Excuse Me, Your Personality Slip is Showing

Taken from http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/

"For books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul whose progeny they are;

Nay, they do preserve as in a vial the purest effigy and extraction of that living intellect which bred them."

~ John Milton (Areopagitica 1644)

Sometimes I get asked, "How much of yourself is in your books? Are any of the characters you?"

Answers: Everything. All.

Writing a novel is not a sterile environment. The author doesn't gear up in a haz-mat suit or scrub-a-dub in a bleach shower before, during, or after writing. Writers' fingerprints are everywhere in a novel.

Think of one of your favorite books. The author who wrote it is a conglomeration of all the characters (yes, even the antagonist). Wouldn't it be fun to meet that person? I've had several opportunities to meet my favorite authors and yep, I can totally see bits and pieces of their characters in their personalities.

John Milton sure had it right 400 years ago.