Discovery Friday

Another day of revision on my middle grade novel has passed. And at one point, a fun discovery snuck up beside me and typed itself right into my manuscript. I had no clue it was coming, hadn't given it a thought, until--voila!--there it was. And instantly I recognized that, yes, this new thought is just exactly right: my main character's cat has big ears.

Big ears? Ha, how silly is that? Pretty silly I'd say--except that it turns out that this little detail can play into the relationship. Who would have guessed? Now another layer exists in the bigger scheme of the story. Someday when the book is published (see, we say when, not if!), my readers will know what I mean.

Isn't discovery in writing fun? At least, today, it was for me.

And so I end this week on a high note, both in writing and in the special events of the past few days here in the family. And I also take a moment at the end of this work week to share a few thoughts on the subject of discovery in writing:

• "We don't write what we know. We write about what we wonder about." --Richard Peck
• "The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes." --Marcel Proust
• "Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing and you learn as you go." --E.L. Doctorow
• "I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear." --Joan Didion
• "Writing is a tool of transformation and can shine the light on the inside, dispelling darkness, taking us through external layers, bringing us closer to our souls." --Hillary Carlip
• "You always find things you didn't know you were going to say, and that is the adventure of writing." --John Updike

Happy weekend--and happy discovering!