This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Susan Blackwell: SparkFile podcast may contain profanity and other adult content. Please use your discretion.

[0:09] Susan Blackwell: When I bump into something that inspires me, I jump in my spark file. Spark file to be something that I wanna make or how I wanna be. I pump it in my spark file. Spark file. I jump into my spark file. Let's open up the spark file.

[0:37] Laura Camien: Welcome to the Spark File where we believe that everyone is creative, but smart creative people don't go it alone.

[0:43] Susan Blackwell: I'm Susan Blackwell, and we are creativity coaches who help people clarify and accomplish their creative goals.

[0:50] Laura Camien: Know that just by listening to this podcast, you are joining a warm and wonderful clan of creatives.

[0:57] Susan Blackwell: You may also be asking yourself, what exactly is a spark file?

[1:01] Laura Camien: Hmm.

[1:02] Susan Blackwell: A spark file is a place where you consistently collect all of your inspirations and fascinations.

[1:08] Laura Camien: Every episode, we're gonna reach into our spark files and exchange some sparks.

[1:12] Susan Blackwell: And from time to time, we're gonna talk to some folks who spark us too.

[1:16] Laura Camien: And your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to take some of those sparks of inspiration and make something of your own.

[1:23] Susan Blackwell: So without further ado, let's open up the file.

[1:32] Laura Camien: I'm excited.

[1:33] Susan Blackwell: Ooh, because I got a goodie for you today.

[1:36] Laura Camien: Okay.

[1:37] Susan Blackwell: I can't wait.

[1:38] Laura Camien: I'm oh yeah, I'm just gonna sit back and relax.

[1:42] Susan Blackwell: I brushed this the other day, but we didn't get into it because we were busy working and we didn't have time.

[1:49] Laura Camien: But yeah, over the holidays, I was looking for a book to read simply for pleasure.

[1:55] Susan Blackwell: Oh my gosh.

[1:56] Laura Camien: Because when the spark file is galloping along, most of my reading is connected to work, either research or podcast or curriculum, reading our clients' work.

[2:05] Susan Blackwell: But I wanted to read something completely for pleasure.

[2:10] Laura Camien: And when I say read, I mean listen to it on audio because that is my joy and my jam.

[2:17] Susan Blackwell: Oh my God, I love an audiobook.

[2:19] Laura Camien: Yes.

[2:20] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[2:21] Laura Camien: So I started an audiobook by Stephen King called 112263.

[2:30] Susan Blackwell: It is fun.

[2:32] Laura Camien: This book, it's all about a high school English teacher who in 2011 inherits a time portal that drops him into the late 1950s.

[2:42] Susan Blackwell: And he goes on a quest to attempt to prevent some terrible things from happening, including the assassination of JFK.

[2:50] Laura Camien: It is history, it is science fiction.

[2:54] Susan Blackwell: Wait, wait, okay.

[2:57] Laura Camien: I was gonna be like, how have I never ever ever heard of this?

[3:02] Susan Blackwell: And now I'm realizing A, I've not read the book, but I love Stephen King.

[3:08] Laura Camien: Um, but I think they made a TV show.

[3:10] Susan Blackwell: They did, I saw it.

[3:12] Laura Camien: Wait, yeah, don't say anything.

[3:14] Susan Blackwell: I won't say that.

[3:14] Laura Camien: Because I'm about 30 pages to the end of the book.

[3:17] Susan Blackwell: Oh, I don't know how it ends.

[3:19] Laura Camien: And I don't know, they only did one season of that show, I believe.

[3:23] Susan Blackwell: And I don't know if it can so much happens in that book.

[3:26] Laura Camien: I'm like, could they cover it all in one season of a TV show?

[3:29] Susan Blackwell: Well, I don't know because I saw the show, but I have not read the book, but now I want to read the book.

[3:33] Laura Camien: Oh my god.

[3:34] Susan Blackwell: Because you teased me with this idea that you're reading a Stephen King thing that has based in history, and I was like, What?

