It happened again. I watched a movie a few nights ago that inspired me in my fiction writing. One scene in particular brought tears to my eyes and made me feel all warm inside. By the time the closing credits rolled across my TV screen my mind was already churning about how I could add a similar scene to the book that I’m currently working on.
These inspirational epiphanies happen all the time. Please allow me to explain before you write me off as a copycat or a plagiarist. It’s not that I’m taking someone else’s scene and putting it into my book. The only thing that I’m copying is the emotional response. I want my readers to be moved as deeply as I was. I want them to have the warm and fuzzies just like I did. I start with the desired emotions and then I tweak my story to make those emotions happen. In every case where this has happened, the scene that I end up creating in my story looks nothing like the scene that inspired me. The only thing that looks like the original scene is the emotional response.
I used to worry that someone would figure this out and get mad at me for borrowing ideas. But, over time, I’ve spoken to other authors, read articles, and listened to podcasts, and realized that everyone does the same thing. It’s part of the creative process.
I’ll give you some examples. I know most of you have not read my books (I hope we can correct that error soon, wink wink), but if I throw out a movie title and a scene reference there is a good chance you’ll know what I’m talking about. Knowing that much will give you a good glimpse into my slightly warped creative process.
The movie I referred to in my opening paragraph is a little bit embarrassing. It’s 13 Going on 30, a romantic comedy from 2004. My 19-year-old daughter chose the movie. As I sat down to watch it with her and my wife, I did not expect it to be all that great. But boy was I wrong. I absolutely adored the movie. But, sticking to my point, there was a sweet scene between the two main characters that moved me to tears. It involved their budding romantic relationship. That’s when inspiration hit me. In Crash Planet, my work-in-progress, there is a love story between a princess who is on the run from bad people and a down-on-his-luck military pilot. With my rough draft completed, I thought I had their love story pretty well worked out. At least I did until I saw that scene from 13 going on 30. I suddenly knew I needed to add a little more to the story of my two main characters so that it would tug on the heartstrings of my readers the same way that movie had done for me. I am now doing some rewriting that I’m sure will add a new layer of depth to my story. It’s exciting to have these moments of inspiration because I know it’s taking my story to a new level.
For Caged Animals (the book that I’m serializing now in my newsletter), the opening scene was inspired by the opening chapter of The Martian by Andy Weir. I was in between writing projects and trying to figure out what I wanted to write next. I saw The Martian in a bookstore and wasn’t even sure if I wanted to read it. I had some time to kill so I sat down and read the first chapter. That chapter was so good, so well written, and had such an incredible hook, it left me saying to myself, “I have to read the rest of this book so I can see what happens to astronaut Mark Watney.” That’s when the inspiration began. From then on, I wanted to write something that left readers hooked after the first chapter. I came up with teenagers getting kidnapped by aliens, a totally different concept than the story of The Martian.
It happened again while I was in the middle of writing Caged Animals. I saw the movie Knives Out and was blown away by the whole whodunnit plot. After watching the movie I thought how much fun it was to see Detective, Benoit Blanc, solve the murder. I had already written most of Caged Animals and its sequel Escaped Animals when I saw Knives Out. I had already developed a backstory for my characters that included a popular student from their high school who had died in a bizarre accident. I’d written it to create tension between some of my characters but I hadn’t planned to make it anything other than something bad in the past. Then, I saw Knives Out and was inspired to allow the truth about the student’s death to be brought to light. I even have a scene in Escaped Animals where all the clues fall into place, and the true murderer is revealed. It’s now one of my favorite scenes from the series.
In my Glazed Man & Rat Girl books, my two main characters are attracted to each other from the beginning stages of the series. Then, Glazed Man figures out the true identity of Rat Girl, but she doesn’t know who he is. Her alter ego, Martha, is clearly infatuated with the superhero, Glazed Man. But, Johnny Crumb (Glazed Man’s alter ego) wonders if she has any feelings for him without the superhero suit on. That whole idea was inspired by the Spider-Man movies. Particularly the Sam Raimi directed movies starring Tobey Maguire. Those movies made a big deal about that part of the relationship between Peter Paker and Mary Jane Watson.
Looking back, every time I’ve been inspired by another scene, it’s added something great to my stories. I’ve gotten to where I can recognize the feeling I get when I’ve just been inspired. When that happens, I know it will be a good thing so I obey that feeling. If anything, my books are stronger and more interesting because I allow myself to be inspired by movies. They always say, “If you want to be a great artist, be a consumer of great art.” That’s what I try to do with my movie-watching and book-reading. One of my dreams is to someday have a young artist tell me a scene from one of my books has inspired them. That their book or movie has become better because of my scene. Now that would be inspiring!
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SCOTT CAHAN 