It Only Takes A Spark...

As a writer, I'm always asked (as I'm sure every writer is always asked) where I get my ideas from and my response always seems to be the same - from anywhere and everywhere.

Back in the days when the Earth was cooling, I remember as a kid having had to recite the Lord's Prayer after singing the national anthem every morning in school.  In those days, "political correctness" hadn't extended beyond the realm of politics.  I also remember being taught all kinds of songs in music class, including hymns and songs of faith.  One of those songs started off with the phrase, "It only takes a spark to get a fire going...".

For me as a writer, this phrase sums things up to a T.  Sometimes, all it really takes is a spark in the form of a gesture or a tidbit of inconsequential information to fire up the old imagination.  Other times, it's something else altogether, like a newspaper headline or news announcement - or, in the case of my book, TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE, the idea came after watching a documentary on the History channel about Norway's "children of shame", born to Nazi officers and Norwegian mothers, who were subsequently ostracized once the war had ended.  I immediately thought this lesser-known aspect of the Second World War would be an interesting back story to a book one day...and after adding some interesting characters, a modern-day twist and some suspense, it eventually became TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE.