So I decided to coincide with
my book being listed on Amazon, I should give people who have read or are
reading my book a behind-the-scenes look at how I went about creating the
story, and where I got some of the ideas from. Enjoy!!
All of this started for me on
November 4, 2011. That afternoon, I went to the Andover State Bank to deliver a
copy of The Trojan Bluestreak newspaper to Andrea Menousek, a very good friend
of mine. I asked her if our writing group would be doing any meetings in the
near future, and she told me probably not because she wasy busy working on
NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). I asked her about it, and she
suggested I look it up.
So I went home and did some
research. Knowing I could easily take on the challenge of writing a 50,000 word
novel in a span on 30 days (26 for me at that point), I signed up right away.
After signing up, the story just sort of popped into my mind.
After writing the prologue
and roughly the first half of chapter one, I took a break for the day, and
began to outline the rest of the book.
From the very start, I knew
basically the entire version of the plot, well I at least knew the basic
version of it. I knew there would be four chapters. I knew what would happen in
each chapter of the book relating to Brendan's life. I knew the first three
chapters would be mostly highlights of Brendan's journalistic career with the
final chapter focusing on his involvement in a murder spree. However, I didn't
know the entire plot, and the rest came to me as I went along.
For instance, the character
Darren Thomas was originally only supposed to appear at Brendan and Gale's
wedding. In fact, the name of him was just pulled out of the air. I needed a
name for the best friend of the main character and the first name that came to
mind was Darren because of my good friend Darren Jones. As I went along writing
about the murder spree, Darren (in the book) had a much larger role, eventually
becoming a third protagonist.
All of the names which appear
in the novel are somehow based on real-life people. In some cases, I simply
combined the first name of someone with the last name of somebody else to
create their name. But the principal characters were not just named uniquely,
they were all based off of important people in my life.
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Main Character Information
Brendan Hopkins: Obviously,
he is based off of me. I like to think of Brendan as a "shadowy
reflection" of myself. He is very much like me in many ways with fictional
elements to his character woven in with the elements based off myself.
Gale Riley-Hopkins: I took
Gale's name from the character Gale Weathers in the "Scream" horror
movie series. I imagined her as being more like Gale Weather's husband Dewey,
but since my main character needed a wife, I made my Gale. She is very much
like Dewey, with Brendan being very much like Gale Weathers.
Darren Thomas: Like I said, I
originally only intended for the best friend of the main character to appear at
the wedding. However, as I was writing chapter four, I needed the main target
of the murder spree (besides Brendan) to have some sort of strong connection to
Brendan, and that's how Darren was introduced back into chapter four, and
slowly became a third main character. He is loosely based on his namesake,
Darren Jones, with both of them being extremely smart individuals. What makes
them different in the character Darren is more vulnerable than my friend
Darren.
Mrs. Callaway: She is
entirely based off my journalism adviser, Mrs. Kristin Baker. Her last name is
actually Mrs. Baker's maiden name that I decided to use to make the character
somewhat fictional. She is very like Mrs. Baker since she did help jumpstart a
journalists's career.
Bobby Hopkins: Bobby is very
much like Roman Bridger and Jill Roberts, the killers in Scream 3 and 4
respectively. Like Roman, he is a product of a mistaken pregnancy and was spent
his entire life looking for his parents, and was rejected by them. As a result,
he seeked his revenge against his parents and the brother who got the life he
always sought. Like Jill, he wanted to gain fame as the ultimate killer of someone
who has escaped death from other similar killers (Sidney Prescott in the Scream
movies, Darren Thomas in my book).
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Major Plot Details
Brendan's journalistic career
- Most of the stories in the book written by Brendan were all fictional
stories, some based off real events. I think only one actual story written by
me that was published in the real-life Trojan Bluestreak made it into the book.
That story was the one about Kids 4 Kids. I had intended for my column on human
rights to appear in the book, but for some reason, it never made it in, yet
there is still mention of it.
Darren's backstory - Before
his reappearance in chapter four, Darren was targeted three times by different
people to be killed. I don't really know why he was picked, but I based his
backstory off of the first three movies in the Scream horror movies series
(obviously one of my favorites). When he appears in chapter four, it's
been about five years since the last failed attempt on his life , and he has
moved on from those events. His self-help book is meant to be the final part of
him moving on with his life. He chose Wichita as the final stop on his book
tour, and ironically enough, another murder spree starts, and Darren is once
again the target. Like I said, his story is very much like Sidney Prescott's
but I wanted to show that men can be just as vulnerable as women in
something like this.
Bobby's murder spree -
Inspired mostly by Jill Roberts and Charlie Walker's killing spree in Scre4m
(Scream 4). I had him target the same sort of people, but with a different
motivation: get revenge on his parents for not accepting him as a son, and at
the same time, finally take out Darren Thomas, something three others had
previously failed to do.
Henry's attack at the end of
the book - When I was writing the ending of the novel when Brendan accepts his
Pulitzer Prize, I wanted some sort of major dramatic twist that would totally
catch the reader off guard. After re-reading the section where Brendan berates
his parents for not telling him the truth about Bobby, and virtually blaming
his father for causing the murder spree, I decided to make Henry snap. I wanted
the reader to see the powerful impact words have on others, and I think Henry's
attack on Brendan truly demonstrates that.
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Final Thoughts:
I just want to express how
much fun I had writing this novel. From the very first day, I knew it would be
easy for me to achieve my goal in the NaNoWriMo challenge, and all I had to do
was tell myself I could do it, and I did. I'm very grateful I did this project;
I think it could help jumpstart a writing career for me - one that's not just
in journalism. I want to once again extend a special thanks to Alicia Renich
for drawing my cover for me, and Darren Jones for volunteering to be my editor.
And I want to thank everyone who has read my book, and I hope this little
behind-the-scenes looks of it gave you a new insight into the story of Brendan
Hopkins and his rise to the top.
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