Spring Thinking

The weather is starting to heat up here in sunny California, and lately I’ve been doing my best to resist letting the AC run all night. There’s something about this time of year that makes everything feel a little more alive and a little more reflective, and it felt like the perfect moment to share a bit about how Out of the Depths began.

What might surprise you is that this book didn’t start as a grand plan or a fully formed idea. It actually began with a single scene, just an experiment. The very first thing I ever wrote for Out of the Depths was the battle between the angel Uriel and the demon Asael. I typed it out in my phone notes without thinking much of it at the time. I wasn’t trying to write a novel. I was simply exploring.

Back then, writing was something I turned to occasionally. It was a way to pass the time, to process emotions, and to bring fleeting ideas to life. I loved imagining scenes in my head and translating them into words, but I hadn’t yet reached a point where I saw myself committing to a full story.

Then came another moment of curiosity, a second test scene. This time, it was the intense confrontation between Angela and Marshall in the car. I wanted something fast-paced, something that made my heart race as I wrote it. Something gripping.

At some point, something shifted.

I realized I didn’t just have isolated scenes anymore. I had people. Characters. Questions started forming in my mind. Who was this girl, really? What had she gone through? Who was the man who took her, and why? Those questions pulled me deeper into the story.

Piece by piece, I started connecting everything.

What began as fragments slowly became something whole. The characters took on lives of their own, growing more complex the more I sat with them. I found myself asking not just what was happening, but why, and how each moment shaped who they were becoming.

That’s when I knew I had something worth pursuing.

Out of the Depths did not come from a single idea. It grew organically through curiosity, emotion, and a desire to understand the people I had created. In the process, I think I came to understand a little more about storytelling itself.

Sometimes, all it takes is one small moment, a single scene typed into your phone, to start something much bigger than you ever expected.