What got you started?

By Keith N Fisher

Here I am again. Trying to entertain, amuse, and inspire you. How did you start writing? Was it that, English assignment you wrote for school? Did it start with the rainy day when you mother gave you pencils and paper to entertain yourself?

I know a writer who claims we were writing in the spirit world, before we were born. Whatever the first inspiration, why do you continue? Some of us claim writing is life and to stop writing, would bring madness. They must write or die.

Do you watch videos and read stories about writers? Stranger than Fiction is a good example of what I mean.

I have been watching old episodes of Murder She Wrote. It was an eighties television series about a woman who took up writing mysteries to stay sane, after her husband died. Each week she helped solve murder mysteries she just happened to stumble into. I think the main character was patterned after Agatha Christie’s, Miss Marple, and the was played by Angela Lansbury.

I liked watching the show back then, even though there were problems with plot. I mean, how many times in one life does a woman writer stumble across a murder? I’m watching it now, because it’s clean entertainment by today’s standards.

Now, that I have made writing my life, I love the references in the show to writing. The writer of the show, Peter S Fischer is a kindred spirit. From the way he has written writing into the show, I know, he feels about writing the way I do.

There are times when the character must get some writing time in, and does. In one episode, the character attends a writer’s awards function, and gets a chapter written, before the cocktails on the night before the awards.

Of course there is a murder, but the interaction between writers reminds me of an LDS Storymakers conference. Several people writing different genres, coming together with a common bond. The episode is based around an old washed up writer who steals a manuscript. He gets murdered and the main character has to solve the mystery because her friend has been arrested. Of course he didn’t kill the man.

Anyway, back to the point. In another episode, Lansbury mentions she wrote her first book to avoid the cliché existence of the quilting and sewing widow. Her book got published and now she spends her time traveling for promotion, and writing. She lives the life many writers aspire too.



Whatever got you started down the slippery slope of writing. I hope it fulfills your dreams. At the same time, I hope you don't run into murdered people everywhere you go.

Good luck with your writing—see you next week.