[3:42] Laura Camien: How am I? I don't even know. What is it? How did I not hear that?

[3:45] Susan Blackwell: And then I was like, that's all we have time for.

[3:47] Laura Camien: Uh yeah.

[3:47] Susan Blackwell: Back to work.

[3:48] Laura Camien: You guys, this is how brutal it is.

[3:50] Susan Blackwell: Brutal with the teasing.

[3:52] Laura Camien: Um, but I knew we were gonna talk about it on this podcast.

[3:55] Susan Blackwell: It's it is a very entertaining book.

[3:58] Laura Camien: I'm I am excited to see where it ends.

[4:03] Susan Blackwell: I have no idea how he is going to end this book, which is pretty fun.

[4:10] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[4:10] Susan Blackwell: When you're 30 pages from the ending of a book and you're like, I don't know where we're headed, that's where we're going.

[4:16] Laura Camien: I mean, that's skill.

[4:17] Susan Blackwell: That is Stephen King skill.

[4:19] Laura Camien: And you know what? I was reminded by this book how much I enjoy the writing of Stephen King.

[4:25] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[4:25] Laura Camien: The creativity and the surprise that he serves up.

[4:30] Susan Blackwell: And when reading 112263, I was also reminded of another Stephen King book that I have read and reread so many times.

[4:39] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[4:39] Susan Blackwell: Like an old friend that I returned to, and I cannot believe in five seasons of this podcast and the hundreds of sparks we have covered, neither of us has done an episode on Stephen King's On Writing.

[4:52] Laura Camien: Yes, I've almost done it, Susan.

[4:54] Susan Blackwell: I have almost done it.

[4:56] Laura Camien: Because I too, I was going through my books and I was gonna get rid of books, and I'm like, oh my God, here are two different copies of it, both earmarked, underlined, et cetera.

[5:06] Susan Blackwell: And then a third and a fourth copy that apparently I rebought at some time, and I'm like, okay, do I love this book or do I love this book?

[5:15] Laura Camien: How many times do I want to purchase this book?

[5:17] Susan Blackwell: It's so good.

[5:18] Laura Camien: It's a great book, but great gift, great gift for a writer.

[5:18] Susan Blackwell: Great gift for a writer.

[5:23] Laura Camien: Holy crap.

[5:24] Susan Blackwell: So I thought before we make another season of the Spark File Podcast, we better get this one in here.

[5:31] Laura Camien: I'm gonna spark you with.

[5:32] Susan Blackwell: Oh, this is good.

[5:33] Laura Camien: Yes, people ask, I'm sure they ask you too.

[5:36] Susan Blackwell: They ask us all the time if we can recommend books about fill in the blank.

[5:41] Laura Camien: And one of the top requests is what books do we recommend about writing?

[5:47] Susan Blackwell: And there's a student who I had in one of my early creativity workshops.

[5:52] Laura Camien: I'm gonna call them Joyce, and I recommended to Joyce what I always recommend, which is Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird, yeah, and Stephen King's On Writing.

[6:01] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[6:02] Laura Camien: So this is like classique, and as evidenced by Laura's four copies.

[6:09] Susan Blackwell: So first I have to shout out the cover of this book.

[6:12] Laura Camien: My edition has a cover that's a photo of the exterior of a house with white siding, a big window glowing with light from the inside.

[6:23] Susan Blackwell: There's flowers next to the external double cellar door.

[6:28] Laura Camien: Uh-huh, the kind where you can access the basement from the outside of the house, the kind of family might scramble into if a twister was coming.

[6:35] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[6:36] Laura Camien: You know what I'm talking about.

[6:37] Susan Blackwell: I do also there's something about that cover on a Stephen King book that I just love.

[6:44] Laura Camien: So at first glance, the image is luminous, but what lurks behind those cellar doors beneath the house?

[6:51] Susan Blackwell: I just want to say kudos to whoever designed that book cover.

[6:56] Laura Camien: It is so witty to me.

[6:59] Susan Blackwell: It's still it's so Stephen King.

[7:01] Laura Camien: Yes.

