Gone to the Dogs

Guest Blogger Maria Hammarblad

Throughout my life, my imagination has been both my best friend and my worst enemy. It helps me write novels, but if I'm alone when it's dark outside, my mind says, "Check out the shadow over there, doesn't that look just like a ghost/monster/vampire/whatever-was-on-TV?" Or, "Hey, we haven't had any break-ins in the area for a long time. Didn't that guy walking down the street earlier look kinda scary, what if he comes back?"

Luckily, dogs cure most self-induced worries. Even if the logic behind it is iffy (in daylight I too know there aren't any monsters) I can't have a saber-toothed evil under my bed, because there's a dog sleeping there. If the guy on the street really is a scary robber, he'll probably pick a house with less barking.

I have a big gang of make-believe friends living in my head too. Some of them have complete lives with long stories, and others are more fragmented. They have one thing in common: they all want to come out to play when I can't do anything about it, like when I'm at the daytime job. I think they like to tease me, because it's really hard to concentrate on mundane tasks with an epic space battle playing out in one's head.

The heroines can be particularly difficult; they like waking me up in the middle of the night with awesome ideas of something cool the hero just did. Luckily, I anticipate it and keep my iPod by the bed. The keyboard is small, but functional. Imaginary people have such poor manners…

From time to time, people ask me if there's something I absolutely need in order to write, besides something to write with, of course. I usually put dogs on top of the list. My dogs are funny and great company, and they're used to me. If I get stuck in a story they take me for a walk, or bring me outside to play.

Right now we have a foster dog, and living with a loopy human writer is completely new to her. To be fair, almost everything is new to her. She has spent too much of her young life locked up, and even the back yard was strange and a bit scary at first. Imagine when the human brings a thick pile of papers, and leaves them on the sofa. Still warm from the printer, smelling funny… You guessed it; doggie turned my manuscript into many tiny pieces of paper. No harm done, she's trying to be a good girl and no one ever told her not to eat paper, but still pretty comical. Everyone's a critic!

Learn more about Maria and her book Kidnapped