I haven’t posted here in a while. Amidst life’s tumults of both the happy and weighty variety, I’ve been making some progress on my current manuscript. No word from my agent in a while. This is a time for keeping my head down and plowing through the new project, trying not to worry about the previous.

The early stages of a new art project are always uncomfortable for me. I think that’s how it should be. I recall Neil Gaiman once talking about how an author needs to write more openly than he is comfortable with.

I think that goes beyond simply being honest and forthcoming and expressing oneself before the world and its judgment. There is also the discomfort of beginning something new without knowing … not for sure … if it’s something you can even do.

Last night I finished Chapter 4 of Blood Game, which features my protagonist, Thomas Vale, talking to his counselor, psychologist Dr. Jasiri Stallworth. It’s an open discussion about how he is navigating his life, dialogue-driven obviously, and therein lies the difficulty.

While I feel like I know Thomas pretty well, I’m creating and developing Jasiri as a new character in this very scene. And that means stepping outside what I know, and trying to become someone else — a difficult thing to do. Jasiri is older than me, a woman, black, blind, and has an emotional intelligence and understanding of human cognition that I will never possess. And I get to decide how she talks and what she has to say.

I feel a little lost, because, well … of course I do. But therein lies the challenge, and the fun. As Bjork Gudmundsdottir might say, “if you don’t take any risks, you don’t get any treats.”

At the end of the day, you just have to do your research, and then do your best. And try to remember that’s it’s OK to be out of your comfort zone, because that’s where the learning happens.