[7:02] Susan Blackwell: Even though the book is about writing.

[7:04] Laura Camien: But it's also about, he talks about the man in the basement.

[7:07] Susan Blackwell: He calls the muse the man in the basement.

[7:09] Laura Camien: And I was like, this is such a great.

[7:12] Susan Blackwell: I love that cover, but the book has been out for decades now.

[7:16] Laura Camien: It's been out for so long that there's many different cover designs for that book at this point.

[7:23] Susan Blackwell: This is a book that both Laura and I check in with every few years.

[7:27] Laura Camien: I really love this book.

[7:29] Susan Blackwell: It is a delightful buffet, and you learn about Stephen King's background and upbringing.

[7:34] Laura Camien: I think he hoped that it would shine a light on those early seeds of why he became a writer, how he became a writer.

[7:45] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[7:46] Laura Camien: Events that I think he doesn't necessarily draw the dotted line for you, but influenced the kind of writing that he likes to make as an adult.

[7:59] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[8:00] Laura Camien: He also shares a toolbox of really, really helpful technical tools.

[8:06] Susan Blackwell: And he shares an amazing true story about why the book almost didn't get completed.

[8:12] Laura Camien: Um there was a he was in the midst of writing the book, and there was a major disruption that almost prevented the book from being completed.

[8:20] Susan Blackwell: So it's it's a it's not a long book, but it's just such a such a buffet.

[8:25] Laura Camien: And Stephen King says right at the top that it's a short book because most books about writing are filled with bullshit.

[8:30] Susan Blackwell: So he figured the shorter the book, the less the bullshit.

[8:35] Laura Camien: Which is a great indicator of one of the reasons that I think I'm drawn to Stephen King as an artist.

[8:42] Susan Blackwell: He comes from a working class background.

[8:44] Laura Camien: He reminds me of where I'm from, kind of this run-down place where kids run feral through the neighborhood.

[8:52] Susan Blackwell: And I enjoy that those places and people are represented in his work.

[8:59] Laura Camien: When you think about the group of kids in the series It or The Teenagers in Carrie, and many of the characters and locations that are represented in 112263, they're familiar to me.

[9:14] Susan Blackwell: And I appreciate that.

[9:16] Laura Camien: And I also appreciate that all the success that King has experienced came from his talent, his creativity, his joy in writing, his work ethic and commitment to writing.

[9:27] Susan Blackwell: It was not about privilege or being well connected.

[9:30] Laura Camien: He is a self-made artist, which always it gives me hope for myself and it gives me hope for other people who came from those types of backgrounds.

[9:42] Susan Blackwell: Amen.

[9:43] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[9:44] Susan Blackwell: Amen.

[9:45] Laura Camien: I remember like, I remember him talking about like his process and my takeaway somehow was also like, I understand his process.

[9:57] Susan Blackwell: And he's also saying, you don't have to do it like this.

[10:00] Laura Camien: That's but just fucking do it.

[10:02] Susan Blackwell: However, it works for you is how you should do it.

[10:05] Laura Camien: He's really clear about that, about uh, you know, journalists.

[10:09] Susan Blackwell: I mean, he's been interviewed so much and asked so many times, like, where do ideas come from?

[10:15] Laura Camien: And how do you how do you write a story?

[10:19] Susan Blackwell: And he talks about it in a really specific way, like a story comes to him, and it's almost like a fossil underground.

[10:29] Laura Camien: And it's his job to very carefully, sometimes with a shovel, but a lot of times with like a feather and a Q-tip to extract the story fossil as completely and as undamaged as possible.

[10:45] Susan Blackwell: And he's also like, and that's how I think of it, and that is my process.

[10:52] Laura Camien: And it is that doesn't mean that it has to be any other writer's process.

[10:57] Susan Blackwell: Which is so refreshing because I I remember it feeling like it gave me permission to just figure out what process works for me.

[11:06] Laura Camien: And that is the process.

[11:08] Susan Blackwell: That's right.

