To be possessed.
What does that even mean?
Am I possessed by an idea, by a feeling, a goal, a ghost?
When I began writing POSSESSION, I was thinking about The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, the novel in which a sedate widow moves to the seaside and occupies a house in which there's a ghost. I couldn't stop thinking about it.
You could say I was haunted by the idea.
Under what circumstances would a ghost start talking to you, and what would he say? Why would you do what he said?
Mrs. Muir's ghost was benevolent; mine, not so much.
Would being possessed by the need to find out what happened to someone else drive a woman to neglect her child, her friends, even herself?
I write to understand people, to work my way through their thoughts and actions. Sylvie's grief was deep and that made her susceptible to suggestion. What would you have done?