heritage intact. The strange nature of their monkey stories and captured princesses expanded my young view into the exotic world. Their dancers and royalty wore pointed hats of jewels and pointed shoulder pads, pointed fingernails and pointed this that and the other thing - kind of spooky, yet alluring. I had to know more. But first, the fire walking.

I was fascinated that people from all walks of life would endanger their health with these red hot coals. For me, a paper cut is bad enough, but burning your feet?! There was much more here than a dare. Finding out why took me into the world of the paranormal and spirituality. I am still intrigued with the genre, to this day. Strange, but true.

Lady with shopping bag walking over red hot coals, behind monk

I found out that some people believe if you can achieve a thing that you, at first, think is impossible, it can break the chains of fear that bind you. Meditation of various forms is suggested to get your mind into a state that it will believe anything you tell it rather than believing what it sees and nothing moer. This is what separates the human mind from the animal kingdom; a cat or dog would no more walk through a fire pit willingly than a human would cut off their own arm. The conscious mind must also take part; one must decide to do this, then the subconscious mind is contacted through meditation or suggestive thought, if you will. Then the body melds with the higher brain functions and allows the individual to avoid harm during the experience. I still wonder, after all these years, if I could do it. Investigating the paranormal can be a life's work and still just scratch the surface... so instead, being in too much pain at the time to meditate, I read up on cultures of Asia.

History is always influenced by geography. I saw how a mountain range or large desert affects not only a tribe or nations travel but their attitudes, superstitions and religions. Take the Chinese and their dragon lore. It explained the mist rising from a cravass that you wouldn't want your children to play near, so you tell them this story that grabs their imagination and voila you have a traditional myth lasting hundreds of generations. Then someone includes gemstones growing between the dragon scales and now you have my attention! So I studied geology of the region which in turn took me to gemmology. The gems of southeast Asia are plentiful and extensive. Apparently, one an take a shovel and, with eyes closed. drop it blade first into the ground and you have a gem mine! Topaz and moonstone; ruby and sapphires. I eventually became a gemmologist through the Gemmological Institute of America (GIA) in Santa Monica and did further studies with the Fellowship of Gemmological Association (FGA) Great Britain.

The real purpose of this story is to illustrate my writer's path and to illustrate how one can be bitten by the writing bug anywhere, anyhow and at any time. From this assignment on, I wrote about what I saw and thought, what I hear and read about and of course, I wrote about things I did, places I went and people I met. Now I write what the characters tell me to write; characters that I (almost) believe have found me and realize I can be a conduit for them by way of the written word, to tell their stories next to my own.

So, if you are interested in being a writer and you find yourself asking "What shall I write about?" then you need to live a bit more, read a lot more and ask 10 times more than you are right now. Don't worry - your characters will find you.

Earliest Reading Experiences

. . .

When I was about 8 or 9 years old we visited my grandparents. I had never seen their house and was curious. My dad noticed and decided to show me 'his' room. Into the dining room back near the buffet, was a panel that looked like all the other panels in the room - decorative woodwork. He reached into a little dish on the buffet and slid this small skeleton key into a lock I had not seen beforehand. Returning the key first, he led my through this hidden door into a dusty hallway. There he pulled a cord hanging from overhead and to my utter amazement stairs lowered from the ceiling. When we got to the top he had to reach into an unfinished portion of the wall to find a light switch.

What I saw befor eme was a barracks type living space. It was obvious, even to me at thet age, that this place was unbearable during the hot, muggy summers. Looking around I found some books about an inventor and was intrigued - Tom Swift. I was already quite interested in the sciences and was eager to learn more about Science Fiction. My dad allowed me to keep a few of those books (not all of them, mind you - "Someone else may want them". Who could that someone else have been, besides me?) Anyway, over the years I have collected more of them and loved them all. I was impressed that the stories were written before the inventions became real, much like Jules Verne and Isaac Asimov. That first one was called Tom Swift and his electric rifle. We have those now. I went on to read Tom Swift junior.

A few of the books that enlightened me to the printed word and its lack of limitation might surprise you. Looking back, they surprise me.

I guess I was about 6 or 7 when I received a set of American Indian books from my grandmother. I really identified with the kids in the stories and grasped white man's inhumanity toward the Indian fully, but somehow 'understood' I should not talk about it, even to ask questions. I kenw my parents were part of the 'white man' cult but I never thought I was one of them.

