How Fishing is Like Writing by Gerri Brousseau

What a beautiful day to lie around in the sun and just be lazy.  Today is the perfect day to sit beside the water and cast out a line.  Yep, it’s the perfect day to go fishing.  And fishing is a lot like writing.  How, you ask?  Well, have you ever gone fishing?  When you do, you get to the water’s edge, put your bait on the hook, and you toss in your line.  The bait hits the water and the fish takes notice (Chapter One).  You wait a while and reel your line in a bit, and the fish follows (Chapter Two).  You slowly draw the interest of the fish to your bait by reeling it in ever so slowly, one click at a time (reeling your reader in one chapter at a time).  But the fish is interested and hungry for more … and he takes the bait.  He’s hooked.  Now you simply have to reel him in and he’s yours.

When I read a book, much like the fish, I want to be interested from chapter one and drawn in by the enticing bait as the writer reels me in.  Like the fish, I’m hooked.  Like the angler, the writer must take his or her time to draw the reader in.  The angler doesn’t get to the water, jump in and ram the bait down the fish’s throat, and so the writer must hold back and not ram the entire plot down the reader’s throat in chapter one either.  He must give out the bait, one click (or chapter) at a time.

Still, unlike the fish, I like my bait, er … I mean story … to keep me interested and to have a bit of romance going on to spice things up.

Why am I telling you this?  Because I’m in writing mode and when I am I can’t seem to get anything else done.  No housework, no grocery shopping, no laundry and I barely take time to eat.  I’m involved in getting this story written because it is burning to be told.  Yet, I must treat my story like bait and like the angler, I must only let out the bait a little at a time so as to entice my reader into the story.  To capture them.  A lazy day by the lake would be nice, but I can’t go now … because I’m writing.

When you are writing, do you seem to have blinders on to the dust bunnies floating across the floor?  When you are reading a great book that you just can’t seem to put down, do you ignore the pile of laundry for just one more chapter?

Filed under: romance