And Then the Dog Showed Up

I rarely read crime fiction that focus on animals as part of the investigative milieu. With a few notable exceptions, I find them too far-fetched. So imagine my surprise when I was working on Craddock #5 and a dog pushed its way into the scene. Okay, so somebody has a dog. That’s nice. But then after a while, the dog showed up again, and this time it wanted more attention. There was a new character and it was nice to have a dog to give her something to do.
But then, the dog stayed. It’s not Craddock’s dog, but I thought it might as well get to have some fun. It rode around with Craddock and went to his house and generally hung out. I didn’t mind. Seemed like a nice dog.



And then….the dog suddenly had an important scene.
Which brings to mind a question of how the writerly brain works. I didn’t set out to give this dog anything to do in the book. He was in the last book, too, as a little side note. Something to add a little jazz to a scene. So how come he showed up in the latest book and made a place for himself? I guess you could ask that about any character, too, but usually you know in advance that a character is needed to carry out certain elements of the plot. I rarely find myself completely surprised by a character.
It almost feels eerie to me that this dog appeared so naturally and continued to be a part of the book—almost as if he was in charge and I should get out of the way.
I would think of this as an anomaly, but it has happened too many times in my writing: something that pops up early later becomes important. In fact, in a couple of books, I realize later that the first few pages foreshadow everything that happens in the book—even though I had no conscious intention of that happening.
More than once I’ve told people that my first two books seemed to write themselves. Some writers say they have never had that experience and others say it has happened to him. I’d love to know what that process is—the thing that makes the story come full-blown into a writer’s mind, as well as the thing that makes a writer include a new character (even a dog) not knowing consciously what he’s doing there, and only realizing later that he or she is vital to the story.
Readers: Any thoughts about this?