Writing a Book

People always want to know how I come up with a book.  The funny part is, I never start out with that as a goal.  I start with little nuggets and build around them as far as I can.  Sometimes that turns into something substantial and other times it turns into nothing.  For example, “Quest for the Red Sapphire” all began with the idea of a sword that held the soul of another living animal with it.  From that nugget I had to decide what kind of animal was held within and why.  Then I had to create a master for the sword.  That took some time.   Then I decided to kill off that character and have the sword fall to his son; but not in a conventional sense.  So the son, Linvin, had to be created.  The longer I worked, the more his story grew.  Then I needed someone to restrain his youthful exuberance.  It had to be someone to be a tutor and guide to Linvin.  Anvar was created and connected to Linvin’s father, Dirk.  Then I needed something for them to seek.  I discarded rings, amulets, necklaces and the like because they had all been used so much before.  I always liked sapphires.  The blue ones were spectacular.  I envisioned an opposite to it.  It only made sense to pick red.  Since I was 13 at the time I went to my older brother and asked if there was such a thing as a red sapphire.  He responded by saying, “Yeah, it’s called a ruby.”  I just smiled.  My character would look for a red sapphire instead of a ruby.  Now I would need to come up with a story as to why it was a sapphire.  That took a whole backstory which would only be eluded to here and there.  Then I needed a couple of antagonists to keep the story interesting.  Enter cousins Bander and Rander, the biggest pains in the neck I could create.  They ride Linvin about every choice he makes.  After all that I just needed to put things in order and make a storyline.   Soon I found I had a book.  All that came from just a little nugget.