Sometimes, novelists use their writer friends in their books. In U R Mine, my friend Nancy Pickard isn’t just a bestselling writer who owns a bookstore, she owns the coolest bookstore in town – Oxford Books. The protagonist holds a private painting event as her bookstore.
Nancy, who is reading the book, emailed me today:
I just got to my bookstore!! I’m so excited. A few minutes later, she emailed again:
I have a writer friend, Randy Russell, who named the a character in his first book after his best friend. In the book, the character got shot and killed. In real life, some months later, the friend got shot though not killed. Randy hasn’t named characters after people since then! You didn’t kill me in this book, did you? : )
I assured Nancy that I hadn’t killed her in the novel and never would! I was struck by Randy’s experience. Nancy recommended that I email him and ask if her recollection is correct. He said it was correct and his email is so rich with this kind of thing that it’s the subject of a post for another day.
What happened to Randy – tapping into the future through creativity – is the focus of one of the chapters in our book Sensing the Future. It’s about how writers, artists, musicians, and others who work in creative fields, often tap into the future through their work. It’s one of my personal favorites.
The chapter includes an experience that Nancy had related to her novel The Virgin of Small Plains. It was published in 2006 and the experience happened five years later.
The story takes place during a blizzard in Kansas in 1987 and centers around the discovery of the naked body of a teenage girl and the dark secrets surrounding her murder.
“This happened in Abilene, Kansas, but before I tell you what happened there, I’ll tell you what happens in the book. In The Virgin of Small Plains, our heroine goes with three women friends to a restaurant for lunch in the small town. As they travel there, they’re aware of severe storm warnings. At the restaurant, while they’re seated at a round wooden table, one of them looks out the windows and notices that the sky has turned seriously ominous. She tells the others, and they all get up and troop to the windows to look.
“At that moment, a tornado warning siren blares. The women hurry to the restaurant basement with the rest of the customers, except for our heroine, who hangs back to stare at the boiling clouds.”
Now here is the precognitive part of this. Nancy and three friends were en route (in real life) to Abilene to have lunch at The Kirby House, a popular spot. They’re aware that severe storm warnings have been issued. At the restaurant, they’re seated at a round wooden table. Nancy looks out the window and notices that the sky has turned seriously ominous.
In real life, Nancy mentions the sky to her friends and they all hurry to the windows to look. At that moment, a tornado warning siren blares.
Everyone except for Nancy hastens to the restaurant basement with the rest of the customers. Nancy hangs back to stare at the boiling clouds. And then it hits her and she exclaims, “Wow, this is just like in my book!”
Notice the words in bold in both the fictional and real-life versions of the story. The details don’t just dovetail; they’re identical. In real life five years after the book was published, Nancy becomes the heroine in her novel. She does exactly what her character does.
A skeptic might argue that Nancy imbued her protagonist with elements of herself, so yes, of course it makes sense that the fictional character would act like she would. But what about the external conditions? A trip for lunch to another town with three female friends, the round table at which they sit, the storm warnings en route, the glance out the window at the scary sky, the tornado warning sirens, and everyone but the heroine makes it into the basement.
Sensing the Future is published today! And the good news is that we all have the ability to do this.
