A story is a living thing. It starts as a germ, not even an idea really, that turns into a bug gnawing in the recesses of a writer’s brain. As the bug grows, eating bits of fluff and the words of stranger’s conversations, it becomes less easy to ignore, until finally it wakes us in the dark hours of the morning, fat and bloated with untapped energy, this thing we must write down or go mad. And that is simply the original idea. The pressure lets off as the words hit the page, but the story still grows. Edit after edit. Draft after draft. Until the finished book only passingly resembles the first bloody words that affixed themselves to the page. HEARTS OF DARKNESS was an organic, struggle of a story to write. I started it during National Novel Writing Month in 2008 and now, almost four years later, have the finished book in my hand. There are crumbs that resemble my first rough sketches of scenes and characters, and there are gems that didn’t make the final cut. I’d like to share with you the earliest scrawls of my debut. Desi’s character changed in the final book, but the…