What keeps me (Edie Hemingway) writing is...

1. my insatiable curiosity.  I'm always searching for ideas, eavesdropping on conversations and writing them down before I forget.  My kids (grown now) called it "asking too many questions."
2. playing the "what if" game.  Once I have ideas, I follow where they lead.
3. my characters, who won't leave me alone once I get to know them.
4. the 5th grade student who asked during my author visit, "Do you have a body guard?"
5. my faithful students.  How can I continue to teach creative writing if I'm not creating my own?
6. my 9-year-old grandson, a budding writer himself, who keeps asking when he can read my next book.
7. a deadline.  Solid as a rock.
8. my discerning editor, who knows how I can make my story better and who cares enough about my work that she's willing to go to bat for it at an acquisitions meeting.
9. my writer friend, who shares the literary heart and holds me accountable by saying, "Let's send each other a page a day."
10. my husband, who gently prods and sometimes, not so gently, gives me ultimatums, such as the time he said, "I won't go on the trip to Alaska with you unless you finish your novel first."  You can see above that we did not miss that trip to Alaska!