Nathan Bransford - The Forums

(...y'all looked friendly enough, plus I dig the positive vibe of the community, so here goes a first-time post...)

Hi, I'm TheScubaGeek and I'm new here. For the last several years I have struggled with a semi-autobiographical fictionalization of my true life stories. I'm a full-time computer programmer and wannabe novelist who lives a pretty mundane life of writing code and attempting to write prose (with a fair bit of beer drinking thrown in for good measure). In other words, boring novel material.

Rewind a few years back, however, and I was scuba diving instructor living on a tiny Caribbean island. Fresh out of college and burnt out on the American Dream, I had sold my stuff, packed my bags, and moved down to Roatan, Honduras, to try out three months of living the island life.

I left five years later.

During my years on the island, I lived an insanely awesome and dangerous life filled with ridiculous adventures: scuba diving with sharks on shipwrecks; spending the night in a homemade submarine 1500ft underwater; finding a freshly-killed murder victim; having a dog explode under my house; saving a girl from drowning 100ft underwater; doing copious amounts of drugs; surviving three hurricanes, two earthquakes, and a political coup d'etat; and of course lots of sex on the beach with foreign women. In other words, perfect novel material.

If only I could write it.

The biggest story from the island-- the one that forms the backbone of my currently 12,000 word WIP-- is about how I accidentally got embroiled in an unsolved international murder mystery that spanned five countries and three years. One tragic night of partying turned into four hundred days of hellish imprisonment for a young woman who unsuccessfully tried to resuscitate a dying girl. Her male roommate vanished from the island and is currently wanted by INTERPOL. I offered my help by means of a Twitter-equipped cell phone... and found myself in the middle of a nightmare.

Write what you know, right? What if what you know could get you killed? It's not paranoia when it actually happens to you... when the hate mail pours in, when the anonymous death threats arrive, when you are personally accosted by a very powerful individuals and explicitly told how you could just "disappear" one day. What then do you write?

But write I must. Every day for the last three years I've known that if I am to do one thing before I die, it's to write this story down. I've tried-- oh I've tried!-- but the writer's block has proven impenetrable. I am certainly in a safer place to write this story than ever before, yet whenever I revisit those events I find myself painfully tongue-tied. I'm not sure if it's the difficulty expressing the memories in words, the pain from reliving certain events, or the spectre of the old death threats, but I am having extreme difficultly finding my voice.

I would greatly appreciate any help on how to write through this mental block, how to organize disjointed life events into an exciting semi-autobiographical novel, and how to find the motivation to write through emotionally difficult sections. Thanks.

You've described the situation adequately, perhaps too fully. I remember those events when they were on the news. Three areas I'd like to suggest considering. One, since the situation is clear, what's the plot? A story's plot has a beginning, middle, and ending.

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf was news-worthy so long as the spill continued. The initial oil rig disaster was the beginning, efforts to stop the leak the middle, capping the leak the ending. There was a central problem wanting satisfaction or dramatic complication. It was satisfied and had a final, unequivocal, irrevocable outcome. Period. Once the ending was reported, the news story was for most intents and purposes over. Until all centrally involved parties and their problems wanting satisfaction have had their final outcomes, is the story over as far as real-world events?

Two, whose perspective is the story really best told from? Who has the greatest emotional stakes? Who is most central to all the dramatic action? Or is the plot best unfolded through an ensemble cast?

Things do get dicey when telling a dramatic account of a real-world event. Litigation is likely, as are threats if the story is published. Dramatic fictionalization of the settings, themes, characters, and events might be a best advantage vantage point.

Somehow, those need to be accounted for. One option, perhaps the safest and potentially most artful course, is to use the real story as a base foundation for a fully fictionalized true account. But that means really developing an understanding of the underlying meaning and greater truth of the events, for a greater good. What's the story really about? Realizing that answer is a key to unlocking the meaning of the story and overcoming writer's block.

As a bystander, I was touched by the events of those fateful events and their parallels to another similar, high-profile situation playing out in the same region of the world. I wanted and still want closure for the one you speak of, that final outcome feeling I got from the oil spill resolution.

You've got a Dragon by the Tail tale, of international intrigues about international personality politics, the countries themselves as influence characters, the global settings and events. I see possibilities and promise. Like I see a social commentary on the state of international policing and its difficulties enforcing across country borders. I see a commentary on the naivete of international tourists. I see a commentary about culture clashes. Are we so different? Or are we of one mind and spirit under the skin? Seeking Old Testament retribution for grievous harm, eye for an eye? Or is there a more enlightened outcome with broad societal ramifications? Since global tourism is an emerging import substitution commodity for struggling country economies, what might be said about the wild west attitudes of predatory international tourists on the prowl and on the lamb (sic)? What makes a predator go global? Maybe the story is in that last, and the main perspective viewpoint. Al la Hannibal Lecter?

Since the final outcome hasn't taken place yet in the real world and since real-world events are complicated by complex coincidence and since real-world attention spans have sought their thrills in other events, bring the story into the present and future; make it public in the sense of psychological horror. It can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere, but give readers a sense global travel is safe and secure by the end. This is a who done it mystery story on its literal surface, but it's a psychological thriller in its figurative depths. Why is it done by whom and why in tourist meccas.

Three, consider a ghost writer's assistance. They're costly but I think the story might ask for one. An enlightened ghost writer would help you develop your creative vision without imposing his or her own creative vision upon it.

Since what you know might get you killed, fit that into the story, too.