Reading time: About 2 minutes
According to Karen Sommerville, inspiration has the habit of showing up after she’s already started typing…
Karen Sommerville is a certified fiction book coach and multi-published suspense author writing as Karen Dodd. Her thrillers transport readers to southern Italy, where murder has a habit of interrupting spectacular scenery. She is also the creator of The Reclamation Letters on Substack, where she explores creativity, loss, resilience and the courage to begin again. She lives on British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast with Gracie, her English Cream Golden Retriever, and Bello, her opinionated Ragdoll cat, where the tides, seabirds and the occasional sigh of a passing grey whale are constant reminders to pay attention.
I was excited to talk to Karen about how she approaches writing.
Q. Roughly how much time do you spend writing every day?
Somewhere between two and four hours. More if the words are flowing. Less if Gracie insists the tide is too beautiful to ignore. I’ve learned that staring out at the ocean isn’t procrastination. Sometimes it’s research.
Q. What’s a simple activity or habit that makes you a better writer?
Reading. Paying attention… To the changing light on the Salish Sea… To my English Cream Golden Retriever, Gracie’s delight over something I would have walked past… To the sigh of a grey whale outside my bedroom window. .. To the things people don’t say aloud… Writing, I’ve discovered, is far less about having something to say than about learning to notice.
Q. What interferes with your writing?
Life. The ordinary demands of daily living. And sometimes the emotional work of rebuilding after life has rewritten the script. Creativity doesn’t disappear during difficult seasons, but it often asks for more patience. Bello, my Ragdoll cat, is less philosophical. He just wants to sleep on the keyboard.
Q. How do you persuade yourself to sit down to write on days when you really, really DON’T feel like doing it?
I make a deal with myself: just ten minutes. If I still want to quit after that, I can. Funny thing… I almost never do.
Q. Is there a particular motto or saying that you’ve found helpful for writing?
Not exactly a motto, but a belief: Trust the process before you trust your feelings. My feelings have talked me out of writing far more often than the process ever has.
Q. Which stage of the writing process do you enjoy the most: researching, writing or editing/rewriting and why?
Rewriting. First drafts are where I discover what I think. Revisions are where I discover what I really mean.
Q. What’s one of the best books you’ve read in the last five years?
Daniel Silva is an automatic purchase for me. His Gabriel Allon novels whisk me back to Italy, where many of my own suspense novels are set. I tell people my trips there are “research.” That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
Q. What book are you reading right now?
On the non-fiction side, Atomic Habits by James Clear. I’m actually re-reading it because each time I do, I find a nugget that I swear wasn’t in the book the last time I read it! On the fiction side, The Last Mandarin by Canadian authors Louise Penny and Melissa Fung.
Q. What do you think is the biggest misperception that new writers have about the act of writing?
That accomplished writers wake up inspired every morning. We don’t. We just know inspiration has a habit of showing up after we’ve already started typing.
