Marilynn Larew's Blog - Posts Tagged "writing-reality"
The Writer’s Life: Reality Will Be the Death of Me Yet
I thought I had learned my lesson writing The Spider Catchers. It’s probably left over from my other life as a historian. I put myself in a major straitjacket by trying to make everything real. Airplane flights were particularly difficult. Casablanca is the air terminal of Morocco. Not only is it the portal for overseas flights, you have to fly there before you can fly anywhere else inside the country. If I wanted to fly from Tangier to Erfoud, and I really did, then I would have to fly Tangier-Casablanca-Erfoud. At impossible hours. I wrestled with the schedules, snarled, and cussed a bit before the light bulb appeared over my head. Well, duh. How many PhDs does it take to schedule a flight from Tangier to Erfoud? Once I threw away AirMaroc’s flight schedule and substituted AirMarilynn’s, things worked out fine. Well, Kamal got killed, but that had absolutely nothing to do with flight schedules.
I had other troubles too. I kept trying to put buildings where they would actually be, practically giving them street addresses. After I threw out AirMaroc’s flight schedule, I threw out Fez’s street numbers, Fiction, Marilynn, you’re writing fiction.
Yesterday I was flipping through a guide to Dubai, looking for locations for Dead in Dubai, when I came across a nightclub all red velvet and gold. I recognized it. It is in Chapter Seven, crystal chandelier and all. I had written that sequence before I had my epiphany on the road to Erfoud. When I finished The Spider Catchers and returned to Dead in Dubai, I took out the real hotel I had Lee staying in and substituted an anonymous one. OK. The room looked pretty much like a room in a real hotel in Dubai, but it also looked pretty much like a hotel room I have stayed in in Hong Kong. But I had forgotten that the nightclub was real. Now I have to take out a lot of writing I absolutely adore and think up some new stuff. By the way, "absolutely adore" is probably a bad sign.
I’m going to make the club the absolute opposite of the other one, all black and white and chrome. My only fear is for Lee’s ears because of all the hard surfaces.
But I’m going to finish checking out the guide books first. I may not be the only person to create a black and white and chrome night spot in Dubai.
I had other troubles too. I kept trying to put buildings where they would actually be, practically giving them street addresses. After I threw out AirMaroc’s flight schedule, I threw out Fez’s street numbers, Fiction, Marilynn, you’re writing fiction.
Yesterday I was flipping through a guide to Dubai, looking for locations for Dead in Dubai, when I came across a nightclub all red velvet and gold. I recognized it. It is in Chapter Seven, crystal chandelier and all. I had written that sequence before I had my epiphany on the road to Erfoud. When I finished The Spider Catchers and returned to Dead in Dubai, I took out the real hotel I had Lee staying in and substituted an anonymous one. OK. The room looked pretty much like a room in a real hotel in Dubai, but it also looked pretty much like a hotel room I have stayed in in Hong Kong. But I had forgotten that the nightclub was real. Now I have to take out a lot of writing I absolutely adore and think up some new stuff. By the way, "absolutely adore" is probably a bad sign.
I’m going to make the club the absolute opposite of the other one, all black and white and chrome. My only fear is for Lee’s ears because of all the hard surfaces.
But I’m going to finish checking out the guide books first. I may not be the only person to create a black and white and chrome night spot in Dubai.
