Sometimes I think my life is an extended lesson in how you can’t plan for everything. But those things that weren’t in my plan always lead me to interesting places. It happens in life, it happens with books. Books don’t proceed according to neat plans. I always have a general road map to follow, but if a character wouldn’t do a certain thing, forcing it to stick to the plan is a bad idea. Much better to ask, under what circumstances would this character do that? Or is there some other choice the character might make that would accomplish the story goal in an even better way?

I need to add a section to the site explaining why I have 3 werewolf worlds. That was not the plan. I started off with one world (Wolf in Cheap Clothing, Wolf in Shining Armor, Wolf at the Door). I wanted to do a full-length werewolf novel. But when I got the opportunity to do that at St. Martin’s, there were story requirements that went against the rules of the original werewolf world. To accommodate that story (Animal Attraction) I needed a new world with different rules. If you’ve read both, you see what I mean. Animal Attraction couldn’t happen in the world of Wolf in Cheap Clothing. But Animal Attraction presented me with interesting facets the first world did not, and exploring that in Red Queen has given me chances to do some incredibly cool things. And then for Claimed by the Wolf, yet another set of requirements called for yet another world. Writing 3 werewolf universes wasn’t my plan, but the books have all succeeded in their own ways and they’ve let me explore variations on a werewolf theme, which I couldn’t have done in a single universe.

We’re packing up boxes to move again, and for people who hate to move, no, this was also not the plan. But after we moved to the beach house, see, the husband got the perfect job offer. And taking the job meant moving cross country. And the only way to really get to know an area and find the right place to live is to live there and house-hunt. Which we did, and found a great place, and now we get to move there. The place we’re moving to suits us better than any place we’ve ever lived, so the change is good even if we don’t particularly like change. It’s far, far better than we could have done if we’d tried to arrange a permanent house from a distance. (We’ve learned the hard way that doesn’t work out well.)

I don’t think the answer is to quit planning; planning has too many benefits. But there is benefit to the “hold on loosely” approach to life. You can’t control everything, it’s useless to try, and it wouldn’t be as good in the end if we could. Sometimes the best things are surprises we didn’t plan.

I’ll make that my mantra as I go back to writing this book.