Inspiration is a funny thing. It can come to us like a lightning bolt, through the lyrics of a song, or in the fog of a dream. Ask any writer where their stories come from and you’ll get a myriad of answers, and in that vein I created the WHAT (What the Hell Are you Thinking?) interview. Always including in the WHAT is one random question to really dig down into the interviewees mind, and probably supply some illumination into my own as well.
Today’s guest for the WHAT is Loriel Ryon, author of Into the Tall, Tall Grass. She spent her childhood with her nose in a book, reading in restaurants, on the school bus, and during every family vacation. Her upbringing in a mixed-heritage military family inspires much of her writing about that wonderfully complicated time between childhood and adulthood. Also a nurse, she lives in the magical New Mexico desert with her husband and two daughters.
Ideas for our books can come from just about anywhere, and sometimes even we can’t pinpoint exactly how or why. Did you have a specific origin point for your book?
So far when I write something new, I start with an image in my mind. I don’t always know who it’s about or what is going to happen, but I have a picture of a scene. The idea for INTO THE TALL, TALL GRASS originates from one of my earliest childhood memories. When I was four years old, my dad was gone, serving overseas and my mom took me and my siblings to visit her family in Texas for the summer. She’d hired a man to cut the grass while we were gone. All looked well when we drove home at the end of summer, the front lawn freshly mowed, the house in order. But when we went inside and opened the blinds to the sliding glass door I remember seeing grass had grown as tall as our house. My grandfather forbid us from going outside until he cut all down because he was afraid of snakes. And even now, when I ask my mother if this memory was accurate or if I embellished it due to being a kid, she tells me, “Oh no. The grass was as tall as the house.”
Once the original concept existed, how did you build a plot around it?
The story took so many twists and turns from my original concept of a young girl standing in front of some tall grass. I’d decided it would be most interesting if this grass grew somewhere unexpected and so I put it in the desert, where I live now. There is something that is just so magical about the desert. I also knew my MC was going to go on a journey. I wanted her to explore the grass, but I needed a reason why, and so came the other characters. A sick grandmother, a sister who has a magical trait our MC doesn’t, an ex-best friend, a boy with a first crush, and a naughty dog.
Have you ever had the plot firmly in place, only to find it changing as the story moved from your mind to paper?
This occurs pretty much every time I try to outline before I have a zero draft done. So in recent works, I’ve tried to use my zero draft as my outlining draft, letting the different parts of the story form. And then I go back and break it all apart and try to nail down an outline to focus on during the revision process. When I was writing, the plot was all over the place as I struggled to figure out what my story was going to be about. Eventually, another strong voice emerged and that was the sick grandmother. She had a story to tell about the pecan orchard and their family and it wove with Yolanda’s story of trying to get her to the tree. The revelations in the grandmother’s story helped me find the plot in Yolanda’s story of healing and revealed the truth about herself and her family history along the way.
Do story ideas come to you often, or is fresh material hard to come by?
I always have a ton of ideas. Sometimes too many. Especially when I’ve finally decided what to write next and want to focus on one project. The new idea comes flitting in, trying to distract me from the task in front of me. Sometimes I have to address it right away and tackle that new idea. Most of the time, I write it down and let it sit in the back of my mind to come back to later. If there is enough there, the idea won’t go away. But many times the ideas aren’t enough on their own and often need to be combined with other ideas to flesh them out a bit.
How do you choose which story to write next, if you’ve got more than one percolating?
I will usually start with whatever is calling me. I try to draft cycle, meaning I finish one draft of a project and either let it sit or send it off to readers and start working on another draft of another project. It gives me something to work on while I’m waiting and I always have something in the works. And it helps me not dive back into a draft I’ve just finished, giving me room to be able to come back to it with fresh eyes.
I have 5 cats (seriously, check my Instagram feed) and I usually have at least one or two snuggling with me when I write. Do you have a writing buddy, or do you find it distracting?
I have two young children (3 & 6) who are quite distracting, haha. I wrote the first draft of INTO THE TALL, TALL GRASS on the floor of my older daughter’s room when she was three and refusing to stay in her bed at bedtime. I did edits and revisions while my younger daughter napped, but she recently gave that up, so I’ve had to get quite creative in figuring out when I’m going to actually write and get work done.