[11:09] Laura Camien: And he stresses that the way that he, and this is so evidenced in the book that I'm reading now that I have 30 more pages left of.

[11:39] Susan Blackwell: And then he goes back on subsequent draft passes and considers theme, beefs things up, yeah, plants seeds that will pay off later.

[11:50] Laura Camien: But yeah, these things like this doesn't want to be revealed this early.

[11:55] Laura Camien: I'm gonna move it to, you know, chapter 13 or whatever.

[11:58] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, yeah.

[11:59] Laura Camien: So this book is it's it's just a slim little book, but it is so chock a block with sparks. And I just wanted to share a few of them, maybe to entice you to pick it up yourself. But this is just gonna be uh the the tip of the sparkberg, as we say.

[12:15] Susan Blackwell: This makes me so happy, Susan Blackwell.

[12:18] Laura Camien: So he wrote Carrie when he was teaching English at a local high school. He was living in a rented double wide trailer and driving a car with a transmission that he couldn't afford to fix. His wife Tabitha, who he calls Tabby, who he is so in love with, was working at Dunkin' Donuts. They had two little kids and they couldn't afford a phone. He was spending his summer months washing sheets and tablecloths at the new Franklin Laundry, a job that he had previously done full time. And he acknowledges that writing on top of his teaching job was the most challenging part for him. Many of us know this challenge of trying to, you know, make sure that the rent on the double wide trailer is paid and carving out our creativity in the margins.

But he said his wife made a crucial difference in those two years, that her support and belief in him was a constant. And I think it's this is really worth noting. Having someone or someone's believe in you and your work is pretty priceless, and it can help keep you going.

[13:32] Susan Blackwell: Well, we firmly believe in that.

[13:32] Laura Camien: We do. We do. We practice that at the Spark File. Another thing that I love about this book, he shares where some of the sparks came from for some of his most well known stories. You may have heard us say that sparks are everywhere. And Stephen King provides evidence of this. During high school, Stephen had a job at the Rumbo Mills. He bagged fab like loose fabric. He dyed fabric. And one 4th of July weekend, they offered time and a half for workers who were willing to spend the weekend cleaning the mill from top to bottom. And because he was just like a lowly high school student, they picked other people first for those jobs. He wasn't even present for the cleaning, but when he returned to work, this is Stephen King's writing. These are his words. One of the dye house guys told me I should have been there. It was wild. The rats down in that basement were as big as cats, he said. Some of them, goddamn, if they weren't as big as dogs. Rats as big as dogs.

[14:36] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[14:37] Laura Camien: One day late in my final semester of college, finals over and at loose ends. I recalled the dye house guy's story about the rats under the mill, big as cats, goddamn, some as big as dogs, and started writing a story called Graveyard Shift. So someone mentions something to him about this like wet basement and the giant rats that were, and he just tucked it somewhere into his mental spark file and pulled it out because as a kid he was obsessed with like horror comics and sci-fi. And so he just plugged it into his writing. Another example, King had a part-time summer job as a janitor at Brunswick High, and he got paired with a guy named Harry, a war veteran. And one day they were charged with cleaning the girls' locker room.

And Stephen King saw things in that girl's locker room that they didn't have in the boys' locker room, including special trash cans bolted to the wall that Harry taught him were used to dispose of like feminine hygiene products and tampons. The memory of the images that he, you know, observed in the girls' locker room came back to him one day while he was working at the laundry job. And he was working at the laundry job. He's working on the machines, putting big, like gross, dirty linens into the washing machines. And he began in his mind's eye to see the opening scene of Carrie, where Carrie starts her period and is met with cruelty and bullying. And he had also read an article in Life magazine some years before suggesting that at least some reported poltergeist activity might actually be telekinetic phenomena, telekinesis being the ability to move objects just by thinking about them.

And uh he says there was some evidence to suggest that young people might have such powers, especially girls in early adolescence, right around the time of their first period. Pow Stephen King writes two unrelated ideas, adolescent cruelty and telekinesis came together, and I had an idea.

