A Story Begins…

... late. At night. Just as I’m tired and ready to crawl into bed. Listening to a piece of music. And my muse takes flight.
 
I close my eyes and pictures take form in my mind, painted by the strains of music, a scene laid out before me, waiting to be captured in words. The scene raises so many questions, questions that will not be answered until the end of the tale. Now, I don’t know what the ending will be. I only have a starting point. And all those questions.
 
So I confine the words into a chapter; the sights, the smells, the sounds, the tactile sensations of what I see. And I put it away to simmer on the back burner of my mind.
 
Over the next weeks, maybe months, I’ll find out who my characters are: what they want, what they would live for, what they would die for. I delve into their minds. I find out what nightmares disturb their sleep. Events that challenge my characters are thrown into the pot. The plot grows organically out of my characters: what is their story, what will force them to reach for everything they’ve ever dreams of, ever cried over and never wanted.
 
And one day, I sit down with my simmering characters and events and write their stories. I have basic events and crisis’ lined up for my characters but I don’t know when exactly these things will happen. They will happen when they are meant to happen. I can’t tell anyone the story because it is still unfolding for me.
 
It unfolds until I type the words “The End”.
 
I like creating stories this way, it keeps me entertained while I am writing – I’m like a reader with the advantage of being able to write the story as it comes to me. I think every writer has his or her own method of writing.
 
This is mine.