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Never Jump From A Moving Novel

June 17, 2016 | By Ariella Cohen | 1 Reply More

AriellaCohen Novel writing is a journey. We authors are the advance team who scout locations before the readers make an appearance. But we’re travelers first and foremost – into foreign lands, if we’ve the nerve to leave the familiar landscape of memoir.

When I began writing, agents and editors cautioned that the craft had strict rules. I was to outline and storyboard everything. The reader might be surprised by where a story took her but I should always be in control. Every twist and turn of plot, every rise and fall of tension, was to be planned and orchestrated. Anything less meant I wasn’t serious.

What rubbish.

My debut novel, SWEET BREATH OF MEMORY, was a road trip I shared with my characters. Assigned to seats and strapped in, they soon unbuckled and shifted about. We settled on a playlist and music soothed our nerves until I gave them voice. After that, they always wanted to chat. We laughed and cried, argued and debated.

They kept me on the straight and narrow by minding the gas gauge, for too fast a pace and we would be stranded. When I drifted over the line, they cried out, and although I sometimes weaved between lanes, I kept moving forward. If my sense of direction failed me, they took the wheel and set the course. During nasty weather, when I considered turning back, they cautioned me to pull over and wait out the storm, never doubting the skies would clear.

sweet-breath-of-memory-cover We had a map of sorts – hand drawn and soon spotted with coffee and cannoli cream – but lacking detail save a few reference points. As much as I tried to follow it, I just as often hopped on and off tangent exits. When that map fluttered out an open window, nobody noticed because we were having too much fun. And by then we didn’t need a map, for we’d found our true north.

The most important thing about that trip is that we all stayed in the car. It was a mutual pact of sorts – one for all and all for one. If I headed into areas that made my characters uncomfortable, they trusted me. And when the uneven road made me cry with frustration, they wouldn’t let me crash the novel.

We started out as in-between people. I was an author in my mind but not on the page, and they were mere outlines – shadows cast by my imagination but lacking color or dimension. At journey’s end, we were fully formed but loath to leave that safe cocoon, for we knew that should we team up again, it wouldn’t be the same.

When my characters stepped from the car and walked away, it was with heads held high and eyes fixed on the horizon. I’d given them what a mother should – a back story to be proud of, forceful personalities and voices strong enough to carry above the din. But the scales are uneven, for they’d trusted me to get them to a destination I’d feared as much as longed for. That’s why I’m in their debt, for although I’d seen them safely delivered, they’d driven me to be a novelist.

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Ariella Cohen is a graduate of Barnard College, the Hebrew University and the University of Michigan Law School. Her debut novel, SWEET BREATH OF MEMORY, will be published by Kensington Books in July 2016. Although she makes her home in New England, her dream self resides in County Mayo, Ireland. Visit her online at: https://ariellacohenauthor.wordpress.com