[16:54] Laura Camien: Now, around the spark file, we'd call that creation by recombination. But then Stephen King fills in the details about the character of Carrie from two girls that he had known and gone to high school with. One was bullied for wearing the same clothes day after day after day after day. And the other one had a mother who had a large crucifix hanging over the couch in their living room and their trailer. King had helped them move some furniture in their house and had seen it. I was just like the way that his mind, his mind is a spark file, and the way that it creates by recombination. And the way that he can tell us that is just it was it's such a fun tour of his brain and his writing process. This book so good.

[17:50] Susan Blackwell: So good.

[17:51] Laura Camien: And something else I want to underline here, and King's book reinforces this for me, is my belief that nothing is for not. Nothing is for not, friends. So my version of this is you're me, you move to New York City to become an actor, and in the meantime, you work in a corporate office to pay the bills. And that may feel like it's not advancing you towards your creative dreams in a meaningful way. But I'm gonna tell you the many years of experience I had working in those environments with those people commuting on the subways of New York City, wearing that drag, being in those meetings, I draw on that stuff all the time as a writer, as a performer, and no acting class prepared me more for acting on camera than working on Park Avenue.

None and Stephen King's work proves over and over again that nothing is for not, like all of that, all of it, all of it. All of it, all the high school friends, all of the weird jobs, tiny bits of scientific knowledge, or you know, like just combining little bits of things. So when you jot something down in your spark mile, as I often do, that's like science related. I'm like, I I'm not going to be writing uh a science paper at any point, but this sparks me for some reason. I don't know why, I don't know why. And uh we'll see what happens with it. But these are great examples of how you combine it with another idea, and boom.

[19:30] Susan Blackwell: Boom.

[19:31] Laura Camien: Yeah. So as I was rereading on writing, I realized that the novel 112263 that I'm almost done with, it pulls in so many experiences from King's life. The details, the scenic backdrops, the wardrobe, the dialects, the streets, the cars. So much of it is pulled from his lived experience. And I wouldn't have realized it unless I was sort of reading them in parallel. So take it from me and Stephen King, nothing is for naught. And it all goes into the big rag bag of your imagination. And you get to draw from all of it. Because as we say around the spark file, if you have to live through it, you might as well make something out of it.

[20:17] Susan Blackwell: You know what I love? Can I just say like I love his ability to um make the most um crazy kind of idea grounded in reality? And I mean that by like Christine, the a car, a haunted, a car that's haunted, fire starter. I absolutely loved the way it was so grounded in reality. I actually believed like there are people who could start a fire with their mind with a push. Um, and that whole interaction I've never forgotten between like the dad who's like at the end if he's got no juice left, um, and he and also he's at the end of his rope in his life, and he has to like give a cab driver a dollar and use his mind to give him a little push to convince him it's a 20. And like just the way he writes about it, as I say that, I'm like, that sounds absurd, but the way he writes it, it's so grounded in reality, and it's a reminder, you get to make up all the rules.

[21:23] Laura Camien: Well, he is doing this so beautifully in the novel that I'm reading now. The rules of engagement around slipping through a time portal.

[21:29] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[21:34] Laura Camien: And I don't want to spoil anything for anybody who's going to read this book, but one of the rules of engagement in that particular book that I just love, and he writes it so consistently, which I think is why it also feels organic in the books that you're citing.

[21:53] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, is the the idea that time and the past is obdurate and it does not want to be changed.

[22:02] Laura Camien: So if you are trying to change historical outcomes, say the amount of resistance is going to be really strong. If you're trying to change a little thing, you might feel a little resistance, but there are certain pieces of sci-fi or world building where I'm sort of like, okay, the rules of engagement aren't super clear, or they don't feel like they are married to reason.

[22:31] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[22:31] Laura Camien: And this feels like it is married to reason.

[22:34] Susan Blackwell: That's a great way of putting it.

[22:36] Laura Camien: He always grounds it in reason, logic, so that you're sort of like, yeah, that makes sense.

