Where the idea for ‘The Secrets of Sirona’ came from
I had the idea for The Secrets of Sirona nearly fifteen years ago…
I was still living at home and on semester break at university. I was tasked with folding laundry. Towels and socks, two loads full for a household of four adults. The towels needed to be folded and distributed across the linen cupboards in two bathrooms, the socks needed to be sorted in their pairs, folded and placed on the bed of the owner.
It was ridiculously tedious work, and the last thing I wanted to do while I was on break. It’s also worth mentioning that this was before smartphones and before podcasts and digital audiobooks were at my fingertips and in my pocket.
So, to pass the time, I started pretending I was someone else. Anyone else.
Who could I be right now? What person, what character would be folding piles of clean and dry laundry? What would she look like, sound like? How would she walk? What would her story be? And then Sirona was born: the tale of a foreign young healer, far from home and burdened with many secrets in the name of survival.
Imagining stories has always been a coping mechanism of mine to cure boredom. It works, too. It doesn’t matter what I’m doing or where I am, I can snap a filter over the situation and pretend I’m someone else and somewhere else. Like a good old fashioned game of “playing pretend”.
Many years later when I was dedicated to finishing an entire draft of one of my many story ideas, Sirona came back to me, Idris too. The laws of Pancara, the side characters and the political situation in Evernene, Bastillia and beyond felt like details that had been growing in my subconscious over the years, and the details arrived on the page when they needed to.
And it all started from folding a stack of towels.
The next time you’re bored out of your brains doing tedious but necessary menial tasks, why not have a go at wondering who else could be in your shoes at that moment? What would they look like, sound like? What’s their favourite food? What’s their story? Where have they been and where are they going? There are no rules and no limitations.
Maybe once the task is done, you might feel inspired to grab a notebook or open a word document and start writing down an amazing story of your very own.
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Currently reading:
The Serpent and the Wings of Night - Carissa Broadbent
Serpent and Dove - Shelby Mahurin
Currently listening to:
Anoana - Heilung
