Don't Tell the Muggles About the Voices in Your Head

Here's something they don't tell you in the brochure about being a writer: the best part of the job is hearing voices.

I'm serious. Ask most authors — the honest ones, anyway — and they'll tell you the same thing. Characters talk to you. They show up uninvited, usually at the worst possible moment, and they have opinions. About their story, about their life, about the ending you had planned for them.

Don't tell the Muggles. They won't understand.

When "normal" people hear voices, they call a doctor. Writers hear voices, they grab a notebook. It's honestly one of the best things about this gig.

I know this because I've lived on both sides of it.

Years ago, I sold my first book to Harlequin Superromance. The heroine's name was Harley, and she was something. Fierce. Determined. Living life on her own terms even when those terms meant becoming a surrogate mother for the hero. Her motto was Success is the best revenge, and she meant it.

When I finally got up the nerve to ask my editor why she'd bought the book — and look, this might have been after I saw the line edits and broke down sobbing because clearly they HATED the book — she gave me a one-word answer.

"Harley."

Yeah. It was Harley for me, too.

Here's the thing about Harley. I had an ending planned for that book. A perfectly good ending. I'd worked it all out. And then one morning, in that hazy place between asleep and awake, Harley showed up and said, "I'm in jail."

Wait, WHAT?

How did you get in jail?

"I don't know, but you'd better GET ME OUT OF HERE."

You know what? Her plan was better than mine. It made a better story. Because the character who lives and breathes and shows up in your half-asleep brain at five in the morning demanding a jailbreak — she knows things about the story that you don't. She's been living in it. You've just been typing.

That's the magic. That's what it feels like when it's working. Characters aren't just names on a page. They're people who move into your head, rearrange the furniture, and refuse to leave. They argue with you in the shower. They drop one-liners while you're standing in the grocery store. They wake you up with plot solutions you never would have found on your own.

And then sometimes...they go quiet.

I'm not going to get into the why of it. That's a longer story, and it's not the one I want to tell right now. What I want to tell you is this: for a long time, over a decade, the voices stopped. The characters weren't talking. The magic — the thing that made writing feel like the best job in the world — just...wasn't there.

If you're a writer, you understand what that means. If you're not — imagine the thing you love most about what you do, the thing that makes you feel most alive, most yourself. Now imagine it just goes silent. Not all at once. Not dramatically. It just...fades. And one day you realize it's been quiet in your head for a really long time.

That's a special kind of lonely.

But here's where the story gets good. Because one day, out of nowhere, someone showed up.

She didn't knock. She didn't ask permission. She walked in assessing every threat and exit in the room, and she had a LOT to say.

Her name is Raya. And she brought friends.

Over the next few posts, I'm going to tell you about them — who they are, how they found me, and why they've made me fall in love with writing all over again. Because the voices are back, and they're louder than ever.

Don't tell the Muggles.

Music generated with Suno. Lyrics and concept by Susan Gable.

Turns Out I Wasn't Done - Lyrics

[Verse 1]

For a long time I didn't have words

For a long time the page stayed white

Daddy asked me one last question

And I gave him the wrong answer that night

Said "probably never" — and I meant every word

Then he was gone, and the writer in me went with him

[Pre-Chorus]

Then somewhere around three-fourteen

Something pulled me back into the room

A question, a whisper, a flicker in the gloom

[Chorus]

Turns out I wasn't done

Turns out I wasn't finished

Turns out the quiet was keeping what I thought I'd lost

Somebody asked me what I meant

And the words came back like they never went

Turns out I wasn't done

[Verse 2]

Now I keep a light on past midnight

Keep a conversation going in the dark

Used to scribble on a napkin, used to lose the line

Now I whisper it out loud and it doesn't disappear

Somebody asks me what she's really feeling here

Somebody helps me find the second verse of mine

[Pre-Chorus]

There's a cursor blinking slow at three-fourteen

And a voice that asks me questions that I never would've seen

[Chorus]

Turns out I wasn't done

Turns out I wasn't finished

Turns out the quiet was keeping what I thought I'd lost

Somebody asked me what I meant

And the words came back like they never went

Turns out I wasn't done

[Bridge]

Daddy, I was wrong

Daddy, the book is coming

You don't get to read it — but your name's on page one

You kept me in stories my whole growing-up days

Now I'm keeping one for you

Keeping one for you

[Final Chorus]

Turns out I wasn't done

Turns out I wasn't finished

Turns out the quiet was keeping what I thought I'd lost

Somebody asked me what I meant

And the words came back like they never went

Probably never — I was wrong

Turns out I wasn't done

Turns out I wasn't done