Next, I was reading every comicbook I could get my hands on. It didn't matter if it was stupid or a classic or missing a page. Actually, that did bug me a bit but then there were the ads on the inside cover for wristwatch radios and sea monkeys that made up for that.

Candide by Voltaire helped me realize that classics were not all stuffy. In L'etrange (The Stranger) by Albert Camus (I read it in French before I read it in English) I found that a flat, colourless story could be so interesting - this was the voice I was to learn about a decade later. Then there was Portnoy's Complaint by Phillip Roth were I learned what it was like to be a boy, deperately experimenting with his sexual maturation complete with a piece of raw liver in the bathroom, his father pounding away at the locked door ('What are you doing in there that is taking so long?') - causing him jump and fling the liver to the bathroom ceiling. I was shocked to read that dad was let in while the liver was slowly cooking itself to the the bare lightbulb while the mortified yooung man prayed it would remain until he was in private again. That was just plain eye-opening.

But my all time favourite was a picture book about planet Earth from the first cooling millennia and through the evolution of extinction events of the Mesozoic, Triassic and Jurassic periods. The deep sea fish were so bizarre I wanted to become a marine biologist...until I got SCUBA certified and realized I didn't have to study to get up close and personal with the creatures of the dark.

These books (and more) have deeply influenced who I am today and will be tomorrow. However, when I was a young teen I got ahold of Valley of the Dolls which I presume was about drugs. My parents found it and a hysterical evening was spent taking it from me and becoming my personal book-burners. I think that was the last character building view of the world I would ever get. From then on, everything was tainted; Should I read it? Should I believe it? Can I talk about it? Is it worth it? And I went back to histoy and science with a smattering of biographies. I would not read mainstream for another decade. Instead, I was into intrigue, judaica and gemmology. By then I was living in Toronto (Ontario, Canada) when a friend introduced me to a movie photos shop that also had comics and graphic novels. A new world opened for me. Not only was this an upgrade, bringing the art of line drawing to the adult level, but also a realization that it is possible and even acceptable to introduce dark material in a comic. Sandman was my first. Wow!

Even so, it would be years before I would try my hand at the bleak, horrific scenes depicted there, in my writing. Maybe I just needed to live more to 'get' it. Frankly, I don't like extreme horror or violece - there is plenty in the universe - and don't want to pass it on, so to speak. However, storytelling (being what it is today) needs to shock if even to introduce unexpected juxtupositions, to keep the publics attention. You can't tell a story if you don't have an audience.

Anyway, this eventually led me to manga and anime from Japan and fed me right back into history. OK, now I 'get' it - I've come full circle - I'm ready to tell my tales. Just keep those insirations comin'!

Villainous Inspirations

. . .

For some time now I have been tempted by the dark side - that of writing mystery.

Being such a nice person (HA!) it has been difficult for me to create villainous characters. Until recently, I had never read horror and had only read a few mysteries. See, I come from a biography and ancient historical research reading background. I have also read that "one should not read what they wish to write" because of the possibility of contamination. The Plegerism Plague is to be avoided at all costs! Yet, after two Alexandra Sokoloffs, a Lisa Jackson, a Nancy Bush and three Agatha Christie's I found the creative juices started to simmer as I cut up the story, sautéed some character foibles, stirred in the subplot and added a twist. Test tasting my new preparations, I gave in to my new addiction - writing (and reading) mysteries. I think I'm on to something good.

So, my renewed attitude - don't believe everything you read. Hope you don't mind... I'm off to munch on a profile.

Science of the Mind

19 May, 2008

. . .

As a kid growing up in England, I was a bit of a Tomboy and a science-fiction buff. I believed everything I read was or could be genuine, true, authentic, real... and the rest of the world was just stupid. To some extent, I still feel that way.

I very restricted as a kid - everything was forbidden and art was bad. Every direction I turned for some outlet to express myself was squashed - except reading. So what better choice of escape than Science Fiction? Furthermore, if science was this cool, then I wanted to be a scientist! I just couldn't tell anybody.

I set out to follow my dream - I would build a chemistry lab in the attic!

It was a very small space up there and with exposed insulation but that wouldn't bother me. I would need supplies. Reading about what was needed to stock a science lab my list seemed to include mostly containers and liquids. I collected jars and odd shaped items like forks missing tynes and, for some reason, I felt I had to have a box of wire coat hangers. Surely, I was being analytical about this.

