Ooh, a lump of gold, I’ll have that

Gold is found in stony ground

One of the startling discoveries I’ve made in the course of 13 years of trying to write novels. That the best bits always catch the writer by surprise, and often crop up where you least expect them. That is – the hardest passages to write, the dull bits, the linking bits, the have-to bits, contain the most potential to surprise you and turn up some of the best writing. Because by definition you haven’t planned them, so you are feeling your way in the dark. And that’s when you make unexpected discoveries.

For example, in a book I never managed to get published, I “had to” write a scene near the end to make it feel like a wind-down before the proper climax. It turned into a sweet little family scene of kite flying in the hills, that I still like enough to resurrect someday, maybe. I never would have planned it because nothing really happened, but in fact it helped to round off certain characters’ individual stories. In other words, you never know…