[22:43] Susan Blackwell: The organic too, Laura, that push that you're talking about, and they even do they even use that term in Firestarter the push.

[22:50] Laura Camien: Push in on writing, Stephen King says early in the book that when he and his brother Dave would instead of saying, I have to go to the bathroom, they would say, I have to push.

[23:06] Susan Blackwell: Amazing.

[23:07] Laura Camien: And that to me is funny that those things are tied together. But I also think we understand that sort of like an organic, yeah, muscular exertion.

[23:17] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[23:18] Laura Camien: And we can translate it into a mental exertion.

[23:22] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[23:22] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[23:24] Susan Blackwell: So fascinating.

[23:26] Laura Camien: Oh my God. I love this book.

[23:27] Susan Blackwell: Are you gonna make me pick it back up again?

[23:30] Laura Camien: Yeah, it's a fun read. And it's it's a it's a fun read, and it is I think surprisingly deep and useful for such uh slim book.

[23:42] Laura Camien: In on writing, Stephen King also offers us a fantastic toolkit to use as we write, rewrite, and edit our work.

[23:51] Susan Blackwell: And I mean like grammar, adverbs, really useful 101 stuff.

[23:59] Laura Camien: And one thing he shares is his foundational belief that in order to be a writer, you should be reading and writing a lot.

[24:10] Susan Blackwell: Oh my god, yes.

[24:12] Laura Camien: Yes, he's so clear about that.

[24:13] Susan Blackwell: Like he's yeah, he's really clear about it.

[24:16] Laura Camien: And I know that I know from my own firsthand experience and from the report of so many clients and friends who are writers, sometimes getting started, keeping the commitments to ourselves can be hard.

[24:29] Susan Blackwell: But if you want to be a writer, you have to be writing and reading a lot.

[24:35] Laura Camien: And I want to share uh uh extended passage where he speaks about this.

[24:40] Susan Blackwell: Okay.

[24:41] Laura Camien: My own schedule is pretty clear cut. Mornings belong to whatever is new, the current composition. Afternoons are for naps and letters, evenings are for reading, family, Red Sox games on TV, and any revisions that just cannot wait. Basically, mornings are my prime writing time. Once I start work on a project, I don't stop and I don't slow down unless I absolutely have to. If I don't write every day, the characters begin to stale off in my mind. They begin to seem like characters instead of real people. The tale's narrative cutting edge starts to rust, and I begin to lose my hold on the story's plot and pace. Worst of all, the excitement of spinning something new begins to fade. The work starts to feel like work.

And for most writers, that is the smooch of death. Writing is at its best, always, always, always, when it is a kind of inspired play for the writer. I can write in cold blood if I have to, but I like it best when it's fresh and almost too hot to handle. I used to tell interviewers that I wrote every day except for Christmas, the 4th of July, and my birthday. That was a lie. I told them that because if you agree to an interview, you have to say something, and it plays better if it's something at least half clever. Also, I didn't want to sound like a workaholic dweeb, just a workaholic, I guess. The truth is that when I'm writing, I write every day, workaholic dweeb or not. That includes Christmas, the fourth, and my birthday.

At my age, you try to ignore your goddamn birthday anyway. And when I'm not working, I'm not working at all. Although during those periods of full stop, I usually feel at loose ends with myself and have trouble sleeping.

[26:22] Susan Blackwell: Wow.

[26:23] Laura Camien: Stephen King stresses this is his process, and it doesn't have to be your process, but I do agree, if you want to be a writer, I'm going to say it for the third time, you've got to be writing.

[26:34] Susan Blackwell: And reading a lot helps too.

[26:36] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[26:37] Susan Blackwell: Writing and reading. He writes, uh, depending on I think his age and his project, he writes, as of the writing of this book, which was several decades ago, he says he wrote about 2,000 words a day.

[26:52] Laura Camien: And he sometimes gets there by 11:30 a.m. And sometimes he doesn't get there until deep into the afternoon. But however he gets there, he gets there.

