The Other Side of Stephen King

My mom has been touting her love of Stephen King for years in my general direction. She’s tried everything under the sun to reel me in – he’s a fantastic writer, not EVERYTHING he writes is horror, he has a wonderful sense of humor, he cusses with abandon! And I’ve read one or two of his books. Mostly the ones that were absolutely not even in the same city as horror and they were great. But I don’t do horror. Ever.

But then yesterday my mom pushed a little book he wrote about 10 years ago in front of me. It’s a book he wrote on writing. I picked it up today as I was waiting for the lunch hour to arrive and I have to admit I’m completely sucked in. He is a fantastic writer. This is not horror, not even really how he wrote horror. He is very funny. And he does, indeed, cuss with abandon. His writing actually reminds me a bit of my own writing thought process when I am at my best.

Interestingly enough, the biggest theme thus far is to write without fear. Which I find a bit ironic considering that is the sole cause for me not writing more often and sooner. Fear of not being good enough, of not having anything worthwhile to say, fear of being rejected, fear of not being able to adequately translate what is in my head into words on paper. You name it and I was pretty much afraid of it. Those fears have served as all the necessary reasoning I could have ever asked for to not write. And they’ve worked well. Until now.

See, now? After this last year? I don’t give a damn whether I’m any good or whether anyone reads it. I just know that I must write. It is no longer a choice. For so long my only tangible motivation to write was for recognition in some way and since my fear shortchanged that motivation, the only option left was simply not to write.

Well, that’s bullshit. So hopefully the book will have some other helpful tidbits to offer and if nothing else, it really is very funny.