As promised, and for the next few weeks I’ll be taking a closer look at some generalities and explore the how and why.
The first: Readers and writers should step outside their comfort zones to gain perspective.
When I made that statement, I wasn’t writing only about specific authors and genres. Everyone has their favorites. As for me, I’d once made it my mission to locate, purchase, and read every novel published by John D MacDonald. To begin, Travis Mcgee, his serial character, was an “everyman” version of James Bond. But beyond those twenty-one Travis McGee books, his other novels were full of intrigue and action.
I’ve since read the published works of Robert Ludlum, Lawrence Sanders, Dean Koontz, and now I’m working through Lee Childs. The reason is simple. They share common themes and familiar phrasing – action, intrigue, strong male characters in dangerous situations.
Call that my home base.
Likewise, some of my female friends have discovered their home base in the works of authors such as Jude Deveraux, Johanna Lindsey, and Catherine Coulter.
Having a home base is normal. It enables our psyche to “go to ground” and kick up its feet. The words flow in and around us. Our thoughts, opinions, and often our actions are developed in this normal ground.
1) So why read outside our comfort zone?
It keeps the banjo playing, “he got a real purty mouth, ain’t he?” part of us to a minimum. Even the most adroit Harvard professor has their portion of mental inbreeding based on their preferred reading list. Change gives us an unskewed view of the world around us.
First, try a change in genre. And you have to be fair here. We occasionally find books by favored authors that leave us just short of mourning the waste of ink and paper. Give a new author and genre time to grab your attention.
I know what the pundits often say: there’s not enough time in a day to waste it on bad writing. Please don’t mistake different for bad.
Also, experience different forms. Read a short story, read a poem, read a biography, read an essay. You didn’t like what you read today? Give it a few days, then try a different author. See an image of the world through a different perspective. Change and experience can help erase bias.
It might sound as though I believe the written word has a magical power to change the world, one reader at a time. In a way it does, depending upon the reader.
2) Why write outside your comfort zone?
You might not realize, but Stephen King writes novels, novellas, novelettes, short stories, poetry, essays, journal articles, non-fiction, and the list continues.
He understands an essential truth. Outside our safe place, we exercise creative muscles we never realized we had. We do more research. We watch people more closely. We read more. We listen more. We learn more. We gain new insights and add layers to our “comfortable” work. Our imagination is set free to explore and, simply put, we become better writers.
My comfort zone is thriller fiction, but I also write poetry, novellas, and short stories in various genres, many of which are included in this website.
Wolves In The Dark is my favorite poem. I wrote it one February night, years ago, sitting cross-legged in front of my fireplace. It can be found in the Poetry section.
The Hospitality Girl is my favorite short work (novella). It is far from my comfort zone genre and is written from a woman’s perspective. Excerpts can be found as Click To Read selections following some of my earlier blog posts.
I hope this has been entertaining and enlightening. Next week I’ll visit and expand upon another topic I might have brushed by in previous blogs.
My Click Here selection is an except from Brettinger that involves a murder scene. It takes place in the early-mid section as the action is beginning to ramp up. For more information about Brettinger, read my section on the origin behind Shadowman. Thanks for reading, and, as always, keep writing.