Thursday evening, I had the pleasure of attending the Stephen King End of Watch tour, which was sponsored by Bookworks. End of Watch is the final book in the Bill Hodges trilogy; the first two books are Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers.
Instead of doing a reading followed by a question and answer session, the event was more of a conversation between Stephen King and George R.R. Martin, who acted as a moderator. Martin did ask King a few questions, but mainly, they just talked back and forth about a few things, including King's writing process. As a writer, this was the most interesting part of the evening for me.
King talked about how he got his start in writing, but when asked where he finds inspiration, particularly for Mr. Mercedes, King mentioned a story he heard in the news that inspired Mr. Mercedes. The story he heard was about a woman who planned on running down someone who was in line at a McDonald's for a sort of job fair; she wanted to run the person down because her husband was cheating on her with that person. That news story led to Mr. Mercedes, in which a man runs down eight people at a job fair and kills them. I'm not surprised that King finds inspiration in every day things and real life events; these things lend themselves perfectly to the types of stories King writes.
One of the questions that seemed to be a fan-favorite came at the end of the night, when Martin asked King how he is able to write so many books. King's response was that he spends three to four hours every day writing six pages, and he makes sure the pages are as clean (proofread) as possible. I loved this, because the advice so many writers hear is to have a routine and write every day, and King actually practices that.
It was great to gain a little insight on King's writing process and where he gets his ideas. A great book for reading more about that is his book On Writing.
Did you attend the event last night? If so, what was your favorite part of the evening? If you didn't make it or want a refresher, George R. R. Martin is hoping to have a video of the event up on his website soon.
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