A Goodreads user
asked
Nancy Naigle:
Hi Nancy! I'm an aspiring author and look to all of your Christmas novels for inspiration. The way you write is so captivating, and I find myself relating to almost all of your characters. The thing I struggle the most with, while writing, is coming up with plot ideas that are as complex as they are inspiring. How do you do it?
Nancy Naigle
Hello, Siri,
I hope you're forging ahead on your writing projects. I have to admit the first several books I wrote...I didn't even really think about plot. I'm a natural storyteller, but the characters are what I imagine and the stories unfold from there. Lucky for me, there happened to be an entertaining plot along the way lol.
Nowadays I do think about the plot. I just keep being active in my life and ideas unfold around me. It might be an experience (like Alaska and glass blowing in Until Tomorrow), a comment ('I just want to run away' that inspired Life After Perfect) or a place (like the beautiful coastline of NC that I write about in The Christmas Shop and Sand Dollar Cove)...but I think the key is to be present in your life now and the ideas will come. If you lock yourself away and try to force a story...it will feel that way to the reader too. Trust your journey!
Hugs and happy writing,
Nancy
I hope you're forging ahead on your writing projects. I have to admit the first several books I wrote...I didn't even really think about plot. I'm a natural storyteller, but the characters are what I imagine and the stories unfold from there. Lucky for me, there happened to be an entertaining plot along the way lol.
Nowadays I do think about the plot. I just keep being active in my life and ideas unfold around me. It might be an experience (like Alaska and glass blowing in Until Tomorrow), a comment ('I just want to run away' that inspired Life After Perfect) or a place (like the beautiful coastline of NC that I write about in The Christmas Shop and Sand Dollar Cove)...but I think the key is to be present in your life now and the ideas will come. If you lock yourself away and try to force a story...it will feel that way to the reader too. Trust your journey!
Hugs and happy writing,
Nancy
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