[27:02] Susan Blackwell: He recommends working in a serene atmosphere, doesn't have to be fancy, a dedicated nook with little distraction, preferably no TV, no phone, and I'll add no social media.

[27:14] Laura Camien: No boy.

[27:15] Susan Blackwell: With the door you can close to communicate to yourself and the world that you mean business.

[27:21] Laura Camien: Oh yeah.

[27:22] Susan Blackwell: He recommends that if you are new to writing, that you begin by setting a lower word count goal, say 1,000 words, and that you take one day a week off. He feels that if you take more than one day a week off, you'll lose the urgency and the immediacy of your story. So show up six days a week and write one word at a time until you get to 1,000 words.

[27:48] Laura Camien: Real talk.

[27:50] Susan Blackwell: Real talk talk.

[27:51] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[27:51] Susan Blackwell: That's how you'll get it done.

[27:53] Laura Camien: That's how you'll get it done. He says sometimes those words come hard to begin with. It's like exercising with stiff muscles. You have to loosen them up and then you're on fire. Sometimes the words come easily. Some mornings it's like working on an assembly line or in a warehouse. But every now and then you suddenly find yourself lifted to another plane of existence. I know how florid that sounds, but it's true.

[28:19] Susan Blackwell: And I think he's right.

[28:20] Laura Camien: I do too.

[28:21] Susan Blackwell: I think he's right.

[28:22] Laura Camien: I do too. I feel like he's talking about those times where like you step away and you come back and read what you wrote, and you're like, who wrote that? Where did that come from? Uh I don't, you know, I don't recollect coming up with that line or something.

[28:37] Susan Blackwell: That is the drug of writing.

[28:38] Laura Camien: That's candy.

[28:39] Susan Blackwell: Beauty.

[28:41] Laura Camien: So good.

[28:43] Susan Blackwell: What a spark. I I feel like this is the key to his success, truly. He truly seems to take great joy in writing and reading.

[28:55] Laura Camien: He says, When I'm writing, it's all the playground, and the worst three hours I ever spent there were still pretty damned good.

[29:03] Susan Blackwell: Oh. It is my observation of myself that I I don't love writing as much as Stephen King loves writing, which makes sense because he has put out so much and I put out much less. But this is somebody who really, really has tapped into the joy of writing.

[29:22] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[29:23] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[29:23] Laura Camien: Yeah, for sure.

[29:24] Susan Blackwell: And you can feel it in his, you know, in his writing. But I do think that it may have a good amount to do with like those breaks that you take away from writing, what it takes to like, let's get that engine going again. And it feels like it's sputtering a little bit. But working your way through that and sticking with it so that then you get, you know, when that engine is running. Um, but the more take breaks we take away from it, the I think the harder it is to get back into that groove.

[29:56] Laura Camien: And to me, exercise is the best analogy to writing.

[29:58] Susan Blackwell: Exactly.

[29:59] Laura Camien: Yeah, it is.

[30:00] Susan Blackwell: And it is exercising, just a mental and creative muscle.

[30:03] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[30:04] Susan Blackwell: He says, I have sat down to write on days when I was feeling fine. I have sat down on days when I was sick with the flu and running a fever. I sat down on days when I had a horrible hangover. I worked on this book after being struck by a minivan while I was out for an afternoon walk with my broken leg stretched out under the desk. And do you know what? The worst day I ever had was fucking great. This is a person who loves writing, and I think whose life has been made and healed by writing too.

[30:39] Laura Camien: Oh yes.

[30:41] Susan Blackwell: I mean, the joy that Stephen King feels when writing is flowing, when he's capturing a great piece of storytelling, I think that he genuinely wishes that for all of us who write.

[30:55] Laura Camien: In January of 2024, King wrote an afterword to the anniversary edition of On Writing, and it concluded with this. Nothing lasts forever, and I fully realize that I've got a lot more road behind me than there is ahead. But over the years, I have had a chance to hone what talent God or whoever gave me. Have I given my constant readers pleasure as we walk that road together? Taken them away from the everyday and plunged them into a world of make believe. In other words, have I given them a measure of joy? If so, understand that I felt that joy first. That delight in the story. Would you like to do this job? Okay. Get started. I wish you well. And I wish you joy.

