Blurry lines.

I have an idea for a story, but I am sort of scared to work on it. Well, actually, I won't dare to work on it until I am done editing all three Ominous Secret books, because otherwise my "fans" will kill me. But once that is done, I have a story idea that I want to explore...

However, I am sort of a chicken. Not a really big chicken, that's for sure. I don't often back down from an argument, and I will certainly bicker back and forth for what's right until the other person gives up. I don't necessarily consider myself a "chicken". Except when it comes to my writing...at times. Ok, I am being vague...let me 'splain...

You see, when I write stories, I make my characters a mix of myself and what I WISH I could be. Meaning, Gennie was me at 19, but I never had the guts to run away from my family responsibilities. And Dillons' personality is me to a T, but her looks are everything I wish I could look like. So when I write stories, I don't necessarily have them make the same choices that I would make. Sometimes they make the wrong choices, or I make them do the thing I wish I could do! So when I write stories where the characters do things that aren't exactly noble, I am always paranoid that my readers/friends/family will misunderstand the characters as some sort of extension of ME and what I would do in a similar situation. Because that's not always the case.

So when the idea of infidelity or premarital sex or drinking or whatever comes up...I have to figure out a way how to approach these boundary lines, which become somewhat blurry for my readers (all 25 of them...again, shut up! How many fans do you have?) :) to discern between ME and my CHARACTERS. Anyway...this is the conundrum that is on my mind today. How can I approach my most recent story idea with a clear difference between real life and imaginary life?

It is a conundrum, indeed...

Brooke Moss.