My use of plots (garden ones)
for plotting (writing ones)
One of the questions I receive from readers which I particularly enjoy answering is “What do you do when you’re not writing?” Of course, the same as everyone, I live a life filled with “MUST DO” lists, but I am also an avid gardener, and – I admit it – that’s my passion-filled, all-consuming hobby. This time of year, from June through to September, is when most of us who garden would love to be able to sit back and enjoy the fruits of our labors; but we all know it’s the time when we really have to apply ourselves because it’s peak growing season…and that, unfortunately, includes weeds!
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| Cathy’s garden in the spring. |
When I’m mowing I find myself in a sort of Zen state; my mind is focused on doing a good job with the creation of stripes on our acre or so of grass, whilst it’s also able to play with plotlines, come up with devilish methods of murder, and offer me the chance to consider the intricate patterns of behavior my characters might display to allow readers to spot a real clue, or be taken in by a red herring or two. Ripping up weeds is a similar occupation – needing just a certain ruthless part of my brain to work in concert with my hands to ensure weeds come up and plants I want to protect remain undisturbed…all while figuring out how the suspects will be challenged by my protagonist, and finally brought to face justice at the denouement.
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| Cathy's garden in the fall – with Cathy on the mower! |
Happy gardening, and happy plotting!
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Cathy Ace is the author of The Cait Morgan Mysteries and The WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries. You can find out more about Cathy, her characters, and her work at her website: www.cathyace.com.
8 comments:
I have two brown thumbs -- I have even been known to kill hostas! Thanks for sharing your lovely gardens with us.
What a lovely garden you have! I like going out and working on my roses. I've come up with many plot ideas while pulling up weeds and deadheading. We garden all year round here in California. Lots of time for thinking while working on the garden.
Hi Judy - oh dear, I pity you...my green thumbs give me great pleasure (especially when supported by a couple of splinted wrist-supports!). I didn't know it was possible to kill hostas. Well done???? ;-)
Hi Sybil, how fortunate to be able to grow year-round. We're always busy in our winter garden, but mainly limbing trees, cutting shrubs back, dealing with hard landscaping and clearing piles form the previous growing season! Enjoy plotting in your plots!
Cathy,
Welcome to Type M. You're inspiring me to once again think of a vegetable garden. . .and maybe even more flowers in the front yard. I need to get outside more.
Interesting post, Cathy. Thanks for stopping by. I'm the vegetable and water garden guy in our family. My wife does the flowers and shrubs. Right now we're both dealing with "Raccoonzilla", the largest darn animal of its kind we've ever seen. We have raccoon pool parties every single night, it seems. And we can't get rid of him! Time to call in the pros, I think...
Thanks Frankie...I know folks get a lot of fun growing veggies, though we don;t due to water shortages during the summer months when our well invariably runs dry so we have to get water delivered in a tanker...so it seems a bit counterproductive to plant things that need water (and lots of it) at that time of year. Our garden tends to look its best in spring and autumn because of that. But I would always encourage anyone with the time (and water) to "grow their own" because all that hard work makes veggies and fruits taste so much better (no fruits for us because of the bears!).
Thanks for having me along, Rick. Racoonzilla sounds like a bit of a nightmare. Good luck with that!
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