Guest Post: Jacquitta McManus

I want to be a Storyteller.

It popped into my head so fast and furious that I didn’t even know how to react. It just came. And I set in wonder, contemplating what it all meant.

For a long time my single goal was to direct fantasy/adventure movies. The genre pulled at me … it fascinated me. The idea of the hero’s adventure fascinated me. But what I didn’t realize was that my journey of directing fantasy/adventure movies would take me down a journey of words and books through a company I would later name Worlds To Discover.

As the idea settled a lot of things started to happen. Stories that were in my head started to be more present, I started sketching out maps, clothing, homes, plants and anything that would help me develop the story. It didn’t take long for me to realize that I wasn’t just creating a journey … an adventure … but rather, I was creating worlds. I was creating people who were real and alive … if only in my head. I was creating places that had history. Cultures. Friendships. And villains. And if I didn’t know before I knew then that just directing a fantasy/adventure movie would never have been enough. I had to write the adventure as well. It had to be apart of me in a way that just reading the adventure could never be.

But first I had to answer some questions like:

1. What makes a character memorable?
2. What makes for a great adventure?
3. How do images play a part?

Of course there are more questions to be answered but understanding these three questions … for me will give me the foundation of my storytelling.

To continue finding out more about Jacquitta A McManus’s adventure in storytelling and her answers to the 3 above questions you can follow her as she continues on her virtual book tour.  Click here for more details. You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, GoodReads, and her blog Journey of a Storyteller. She would love to hear from you. If you would like to order any of her books visit her website, or find it on Amazon.com.