The crawl space into the attic, ironically, was in my bedroom ceiling and just barely big enough for a grown man to squeeze through unless he was portly. I would need a ladder to come and go. Also, I had to find a sink and table that would fit through the opening because I would not be permitted to make it any larger; of that I was sure. There would probably need to be a light and I was pretty sure there were no outlets up there, but I would deal with that later.

I made 'dry-runs' of how I would amass all this equipment and get it into the loft at night when my parents were asleep without waking anyone. Ah. There was a loose floor board that made a 'kunk' every time anyone entered my room. That had to be fixed.

Next day after school, I set about repairing the noise maker. Hammer and nail in hand, I could do this myself. 'Kunk". There it is - that's the one. Center the nail... hold it steady... Bang. Bang, bang, bang went my hammer. Bang and SSSSS! Water squirted up through the nail hole like a fire hose and up my nose. I was soaked in a flash. It 'vesuviused' for an hour while my father looked for the shut-off valve, got his tools and tore up the other floor boards to repair the water pipe I had pierced. My room was too wet to sleep in so I was evcuated to my sisters room, next door.

Undaunted by this set back, I continued to erect my lab in my head. I visualized my test tubes, jars and Bunsen burner around me - wait! I won't be allowed to have a flame in the attic! I won't be able to have a Bunsen burner! My state of depression kept me awake so I was the only one who heard the disruption coming from my room in the wee hours. Too scared to get up and see what the sound was, I drifted fitfully off to dreamland.

In the morning we discovered that the build up of water pressure that was turned on full force after the repair, had caused a leak in the attic which in turn had soaked the plaster ceiling and that was what fell on my bed in the night. So much for my laboratory.

At nine years of age, I didn't know what I would be using it for anyway.

“If it is your time, love will track you down like a cruise missile.”

Lynda Barry

"The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it."

“The work will wait while you show the child the rainbow but the rainbow won't wait while you do the work.”

Unknown

Earliest Writing Experiences

. . .

I was living in England when I received my first fountain pen. I was eight.

The school I attended was modern (in that it was co-ed) though was still attached to some old-world traditions - we used dip pens with ink wells and blotting paper. We were taught Olde English calligraphy to script our Keats and Shakespeare onto translucent parchment. To this day I prefer to write in long hand with a fountain pen filled with green ink. I am also addicted to sealing wax and truely cool signet stamps. E-mail has taken all the fun and ritual out of communication. Yes, it's faster but is that always better?

I must have been quite young when I first remember a visit to my grandparents house. My father told me his favourite room of the house was in the attic and I wanted to see it. This upper floor as divided in half. One side was my dads sometimes bedroom and the other side was a storage studio for my grandfather's drawings. Though he was an engineer, he had drawers full of huge images composed of one continuous ink line that curlycued swooping back and forth, elegantly folding on itself repeatedly until an elk or bird appeared. I was fascinated and wanted to have one. I was told no, and now they are gone forever. I hate that crap. I would have framed it, loved it, shared it... but no.

When I was eleven or twelve I had a teacher, Mrs. Vescovy, that set my brain on fire! Her classroom was overfull with items like magnets, jars of coccoons, test tubes, an electric gizmo that made your hair stand 'on end' and (my favourite) a metal earth on a crank handle you could spin and watch the earth get flat-ish. A combination lesson in centrifigal force and a possible scenario of the moon pulling out from the earth where we now have the Pacific Ocean ignited my imagination. Then she told us about ancient Egypt! I was so in awe of her I altered my penmanship to be like hers. It has persisted to this day.

Breakfast - Most Inspirational Meal of the Day

This article appeared in the July 2009 edition of the award winning LARA newsletter

. . .

By Niki Chanel - As a kid, I did not spend much time around my parents. They believed that 'children (they had three) were better seen, not heard… better still, unseen'. They ate separately from us and nixed most subjects of conversation as unsuitable around them so my sisters and I did not get our heritage by osmosis.

However, since their health has begun to fail I have made my parents breakfast and talked with my mother and father daily. Every once in a great while a "smackeral‘ of information about their past lives would slip out and send me reeling. Who are these people?! After an enlightening argument (me angry at being treated like the daughter in the cupboard) I vowed to make this experience a positive one – I’m taking notes!

Something happened that first day when I took out my pen and notebook… they started to tell me stories!