[31:45] Susan Blackwell: Come on.

[31:46] Laura Camien: We also wish all of you writers such joy. And I wanted to share one last thing. I recommend, as I said earlier, I recommended this to Joyce, my young student, who said, What book should I read? And I was like, Bird by Bird and Stephen King's on writing. So a little bit of time passed, and I don't know, a month, and I got an email from Joyce. And Joyce said, Okay, I finished those two books. What should I read next? And I said, You shouldn't read anything. You should write.

[32:21] Susan Blackwell: Right.

[32:23] Laura Camien: And I want to say that to all of you too. Read it, read on writing. It's a wonderful book. And then write, write, write, write, write, write, write, write, right, write. Hopefully, with a fraction of the joy that Stephen King has felt in his writing and the joy that he has brought to all of us readers.

[32:42] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[32:43] Laura Camien: Yes.

[32:45] Susan Blackwell: Well done, Susan.

[32:48] Laura Camien: I love the spark.

[32:49] Susan Blackwell: I love this.

[32:50] Laura Camien: Love this book. I love these messages from Stephen King.

[32:54] Susan Blackwell: Truly the best.

[32:56] Laura Camien: And again, it's not for Stephen King is not forbidden. He reminds me so much of like my people that I love that somebody that comes from what he comes from has grown into such an astounding artist.

[33:14] Susan Blackwell: I I think he's I I think his writing is tremendous.

[33:18] Laura Camien: Same.

[33:18] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[33:19] Laura Camien: Same.

[33:19] Susan Blackwell: And not all of it's for me. Like I'm not a horror person. You know that. And and I know you're not either. And yet, because they're so grounded in reality, I can read a book about a car that's been possessed and be engaged and creeped our pet cemetery or any of these where I'm like, what am I doing reading this book? It's the writing.

[33:41] Laura Camien: It's so good.

[33:42] Susan Blackwell: The writing is so good.

[33:44] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[33:46] Susan Blackwell: Thank you, Stephen King.

[33:47] Laura Camien: Thank you, Stephen King.

[33:49] Susan Blackwell: And thank you, Susan Blackwell.

[33:50] Laura Camien: Well, my pleasure, Laura Camien.

[33:52] Susan Blackwell: And I think that's it. This episode of The Spark File was made on the lands of the Lenape and the Mohican people.

[33:58] Laura Camien: And as always, we hope it put another bunch of sparks in your file.

[34:02] Susan Blackwell: Hey, listen, if there's a spark you'd like us to explore, or if you'd like to learn more about how to coach with us to accomplish your creative goals, email get creative at the sparkfile.com or reach us through our website, thesparkfile.com.

[34:18] Laura Camien: Hey, we will even happily take your feedback, but you know the price of admission. First, you gotta share a creative risk that you've taken recently.

[34:26] Susan Blackwell: You can follow us on social at the sparkfile and be sure to subscribe, rate, and five-star review this podcast. It really helps other listeners to find us.

[34:35] Laura Camien: Also, if you like this podcast, we hope you'll share it with people that you love.

[34:39] Susan Blackwell: And if you didn't like it, get down, get down real close to that opening of the sewer.

[34:45] Laura Camien: Get down in there. There's somebody down there who wants to talk to you.

[34:50] Susan Blackwell: If something lights you up and gets your creative sparks flying, we are writing you a forever permission slip to make that thing that's been knocking at your door.

[35:00] Laura Camien: It is your turn to take that spark and fan it into a flame.

[35:06] Susan Blackwell: You know, you gotta take it and make it when I bope into something that inspires me. I dump it in my spark fire.

[35:19] Laura Camien: Spark could be something that I wanna make or how I wanna be.

[35:25] Susan Blackwell: I pump it in the spark fire.

[35:30] Laura Camien: I jump into my spark fire.

[35:34] Susan Blackwell: Let's open up the spark fire.