm going to be honest. Every time I finish writing "the next book," I take a long hard look at whether I should continue. The market is down. Artificial intelligence is threatening the future of human creativity (Yes, I know, AI has no depth of emotion.) Angry people are writing nasty reviews for authors whose books haven't even been published yet based on subject matter alone. Let's face it, the world is coming to an end.

I'm in the editing phase with the next Elspeth Barclay book, which means I'm also thinking about what comes next. Do I want to go through all the writers' angst again? Do I have the fortitude to write another book? 

And then something taps me on the shoulder, a little something called imagination. Did you see that? Did you hear that? Remember that story so-and-so told you? Wouldn't that make a great start to your next story?

The news headlines no longer hold "topical ideas." They are filled with vitriol and people doing unthinkable things in a world where people believe empathy is a bad thing. Finding a human interest story that sparks the imagination is difficult among all the finger pointing and verifiable lies that people insist on perpetuating in hopes of making them truths. There are more storytellers out there than I'd ever imagined. The difference is I only hope to entertain you with my stories, not to convince you that my fiction is actually fact. 

I just read an interesting book. It's several years old, written in a different century, even. It's a fictional historical account of a city that I've visited and am familiar with, written by a lawyer. While it was slow getting out of the starting blocks, it grew more interesting as the story went on, and for most of the book, I was able to suspend disbelief, enough verifiable historical facts turning up that some of the not verifiable ones went right over my head. It wasn't until I was done that I realized the author had thrown in a president from before my time as a child in the story's city--a president who grew up in New York. He had no place in this book other than as a marker of the time period. I forgive the author, because the book is fiction. Some of the things happened, but because the characters came from his imagination, I'm willing to give him a pass on the historical hiccup. 

Which brings me back to "what next?" 

I had a thought to interview someone who had a ghostly encounter. Maybe incorporate that into the next book. And then I started thinking about fairy gardens and if there was a way to incorporate that into a ghostly story. I'm also planning a trip to New England with one of my first critique partners, a place where ghost stories abound. The possibilities are expanding. Will I write another book? Most likely. It's part of my original programming, after all. I see something, I see a story behind it. My imagination is going to make up that story whether I want it to or not. And it takes my mind off the next news cycle, which consists of people fighting reality. Me? I'd rather escape reality in a more constructive way. Even when I don't like the news cycle, "the truth is out there," and there comes a point when you have to see it as it is, and not through the lens of imagination.