It turns out I have relatives I didn‘t know I had, they have experienced accidents I never knew about, they‘ve been places I would be hard pressed to find on a map and now they‘re realizing that they don‘t know all of each others stories – after more than 50 years of marriage!

I‘ve been able to ask questions as an interviewer might because 'I can use this in one of my books'. How that makes any differ-ence to my parents I don‘t know, but it has improved our relationship, given me personal history and helped inspire me to write more frequently with more 'insider information‘ than ever before.

Each day, when I get home, I copy my hand written notes into appropriate computer files. Doing this, I often get flashes of scenes from these tidbits that make it easy to landscape a location in a WIP, flesh out a character or simply have enough information to look up some scintillating factoid I didn‘t know existed until scrambled eggs unlocked my father‘s tongue or a pastry excited my mother into divulging her ancestry.

For example, my sisters knew nothing about an airplane wreck my father was in or how he survived and got rescued by building a ring of fire around himself.

Neither sister knew that, through my mother, we are descendants of Napoleon Bonaparte, the Wright brothers and Charles Shaw -- you know… the two-buck-chuck wine from Trader Joe‘s. (Sorry - can‘t bring in any cases of the stuff because my mom is mad at Charles for some reason she is still unwilling to tell, and they‘re not speaking.)

A few pancakes later there are accounts of private parties on ships festooned with antique weapons and way too much alcohol. They have traveling tales, like the one about a 400 year old English Inn where a chair at the head table can be made to drop backwards as the floor boards slide open to dump said guest into the river running beneath it. If that‘s not writer‘s inspiration, nothing is!

Gruesome war chronicles, unbelievable college stunts, scary descriptions of being caught on the tracks of an oncoming train, weird tales about military edicts not to fly directly over the Great Pyramid and top secret things I can‘t print here – are a bowl of oatmeal away… today. I cannot wait until tomorrow. Since I will probably outlive my parents, it is my responsibility not to wait til they‘re gone to read through their old letters and guess what was written between the lines. I‘ve got to get my history lessons now. We all do.

This decision of mine to take notes in front of the very people who kept my past out of my present has given me a future. My suggestion to those of you looking for inspiration: get it from real life. Take your notebook with you everywhere and do not shrink from taking notes. One little eavesdropping incident could set off a novella series or a movie script! More than once it has been proven that 'fact can be stranger than fiction‘ and you want to get that fact while it‘s hot! Life is fast and forgetting an intriguing little blurb you heard at the gas station or waiting in line somewhere is easy to do. Write it down - quick! If you feel it‘s worth writing down, you have already been inspired. Take the next step and use it.

Anyone want any some more toast?

10 June, 2008

. . .

Nightmares : When I was quite young, I had nightmares. I say that in the plural because I had many of them. The two most frequent, were also the most frightening. One of them was hallucination-ish.

I wake (or believe that I am awake) and look out the open bedroom door and see a beetle on the floor walking into my room. He is followed shortly, by another. I always hope that only the two will bother me tonight, but they always have company - lots of company! Black bugs, insects and arachnids of every size and discription push into the room, flooding the floor with a dark, undulating carpet of menace. They head straight for me as though some sinister quest has been demanded to them. My fear paralyzes me and I sweat. They leap onto my blanket and crowd around my seated fetal position, making a ring around my feet, waiting, as if they are uncertain what I will do when they advance. After a short pause, they proceed. I still cannot move and am exhausted from the tension. They crawl onto my legs then body, swarming me and I lose consciousness from fear.

The other one was more abstract - almost like a Flash movie that recycles, so can last as long as it 'wants'.

Black amoeba-like shapes move around on a white background. Each shape has a sound: the little ones have a screechingly high tone, much like chalkboard agonies, while the larger ones have an impossibly low, deep tone, equally irritating and as terrifying as an ogre's bellow, for a child. Since nothing else fills my field of vision, I am forced to look and listen. As I watch, the larger ones consume the littler ones and I hear the babies screaming in fear and possibly - pain. New, unsuspecting tiny shapes appear from the edges of the viewing 'screen' and the torture, both theirs and mine, continues.

I have always wondered: What was the point of these terrifying dreams? How do they solve a problem, send me a warning, teach me a lesson? What did they symbolize? Why did they stop after being nightly? In what way am I different than if I had grown up happy and peacefully? I can answer that last question: I would not be as anxious, high strung or neurotic! So... was I destined to be anxious, high strung and neurotic? If so, that must mean I was destined to write; to write neurotica!