Why Fiction Writers Write

I believe that fiction writers select topics—and genres—because of an inner need to explore the topic in more detail.  Simple, but complex.

Fictionalizing a real event—or real people—can be painful to the real person, and most certainly to the relatives and loved ones of that person. It is often said that a writer writes about what he or she knows.  I say that is not true. He writes about topics and subjects he finds intriguing.

I suppose there are as many answers to that question as there are writers. But generally speaking, I believe that fiction writers select topics because she or he has an inner need to do so. I'll give you two examples:

A marine platoon is halfway across a beach in the Eastern Pacific. A land mine explodes. One person remains alive.  If that one person were you, how would you cope?

You’re a train engineer, distracted by a firecracker going off on the tracks. You take a curve too fast and twenty-five people die when the train derails. Can you move past your guilt?

How do we, as humans, ever recover from such tragedies? That is the question that prompted me to write Out of the Depths. 

What are your thoughts?

David