Happiness and the Art of Storytelling: An Interview with Daniel McInerny

It's like everyone tells a story about themselves inside their own head. Always. All the time. That story makes you what you are. We build ourselves out of that story.

~ Patrick Rothfuss

Tomorrow marks the beginning of that madcap dash into the world of words and word counts: National Novel Writing Month – affectionately known as NaNo.  I didn’t sign up this year, but throughout the month of November, I’ll be highlighting authors, their books, and the writing process.

W

e all live in a story.

Some of us just happen to narrate our own stories.  We are sometimes called crazy.  Sometimes we are. 

We are writers.

And it is both our gift and our curse to live in the midst of a jungle of words – poetry intermingled with prose.  Some of our stories have tragic ends.  A few have happily ever afters.

But all some have moments of happiness and joy.  Moments, that if they are gathered up, would shine a light on the darkest dramas and mysteries.

Throughout the month of NaNo November, I will highlight different authors and their books.  Because you can’t become a good writer, if you aren’t a good reader.

Today marks the launch of a new blog series, The Happiness Plot by novelist, screenwriter, children's author, playwright,  Daniel McInerny.  This blog series focuses on storytelling and the quest for happiness and will be available as an ebook by the end of the month.

Join us in the La Belle library, where we’ve just sat down with a pot of Earl Grey.

Image: Google Images

Why do you write?

I write because I love to contemplate the human predicament through the means of beautiful language.

Name two mentors who influenced your writing.

My father, Ralph McInerny, and all my high school English teachers, who as a group were exceptionally gifted at teaching the fundamentals of writing. 

Name five writers you recommend (any genre).

Evelyn Waugh

P.G. Wodehouse

Flannery O’Connor

Muriel Spark

Walker Percy

What is the toughest challenge you face as a writer?

I struggle to be a more “seat-of-your-pants” writer, making up the story as I go along, line by line. This is an important struggle for me because my entrenched analytical habits (I hold a PhD in philosophy and taught in academia for many years), while immensely valuable, can also be a hindrance to creative work. Thus I am trying to learn not to plot and analyze too much ahead of the moment of actual composition.

Describe your writing process. 

I tend to get an idea for a story long before, sometimes years before, I actually begin writing a first draft. The thing often begins as a series of scraps and influences and vague possibilities that I collect in a notebook. It takes me a long time, and more than one false start, before I have a firm sense of what I’m doing, which is typically toward the end or even after the first draft.

What does your writing space look like?

Dreary.  Home office in the basement. No windows. Rickety desk with a broken leg. Horribly uncomfortable chair. Insufficient shelf space.

I can’t think of a more perfect place to write.

Your new series on storytelling, The Happiness Plot, begins today.  What inspired you to write this?  And what can writers (and readers) learn from it?

I really love James Wood’s little book, How Fiction Works, with its pithy 200-word sections.

It occurred to me that these sections were just about the length of a blog post and that Wood’s book provided a good model for a series of posts on storytelling structure. My contribution to all the “how-to” material in this area concerns the link between story structure and our human quest for happiness. I believe understanding this link allows us to tell more emotionally moving, intellectually satisfying, beautiful stories.

Daniel McInerny

The series is perfectly timed for those participating in National Novel Writing Month in November.  As soon as the series is done at the end of November, I’m going to collect the posts into an ebook, with the addition of some bonus material I’m sending out to the folks on my email list. I further plan on doing further blog series on other aspects of writing and the writing life. 

All this material is great for lovers of fiction as well.

Give 3 brief words of advice for writers.

Sit. Now. Begin

Anything new in the works?

Currently I’m writing a novel for adults as well as returning my play, The Actor, about the young Saint John Paul II’s subversive theatrical activities during the Nazi occupation of Poland, back into its original form as a musical. A producer has shown some interest in the work and right now I’m doing a revision based upon his and another friend’s notes.

Thanks for stopping by, Daniel!

To follow the storytelling adventure and to subscribe to Daniel’s email list to receive cool bonus content and a free storytelling consultation, go to  The Happiness Plot.

For more info on the Kingdom of Patria series for children, go to www.kingdomofpatria.com.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

Writing Believable Characters: The Importance of Background in Dannika Dark's "Seven Years"

A man should be more original than a bouquet of roses and a box of chocolates.

Flowers die and sugar sticks to your hips like a permanent record to a criminal.

~ Dannika Dark

In November, I am continuing to participate in the Two Pages-a-Day writing challenge.  And I must have been abducted by aliens who replaced my brain with rocks, because I’m also doing NaNoWriMo for the first time.  Someone get this girl a drink!!

E

ver experience something that changed everything?

There was your life before the event: ordinary, routine, perhaps a little on the naïve and ignorant side.  Most of us are guilty of believing in our own immorality. Until we become sick.  Or we lose someone we love. 

