Where Do You Get Ideas (part 2-Devlin Spudd is born!)

Flashback six years or so. It was late, I was tired, my mind was racing, and my body refused to rest. Replaying events from the day, from classes to Debate to family, my brain was in hyperdrive. Through the storm, a name came to me. Devlin.

Weird. I didn’t know a single person named Devlin. It sounded upper class, sort of a starchy but adventurous Brit, choked with too much money and bored to death. Need a last name, I thought. Something opposite, not classy or impressive. When 007 enters a room and announces, “The name is Bond, James Bond,” it works. But what if Devlin had an awful sounding surname, the kind where people would laugh if he tried the Bond bit?

Spudd, I thought. Single syllable, plosive consonant ending. Devlin rolls off the tongue, soars with the angels. Spudd falls to the pavement like a sack of wet cement. Layered under sheets and blankets in the dark of my room, quite without warning, Devlin Spudd was born.

But who was this guy? He was merely a name. No face, body, family, context. What sort of person is a walking contradiction, uber-cool and deeply flawed with fears and insecurities, intelligent but lacking common sense? Easy. A teenager. I had a name and vague context, and truly that excited me. What does teen Devlin Spudd do? Before I could create any sort of plot, I fell asleep.

Devlin slipped my memory. The next day at school, I was standing by the entrance to the food line, examining my options. I don’t recall the specific choices, but nothing thrilled me. If you’ve eaten in a school cafeteria, you know the feeling. Shifting my weight, staring at the signage, feeling the moments ebb away, I remembered Devlin. This was it! What do teenagers worry about? High on the list of concerns: What’s for lunch?

Four years of high school works out to roughly 720 days. The vast majority of those days are largely forgettable. As a teacher, I want to believe I’m memorable, that today’s lesson will really make a difference in someone’s life or that I’m an inspiration. That’s mostly fool’s gold. Like most other students, my guy Devlin wants to know what’s for lunch. And maybe dessert.

Devlin’s first “adventure” was a trip to the lunch line, a study in indecision and appetite. “Parallel Lines” would just be a single story. Devlin ponders what to eat, has some amusing incidents along the way, talks to a cute girl he want to impress, and ultimately finds a meal. I gave him a best friend, Jimmy, a sarcastic cafeteria lady, and a few extra characters to round it out.

When I completed “Parallel Lines,” I thought that was it. This wasn’t a plot for a novel. It was 5000 words depicting a typical morning in a high school kid’s life. Most students aren’t villains or heroes. They’re just hungry, trying to survive the day.

My problem? I liked Devlin. He was cool but nerdy, thoughtful, funny, self-conscious, observant. Now, I was hungry for more. I decided to write another story, Green Ten Speed, about Devlin’s first day at school. I found Maureen and Gwen and Mr. File.

I wrote another story, then another. His world kept growing, populated by teachers and students and admins and bus drivers and custodians and security ladies. I had stories and more ideas but no coherent plan. It was like organizing flakes in a snowglobe. I could write a book on how not to write a book.

This is the short version of chasing an idea. Eventually, after twenty stories, I stopped. Some nights I dreamed of Devlin and Jimmy and Gwen and the others. Satisfied that I had told his story, after endless edits and revisions, I was ready to move on. With the help of some friends, five years later, I published Chasing Rainbows and Dogs that Won’t Hunt.

Now, I’m chasing my next novel.