All the crayons in the box

Just as every reader has a “to be read” pile somewhere in their life, every writer I know has a “to be written” pile of their own. These are the stories, ideas, inspirations that continue to bounce around inside our brains even as we try daily to focus on the work in progress in front of us

An interesting topic came up in my online writers group this week about the idea of writing in more than one genre. As you can imagine, the split on if this was a good idea or not was about 50/50 with most of us. Some felt that you spend all this time writing and trying to create your own unique voice that you are somehow diminishing your talents by “splitting” your focus by jumping between genres. Others took the view that exploring more than one type of story, or theme, or really any type of writing was part of the beauty of the art and allows a certain level of playfulness to what we do.

Can a truly great author of children’s novels suddenly turn and become just as good (or better) at writing hard-core adult suspense? Seems to have worked out well of JK Rowling, who also writes under then name Robert Galbraith. (I highly recommend ‘Cuckoo’s Calling’ as an intro to her street tough detective, by the way.) It’s easy to find a list of authors throughout history who’ve done it: Nora Roberts writes a J.D. Robb, Steven King wrote as Richard Bachman, etc. I once heard a story that Nora Roberts publisher had been pushing her into writing in another name/genre. Nora wasn’t really interested at first, but the publisher put it to her this way: “Have you ever heard of Diet Coke? You think Coke makes all that money just selling one kind of drink?”

When asked, I always tell people I’m an “all the crayons in the box” kind of person. I loved coloring as a child, and when I find time as an adult, I still enjoy it not just because of the simple fun of putting color on paper but for me it was about getting as MUCH color on each page as I could. If there were 64 colors in my box, I was sure as shootin’ trying to get every color on the page.

So back to the start of this blog, as a writer isn’t telling different types of stories, in different ways just us simply using all the crayons in our box? I know that if I’m writing an adventure/coming of age story its going to include a lot of Raw Sienna, Sepia, and Tumbleweed browns, cast against Granny Smith Apple, Olive Green, and Sea Green with plenty of Cornflower Blue along the way. Romance, you ask? Magenta, Wild Strawberry, Champaign White and Tickle me Pink should work, only if I can go deeper and a bit darker with Plum and Orchid purples, and Periwinkle Blue to set the tone.
Science Fiction/Fantasy allows me to include lots of Purple Pizzaz, Razzle Dazzle Rose, Electric Lime, Laser Lemon and Mango Tango to light up the universe. The new metallic crayons must also be represented as well so let’s add some Blast Off Bronze, Cyber Grape, and Sonic Silver too.

Even if you never write a best seller, or make the top of anyone else’s chart, at the end of the day you’ve created something beautiful and colorful to add to your own, and maybe someone else’s life. And isn’t that part of what we are all trying to do with both our lives and our work?