Kim Batchelor

Writer of magical realism and other imaginative fiction

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Jan 24 2014

Everyone confuses me for Lady Gaga…and other things I make up

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Lady Gaga

You can’t see me right now, but I’m 5’1. My hair is “platinum” rather than Marilyn-Monroe-blond. I have never worn food, although I once saw a meat dress in the Musee George Pompidou in Paris. Close enough.

Two things: I like to make things up. And I like to inhabit characters in my mind. I’ve been doing it for years. I started early, daydreaming in class. Slipping into my room after school to write volumes based on the characters I imagined into being. Wearing out my poor little typewriter, one spool of ribbon after another (remember ribbon?), telling their stories. Wearing their joys and sorrows and their experiences in the worlds I also invented. It never stopped.

Many say that real writers have to write. We can’t stop ourselves. But isn’t it more accurate that we fiction writers have to tell stories, and that in the process of telling stories, we have to tell the stories of those people we’ve made up?

(Excuse me for a moment. I have a dance number.)

I’m back . So if I were to write a novel based on a tall golden-haired singer with heavy makeup I’d be right there in her head, even as she walks down the street and people stare at her and whisper to the people walking next to them. Then the threatening message is left on my car and I’d realize that the note is not meant for me but that I have to warn the intended target who is performing that night in a meat dress at the local music venue.

Try this at home. Anyone can do it. You don’t have to write it down.

I have to duck out now. Someone who looks just like George Clooney is waiting for me. And, by the way, don’t worry about correcting those people who think I’m Beyoncé. I get that a lot.

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Written by Kim · Categorized: Storytelling, Writers, Writing · Tagged: lady gaga, Storytelling, Writing

Jan 11 2014

Harvest Moon: A Storytelling Blog

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Harvest Moon (compressed)It appears in those moments between waking and sleep. Or slips into a dream. It lurks in the shadow of a corner. A brief conversation overheard gives it a voice. A man sitting alone on a bus wears it. A woman’s face behind heavy makeup shouts it into being.

A story.

Some say that writers write because they have to. I believe that writers write because they have stories that have to be told. And they can’t stop themselves. Those stories that gnaw at me are why I set aside time every day to put words to paper. Writers have to write down those stories that dredge emotions from us, scenes that make us cry, relationships that make us laugh, and, often, situations and conditions that provoke in us rages small and large.

When I decided I wanted to post regularly, to communicate with my readers—current and future— I didn’t want to talk about myself (although I’m sure one might find my ramblings profound and scintillating and, frankly, life-altering to the point you will never be the same).  Instead, I want to know what forms the fuel of inspiration and imagination plays in the creative process by talking to a range of people with ample imaginations. Okay, occasionally I may indulge in sharing my own ruminations. But mostly I want an excuse to hear from creative storytellers, in all the forms their storytelling takes.

The blog is represented by this photo of the “Harvest Moon” originally posted on Facebook by Anna Maria Gardner. This and two other of Anna’s photos inspired me to want to ask her about how these photos speak to her differently than they speak to me. One of the photos inspired a story I’ll be posting on the web site for my children’s book, The Island of Lost Children. There you’ll find the occasional “Five Minute Bedtime Story” as well as blog posts from the characters in the book. I’ve already approached a couple of writers, one of whom draws from the same source for her material as I have, but who approached it in a very different way. I have in mind a new animator who just revealed a very funny project. And songwriters.

Most of all, I want to have fun and occasionally be moved. And, yes, even inspired. So join me on a flight to the moon of harvesting stories every week or so. Who knows where we’ll end up at the end of the flight.

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Written by Kim · Categorized: Creativity, Fantasy, Featured, Imagination, Inspiration, Storytelling, Writers, Writing · Tagged: imagination, inspiration, Storytelling

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