I don’t know about other writers, but this is the way stories are conceived for me. It can a brief story in the newspaper, something seen on the street—or in the woods. Today it was the woods. I snowshoed through fields into the woods at the far side, followed meandering deer trails, across a stream, up a ridge through a cedar stand, under towering hemlocks, the occasional big white pine. It was quiet. A pair of ravens flew over, cronking to each other. A gaggle of chickadees tumbled past. And when the birds were gone, there was the sound of snow falling from the tree tops, suddenly and inexplicably, leaving floating clouds of powder.
And then there was the chair.
It was on top of a knoll, overlooking a clearing that probably was wet in the spring. The chair was blue, one of those folding things people bring to soccer games or the beach. It had a foot of snow on top of it, probably hadn’t been sat in since deer season ended in November. I snowshoed up to it, looked out at the view the person had when he or she eased back. What would it be like to be walking in these woods in the summer, to look up and see someone watching you from a chair? A baseball hat. Sunglasses. Would you stop and go the other way? Go over and try to strike up a conversation? Would he have a rifle across his lap? What if the next time you were in the woods, he was watching again. From a different place. By the time you got to the chair, he was gone, slipped back into the trees and brambles without a sound. And it kept happening until you felt you were being stalked. It was so unnerving you stopped going into the woods. You walked on the roads. You stayed close to home.
And then one night the phone rang. You picked up and nobody spoke. You were about to hang up when someone, a man with a voice like a ragged whisper, said, “Where have you been?”
“Who is this?”
“You stopped coming.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“Are you afraid of me?”
“No.”
A long pause.
“You should be.”
In PORT CITY SHAKEDOWN, the first Brandon Blake novel, Brandon gets a full dose of bad guys. A brawl in a funeral home introduces him to Joel Fuller, a sociopathic hustler. Fuller is fresh out of jail and determined to take Brandon out—after Fuller and his sidekick Kelvin shake him down.
Rocky isn’t a tough guy. He’s a skinny little kid with crooked glasses, and he shouldn’t be homeless in Portland, Maine. When McMorrow and Roxanne pluck him from under the stomping feet of a gang of street kids, Rocky latches onto McMorrow–and drags him into a world of murder, both old and new. Why is McMorrow protecting Rocky? The cops want to know. Why is Rocky on the run? McMorrow wants to know. Why does death follow in Rocky’s wake? Jack and Roxanne need to find out before they’re added to the list. 
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And so, there it is. The difference between me, who occasionally day-dreams about being a writer, and you, and actual WRITER. I would have seen the chair. I would have looked at the view. I would have wondered about it. I might have photographed it 4 different ways had I my camera. But then i would have walked away. But you instantly weave this tail of wondering and possibility. And as a reader, I’m instantly hooked. When can we expect the rest of the story? With admiration, I’ll be looking forward to it.
But I can’t take photos. Writers, I think, just have overactive imaginations. I’ll ponder what happens next.
I would have thought of the sadness of the sight of a summer chair covered with snow…it’s melancholy, don’t you think? I don’t think my mind would have made the jump to sinister stalker guy. I wonder if you would have thought of that story had it been summer, with green leaves and less ominous birds than ravens fluttering about…maybe a goldfinch instead? Or were you affected by the mood of winter, with the bleak trees and the dark sky?
Thank you for sharing that process!
I don’t think it was the weather. I think it just goes with the territory. Where some people see melancholy, crime writers see murder. The ravens—scavengers, feed on dead carcasses—were a perfect touch.
How do you know it wasn’t a murder of crows?
I think it is only geese that gaggle. In any case, I am putting on my snowshoes and heading into the woods.