Burton W. ColeReaders often ask me questions like, “Did that actually happen?” “Are your characters real people?” and “What books did you read as a kid?” Good questions. Let’s see if I have good answers.
Q: Are your story characters modeled after people you know?
A: They sure are. I can tell their stories because I know them.
However, none of the characters in my novels is an exact copy of someone I know. I borrow fun quirks and habits from lots of people I know, mash them together, and pull out parts to use to build each character.
In my Bash and Beamer novels, Beamer—who narrates the adventures—is mostly me. Beamer is boring and kind of grumpy. That’s what I felt like when I was his age. I can write his feelings and emotions because I lived them.
Bash—the cousin with the big imagination but not a lot of common sense—is a compilation of my siblings and cousins. Tim, Dale, Dan, Rick, Billy, Randy, Scott. My cousin Scott was always coming up with crazy ideas. Whenever I get stuck trying to think what Bash would do next, I ask myself, “What would Scotty do in this situation?” Then I have my scene.
Q: What books did you read as a kid?
A: I still have the copy of “The Adventures of the Winnie-the-Pooh” by A.A. Milne that I got for my birthday in 1967. What fun, lyrical, imaginative writing. I think it helped shape my eventual career path.
I read every Hardy Boys book I could find at the library. When I ran out of Hardy Boys, I resorted to Nancy Drew. By seventh or eighth grade, I had plowed through all 56 short stories and all four novels that A. Conan Doyle wrote about Sherlock Holmes.
I finally figured out that I wasn’t all that great at writing mysteries but I did have a knack for silliness. As a grownup, I read lots of comic novels (and comic books). My humor writing hero is Patrick F. McManus, particularly the short stories he wrote about his childhood with his best friend, Crazy Eddie Muldoon, and his mountain man mentor, Rancid Crabtree.
Q: Did those silly things that Bash, Beamer, and the other kids did in your novels really happen?
A: I made up half of the crazy stunts in this series by daydreaming about what would be funny. The other half are goofy things we really did. I don’t want to say which is which because Mom hasn’t found out about all of them yet! (Actually, Mom remembers more of them than I do.)
Yes, a cow did drag me toward the midway at the county fair. Yep, we did try to zoom off the chicken coop roof on sleds after a blizzard. But no, we didn’t ride our cows to the ice cream stand. And no, we didn’t sneak a skunk into Sunday school. (But there may have been a snake once.)
That’s it for this week. What questions do you have for me about an author’s life or about my Bash and Beamer novels? Leave them for me in the comments and let’s talk about them in an upcoming post.
Misha
Kristen Gwen
Julia N. White
My children’s book, “Licky the Lizard” is based on my own experience with lizards. I’m not saying I love lizards, but I am learning more about them. 🙂
Melissa, just the name Licky is already hilarious for a lizard. I’m sold on the title alone.
Great post. I think readers and writers alike are always interested in where writers get their ideas and such.
Here’s a question… When do you write? Morning? Evening? How do you fit in writing with your busy schedule?
Ooh, good question. The kids in the photo above this blog post asked me the same thing.
Because I work full-time at another job, and because I have a lot of family and church obligations, fitting in writing time is HARD. Sometimes it feels like I will explode if I don’t sit down and write. That stuff inside has to come out somehow.
That said, the most likely days and times to block out consistently for writing are Tuesday and Thursday nights after work and Saturdays during the day, all at a local library. Writing at home is difficult because my easy chair and chores are all there. At the library, I have a much better chance of concentrating. (I am sitting in a library as I write this.)
After that, I’ve been known to get up at 3 a.m. to write something before it goes away, write in the morning before work, and sit in my easy chair or on the bed any night of the week with my laptop and get in even 20 minutes. I have to write.