How'd You Come Up With That?

A question for the writers out there. How many times have you been asked, "How'd you come up with that?"

On the surface, it's a simple enough question. But we're writers, we're not interested in what's on the surface.

My book The Little Red Boat focusses on a college basketball player and his best friend dealing with their demons and their gambling addictions. After reading the book, a co-worker of mine asked, "How'd you come up with that?"

Why do questions like this bother me so much? I guess on the one hand, I should be flattered that someone is so dumbfounded that such a plot is even conceivable, but that's not how it resonates with me. To me, it's right up there with the suggestions for ideas: "Hey, you should write a story about ..."

Maybe this is why I never wanted my coworkers to even know I'm a writer. I feel like perfect strangers can give a more constructive critique of your work. Granted, sometimes perfect strangers are overly harsh in their criticisms, but others are too polite, so somewhere in between lies the truth.

Don't get me wrong, there have been coworkers, friends and even family members who seemed to be able to just read the story and react as any other normal human being would react: "Wow, I was completely blindsided when you killed off that character ..." or "The devil character totally reminded me of my ex-wife ..."

But there are always those that seem to think that you want their advice on how to be a writer. I believe I speak for every writer on the planet when I say, "We don't!"

At present, I am in the process of refining a story I recently completed. I have summoned a few beta readers to get their reactions, and one of them just so happens to be a coworker. I don't think she fits the profile of unsolicited life coach like so many of the others. For one, she reads a lot. She has told me she wants to read other stories of mine in the future. After reading a short story of mine a few years ago, her first reaction was that she had a new favorite word: "Megalomaniacal." It was a word I used in describing my main character in the first paragraph of The Redemption Clause:

"In life, he was a scoundrel; a megalomaniacal, narcissistic miscreant. In death, he was, to put it as plainly as possible: dead. Nothing more, nothing less."

I loved that reaction. It was honest. And more importantly, it was a reaction to the story, not a reaction to the fact that someone they know is a writer and probably wants advice.

Because of this, I can't wait to get her reaction to my latest novella.

Don't get me wrong, opinions from friends and coworkers can be insightful; they can be critical, complimentary, flattering, sobering, or all of the above. But if I just opened up a vein and let someone read a hundred and fifty pages of something I created, the last thing I want to hear is, "Hey ... how'd you come up with that?"