Seven years ago, twenty-eight year old Alexia lost her older brother to a horrific motorcycle accident. His best friend, Austin, whom Lexie had had a crush on since she was five, disappeared right after the funeral without a word.  Two years later, her father abandoned what was left of the family.

But not everything is as it seems.  And Lexie is about to find out just how deep the rabbit hole goes.

The Love Story

Seven years ago, my world ended.

Seven years later, my new life began.

It's been seven years since Lexi Knight lost her brother in a tragic accident. On the anniversary of his death, her brother's best friend shows up unexpectedly - a man she hasn't seen since the funeral. He is no longer the boy Lexi once knew, but a dangerous-looking man with tattoos and dark secrets. He broke her trust and abandoned her family, yet what he reveals makes it impossible to stay angry. Lexi has been secretly infatuated with Austin since childhood, so finding out he's a Shifter just makes him sexier. Dammit.

Austin Cole has returned to the city where he grew up, and just in time. He's lived a hard life these past seven years, and the shadows of his past are threatening to destroy Lexi's family. It's time that she learned the truth about her brother, but there is a shocking twist that Austin never saw coming. Now he must protect her family when her mother and sister wind up in mortal danger. Will Lexi learn to accept the truth about who he is, and can Austin salvage a relationship from the ruins of their past?

The Importance of Background

One of the most important rules of writing is that your characters must have a history ~ whether you tell the whole story to your readers or not.  You as the writer must know it.  No one ever acts in a vacuum and stories certainly don’t happen in a vacuum either.

It is the nature of humanity.

It is the nature of myth.

And unless you have already read the Mageri Series by Dannika Dark, if you read Seven Years you may be a little lost and confused about Austin’s story ~ the Breed back story.

I won’t give any spoilers, but when you find out Austin’s secret, you can still get the story as it is currently unfolding.  But you miss the nuances that come from already knowing the intricacies of the Breed world.

Since this is touted as a stand-alone novel, I would expect there to be more detail about the paranormal world that Lexie finds herself thrust into.  But since I was already a big fan of the Mageri series, I knew the basic history of Mages, Chitahs, and the various other Breeds.

Getting to Know You

If you  haven’t read the Mageri series, stop right there, go download all four books (the fifth is being written) and read them.  Ms. Dark does an excellent job of building the Breed world right in the midst of our own.  Shifters make an appearance in the Mageris series, but in Seven Years they take center stage. It was like reading another chapter in the Mageri series.

Which is why, although I read it one sitting and loved it, I can’t agree that it’s a stand-alone.

Having said that, I also wanted to learn more about the Shifters: where they came from, what their hierarchy is.  Ms. Dark is currently writing the sequel and I hope we get to learn more.

And I would love some of the characters from the Mageri series to make an appearance. Hint. Hint.

So if you like Shifters, if you like a little mystery, if you like smoking hot love scenes ~ buy Seven Years.

But buy the Mageri series and read it first.

Oremus pro invicem,

~ Mikaela

I received this book as an ARC from the author.  I have not been paid for this review.

About Dannika Dark

This is the segment where you learn a little more about who I am, so here's what I can tell you:  I drink copious amounts of vitamin water placed precariously close to my laptop while writing. These are two healthy habits I have no intention of breaking. I'm a transplant living in the south, but I was born in the 70's to a military dad who moved us around the world.

When I'm not writing (which is all the time), I'm hunting down Indie music, watching movies, reading, eating Tex-Mex, discovering new ways to humiliate myself bowling, and burning up my laptop battery on the Internet. I have a relaxed, easy-going personality and don't like drama. I live with a cat who thinks she is a dog, or a goat (she eats plastic, so I'm not sure which).

Throughout my life, I've had insomnia. Counting sheep never worked and eventually I would imagine those sheep were the sole source of food after an apocalyptic battle where only thousands survived. I made up stories in a futile attempt to bore myself to sleep. The problem was, I got so wrapped up in my "head stories" that I would continue them through the following nights, changing it up each time to make it more exciting. Eventually, I started writing my ideas down - creating short stories, and then I discovered my love for poetry.

It's almost embarrassing how many spiral notebooks and stacks of paper I have of poetry and lyrics.

Another passion: digital art. I design all my book covers, marketing, and series art. I'm a very visual person and pursued photography as an avid hobby for many years.

I am not a YA author (I feel like I have to state this only because I've had a few people ask), but I think it's wonderful there are so many books available to teens in Urban Fantasy and Paranormal. 

I am finally doing what I have always wanted to do: giving my characters a pulse through writing full time. I focus on adult urban fantasy romance, but I don't like labels and I enjoy blending genres to break out of the confines of predictability.

But it's what I love to do. 

And the Giveaway!

1st prize: 1 autographed paperback of Seven Years 1 key necklace 5 autographed bookmarks

2nd prize: 1 autographed paperback of Seven Years 5 autographed bookmarks

3rd prize: 1 Dannika Dark ebook (Winner's choice) 5 autographed bookmarks

a Rafflecopter giveaway