The Real Story Isn’t Necessarily the Chapter
Sometimes you don’t fully understand a character until she writes something she would never say out loud.
When I created Story Insiders, I knew I wanted paid subscribers to receive more than early access to fiction chapters.
I wanted to offer something that felt genuinely different.
Something more intimate.
At first, I thought the Private Journals would simply be bonus material. Extra scenes. Additional character insights. Something fun for readers who want to spend more time with the women of Echo Canyon.
I was wrong.
The Private Journals have become one of the most surprising and valuable parts of my writing process.
Here’s what I’ve learned.
A chapter shows what a character does.
It shows what she says out loud, how she behaves, what choices she makes, and how others experience her.
But a private journal does something entirely different.
A private journal reveals what she is finally admitting to herself.
And those are not always the same thing.
That difference has fascinated me.
Because it isn’t just true in fiction.
It’s true in life.
Most of us have two narratives.
There’s the version we live out loud. The capable version. The one who gets things done, answers the texts, shows up, handles the responsibilities, and keeps moving.
Then there’s the quieter story.
The one we tell ourselves when no one else is listening.
Sometimes that second story is the truer one.
I saw this again today while writing Skylar’s private journal.
Skylar is a retired archaeologist and bestselling historical novelist in Mirage of Trust. She is brilliant, accomplished, disciplined, and highly respected. She often comes across as one of the strongest women in the canyon.
But strength can be misleading.
Strong women get tired, too.
In her journal, Skylar writes that she is exhausted, not from writing itself, but from everything surrounding it.
The files.
The deadlines.
The marketing.
The endless demands for visibility and access.
Sound familiar?
What surprised me most was not her exhaustion.
It was what restored her.
Not more rest.
Not a productivity system.
Not someone solving her problems.
What restored her was being led back to the thing that makes her feel most like herself.
Her novel.
Maybe this is true for other authors. Maybe it’s more true for fiction writers.
Because it’s true for me, if I don’t touch my characters for a day or two, I’m not happy.
What restores us is not stepping away from work. It can be returning to the right work.
The work that connects us to ourselves.
That’s what the Private Journals are helping me discover, both as a writer and as a woman in her seventies still building something new.
They are not extra chapters.
They are not deleted scenes.
They are where the women tell the truth.
And increasingly, they are helping me tell the truth, too.
That’s why I save the Private Journals for Story Insiders.
Not because they’re hidden bonus content.
Because they offer a more intimate look into these women.
Here’s what Jane, a Story Insider said:
