Characters are like tributaries

They came to me in the shower – Willow, Peter and the Old Woman. I saw them at the cemetery: the Old Woman watching from the bushes, Peter staring from a few graves away and Willow playing the violin to her child who was dead. And thus began my writing journey of "The Christmas Violin."

It’s a wonderful yet difficult journey, and it’s far from over. It’s challenging bringing together three characters that are fighting very different demons.

The characters are like tributaries that flow into a river and eventually empty into an ocean where they twist and turn, rumble and tumble before crashing to the shore. There is enormous power when the wave crashes, but then the water recedes and its force is much weaker than that of the incoming wave.

The challenge is to have the tributaries flow naturally into the river and the river to flow naturally into the ocean.

Water always seemed to find a way. I hope I do, too.