Ask the Author: Keith Blenman
Answered Questions (2)
Keith Blenman
I've always had an overactive imagination. Like, I remember reading "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" in middle school and it being the first story where I truly identified with a character. "That guy walking down the street, pretending to be driving a tank? That's me! That's exactly it." I've always been like that. When I was a child I'd talk to rocks. My imaginary friends were an entire village that lived in our mail chute.
I think I was twelve or thirteen when I really caught the writing bug. I always wrote and made little comics and stuff, but yeah, around that age I started taking it seriously. Where my friends were playing sports and reading comics, I still had all these worlds and characters in my head, and felt compelled to get them out. I was secretive about it though. Like I told my dad I needed a new notebook and some pens for school. I made him take me to the store. I spent forever picking out exactly the right notebook. Mead. Mint green. Three subjects. Two hundred pages. And as soon as we got home I went up to my bedroom and started writing a book. Twenty five years later, I still have it. I have a little tattoo of the main character from that story. Anyway, it was such a cool experience, writing that story for six months. Channeling my imagination and finding a format for it that didn't have any boundaries. I was a little kid who discovered a secret playground nobody else knew about. One I've never found an exit from. So I've just stayed there and I'm still playing today.
I think I was twelve or thirteen when I really caught the writing bug. I always wrote and made little comics and stuff, but yeah, around that age I started taking it seriously. Where my friends were playing sports and reading comics, I still had all these worlds and characters in my head, and felt compelled to get them out. I was secretive about it though. Like I told my dad I needed a new notebook and some pens for school. I made him take me to the store. I spent forever picking out exactly the right notebook. Mead. Mint green. Three subjects. Two hundred pages. And as soon as we got home I went up to my bedroom and started writing a book. Twenty five years later, I still have it. I have a little tattoo of the main character from that story. Anyway, it was such a cool experience, writing that story for six months. Channeling my imagination and finding a format for it that didn't have any boundaries. I was a little kid who discovered a secret playground nobody else knew about. One I've never found an exit from. So I've just stayed there and I'm still playing today.
Keith Blenman
My upcoming novel, Necromantica, actually started with a text message. I have a muse, my very lovely girlfriend. She's into fantasy, Drizzt, Salvatore, and that general type of world. Anyway, one night I couldn't sleep and she sent me a text to try and think of a story about her and I storming a castle. You know, slip away into fantasy and end up having some really bad ass dream. Well I didn't sleep at all that night, but instead came up with an idea for a quick story that I could text back to her. I started typing the message and decided it was far too much to put into my phone (a crappy old flip phone with a keyboard you practically needed a magnifying glass to see). So I started to write it as an email, thinking it'd be a good three or four page story I could entertain her with. Then after writing three or four pages I realized what I had was probably a bit more than I'd intended.
The first draft consisted of four or five emails written over two weeks, totaling sixteen pages. I hadn't put too much thought into it as I was writing them (I really just wanted to entertain my muse) but when it was finished I caught myself still pondering the story and developing the characters (at the time they were simply named "You" and "I."). So I started writing little flashbacks that took place between each of the emails and pretty soon I had a thirty something page novella. So I showed that story to a few friends and asked if it was worth continuing. I got some good feedback and well... three years later I'm ready to publish my little text message story as a fifty thousand word novel. All of that said, I suppose the short answer is, "A pretty girl texted me an idea and I really, really wanted to make out with her."
The first draft consisted of four or five emails written over two weeks, totaling sixteen pages. I hadn't put too much thought into it as I was writing them (I really just wanted to entertain my muse) but when it was finished I caught myself still pondering the story and developing the characters (at the time they were simply named "You" and "I."). So I started writing little flashbacks that took place between each of the emails and pretty soon I had a thirty something page novella. So I showed that story to a few friends and asked if it was worth continuing. I got some good feedback and well... three years later I'm ready to publish my little text message story as a fifty thousand word novel. All of that said, I suppose the short answer is, "A pretty girl texted me an idea and I really, really wanted to make out with her."
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