Making My Mark

By Katherine Fast

I had to noodle for a while to come up with something about my books that differs from what my fellow Besties have to offer. It seems they cover the bases many times over with strong protagonists and unique voices, clever, devious, and twisty plots, and dynamite settings. I also have a sassy, independent young woman protagonist with a chip on her shoulder who lives in an antebellum inn, an antique train station and a caboose, and who gets into all manner of trouble. But she has one skill that other writers don’t employ: graphology, the use of handwriting analysis for personality evaluation.

I’ve been fascinated by handwriting since I was six and my father was institutionalized in a state mental hospital with manic depression. I could tell by his letters how he was doing. Small, very light, downward slanting writing told me he was depressed, while large, powerful writing that dominated the whole page indicated an upward spiral into mania. Of course, little unicorns in the corners were also a hint.

I began studying graphology in earnest in the eighties, became certified at the professional level, and then worked for thirty years with Barbara Harding Associates. We used graphology to create profiles of candidates for hiring, to profile persons of interest for law enforcement, as a tool in counseling and education, for lawyers in jury selections, to evaluate threat letters…so many varied applications where it was important to understand the unique characteristics of personality. My latest application is to incorporate elements of graphology in fiction.

At a recent book signing event, a noted psychologist stated that the study of graphology had been debunked by multiple well-known studies and was basically worthless as a tool. It’s true that graphology is a soft science and that it is not admissible as fact in a court of law. Graphology doesn’t predict behavior any more than a SAT score predicts academic performance. However, centuries of empirical evidence demonstrate its usefulness in the understanding of personality.

Many resist graphology as a useful tool until demonstrations show how accurately the strokes they make represent them. When I had my writing analyzed, my small script suggested a focused, detailed nature that delved deeply, tending toward the expert side rather than the larger picture. My connectors have angles and garlands, two somewhat contradictory traits. Angles indicate an analytical, problem-solving bent, and the tendency to be critical. Garlands suggest a more giving, open nature. Other traits for humor, communication ability, goal setting, etc. were right on. And then there is the large fu-k-you K-buckle in my first name, Katherine, a strong sign of authority resistance.

Think of handwriting as brain writing. Your hand is dumb until it receives explicit directions from your brain, and your brain is different from anyone else’s brain. Your writing is as singular as your brain and as unique as a snowflake. Court-certified document examiners take physical measurements of various aspects of writing to prove or disprove forgery. In contrast, graphologists will interpret a host of both positive negative traits to create a personality profile.

Casey Cavendish, my protagonist, has studied graphology and uses handwriting analysis to understand other players’ characteristics in all three novels. In The Drinking Gourd, Casey painstakingly traces over the writing of her erstwhile friend Jules, over and over and over again, to feel what it’s like to write like Jules. Casey studies the writing. She knows what she’s doing and pays attention to the size and formation and slant of the letters, the spacing between letters and words and the pressure of the pen on the paper. She practices in order to forge a suicide note to save her brother from prosecution. Readers often comment about how they enjoy witnessing how Casey studies the strokes made by Jules.

Try it. Select a writing that you can see is quite different from yours. If you have little letters, try tracing large letters. You’ll feel as if you’re falling off the page. If you are a fast writer, choose an exact, copybook, careful writing. You will be surprised at how frustrating it is to write slowly and to be so exact. If you usually print, try tracing someone’s cursive script. You’ll get a small sense of what it’s like to be another person just by tracing the writing.

In Church Street Under, Casey recognizes her aunt’s forgery on a critical document and uses her knowledge of handwriting to challenge and foil the aunt’s attempt to steal property.
In Caboose, Casey manages the rental of a large mansion. New tenants appear to be a very successful, wealthy young couple, an illusion that is shattered when Casey compares separate notes left by the husband and wife, one of the first clues that points to serious trouble. The husband’s writing shows him to be a driven, angry individual with a penchant for violence and little compassion for others despite his outward affable, public persona. The wife has a gentler mix of traits, but mixes vanity and an appreciation for the finer things with signs of manipulative tendencies. The partnership leads to a conflagration that causes serious trouble for Casey and threatens the couple’s little boy.

I’ve also used handwriting in short stories. One in particular, “Free Advice” focuses on the tendency of friends and acquaintances to ask for a quick and dirty examination of writings which they expect to be free. This story illustrates the danger of concentrating on a single trait—in this instance “decisiveness”—while ignoring other, equally important traits, that lead to disastrous consequences.

In each application, I hope to provide enough analysis to explain the interpretation without delving too deeply into the weeds. If you read these stories, please let me know if the inclusion of graphology enhances your enjoyment. Thanks for reading, Kat
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Katherine Fast received Professional Level certification from the American Association of Handwriting Analysts, and Master Graphotherapist from the Institute of Graphological Science. Working with Barbara Harding Associates, she has applied graphology in personnel screening, executive search, jury selection, and educational counseling. Using her workbook, Graphology the Fast Way, she’s taught courses in California and Massachusetts.

She’s written three novels in the Casey Cavendish Mystery series, The Drinking Gourd, Church Street Under, and Caboose, and has published over thirty short stories in various anthologies.