If you thought DaVinci's portraits are masterpieces only because they are inventions of genius then what you need is school. Better yet, ask Dan Brown. And you just might begin to see secret messages in every picture and coded calligraphy on the walls of your bedroom.
I think it's awesome how an author's invention can rework generations of tradition and pop open a can of really controversial worms. A handful pages of creative writing influencing a million mindsets, staunch, dogmatic, diehard or just.
These guys pulling such stunts, how do they achieve it? How does a writer pull off a bestselling novel based on a web of conspiracies built around a common theme, complete with his reader's eyes popping, jaws hanging and completely thrown off balance? There a million and one roads to a question. Let's start with the one.
What is the big deal about popular ideas? Popularity? Well, yeah. And to arrive at the stone castles of popularity or common items, get your swimming trunks we're going for a dip, you'll need to wade the larger-than-life moat defending its grounds. I suppose that would be rumors and household gossips, right? This may involve beliefs and unwritten constitutions commonly called, tradition.
So, here's how the gig works. Any serious-minded writer knows that to write a book or even a short story on a popular theme requires him/her to do heartbreaking research. The author gathers as much info as he can, heaping a pile of resources relevant to the subject of his project. A little research work at the local library or on the internet is okay for a short story or essay. He sits down and does a run up of the entire stuff he's accumulated, separating whiff from wheat and sets himself up to write when he believes he's ready.
The writer tries to be as realistically accurate as he possibly can with the facts and, here's the bottom line, somewhere in the course of the story he throws something extra into the usual mixture. Something not true, not popular within the crowd, not commonly known as fact, and yet, is not a lie. It's the element of surprise. You may be wondering, is it possible for something to be untrue, yet it isn't a lie? Of course. This is a world you, the author invented. It's got nothing to do with the one we live in. Your characters are just that, your characters, your creation. Anything and everything you say in your story is real and irrefutably true. Don't you just love being a writer?
Stephen King has authored over 50 bestsellers. He has a book based on a killer cell phone, there's another on a killer clown, and yet another on a killer car. He has a book on a log house possessing power to choose it's residents. Your story is all about your twist-ability. If you can twist the plots – interweave the real and the fantasized, you have a chance at churning out bestsellers.
And there's beauty killed the beast, King Kong, and somebody invented Godzilla, the mammoth lizard. Maybe, the guy had a morbid fear of lizards as a child. Ever witnessed such enormous creatures in your life? Atoms were believed to be indestructible and indivisible until some chap split 'em into, not two but three. A nucleus and two electrons. If you really want to be creative as a writer start splitting those atoms of popular notion and then transport the electrons into your plot development.
Keep your pen bleeding.
Akpan
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