Amateur To Published: The Fiction Writer's Guide To Publishing

1 - Come Up With An Idea

Some writers get their ideas naturally – like a light lighting up in their brain while they sleep. Others need a little more help in awakening their creative juices. This chapter will give ideas on how to create your own thunderbolt when it refuses to come naturally.

IDEA 1: TAKE A HINT FROM YOUR GENRE

In the chapter on picking a niche (check the table of contents), we talked about researching the various genres then picking yours. I assume you did your research and now know about the common tropes in your genre. Use these to come up with an idea for your story. For instance if you're writing a Romance you couldhave storylines like a woman hiding a baby from a past lover, best friendsfalling for each other, family enemies forced to work together, an arrangedmarriage. If you're writing a mystery you may have a serial killer on theloose, someone being stalked, a conman on the path to vengeance.

IDEA 2: PLAY WITH BLURBS OF OTHER BOOKS/MOVIES/SHOWS IN YOUR GENRE

A blurb is that short description that gives you a brief idea of what the book/show is about even before you read it or watch it. It seldom ever tells you exactly what is going to happen in the story which means you can use it to create a completely fresh idea. Here's how it works; most books/shows will have just one sentence to summarize what the whole plot is about. You only need that sentence.

Let's take a sentence off of an entry on Wikipedia from the TV series, Women's Murder Club:

Lindsay and Jacobi hunt down a killer who committed triple homicide on a subway car

Note the highlighted words.

Now, replace those highlighted words with words of your own to make a completely new statement. For instance;

Dahlia and Seth hunt down a thief who stole diamonds from a jewelry store

And we have a whole new idea for a Mystery novel or a Romantic Suspense novel if you like!

IDEA 3: ASK WHAT IF

Some story ideas come from just asking questions about an idea you already have. Let's say we're going with the above story where Dahlia and Seth are hunting down a thief who stole diamonds from a jewelry store. Here are questions we could throw at that idea:

What if Seth is actually the thief but Dahlia doesn't know?

What if Dahlia is actually the thief?

What if Dahlia is a guard at the jewelry shop and also has a criminal record (obviously that makes her suspect number one)?

What if what seems like just a run of the mill theft has actually been organized by a super organization?

What if the diamonds have some kind of magical property unknown to the thief?

The more questions you throw at the story the more likely you are to eventually come up with a fascinating story that is both original and unique.

IDEA 4: LOOK AT THE PEOPLE AROUND YOU

Are you on a train, at the bus-stop, in class, in a super-market? Wherever you are as long as there's someone around you s/he is a walking unwritten story. If you're alone, a photo will do. Look at that person and try to figure out the person beneath just by looking at their appearance.

Is she wearing a blue coat? Maybe it's the one her father gave her before he passed on.

Does she have earphones in her ear? Maybe she's listening to the new record she's trying to drop but her production is giving her a hell of a time.

Does she have a scar at the side of her neck? Maybe it's a result of one scary night encounter with a pick-pocket.

Is she trying hard to keep from falling asleep but failing miserably? Maybe it's because of the two jobs she has to take to pay for her college tuition as well as raise her son.

Once you've made a guess think of ways you can make your guess into a story, after all you've already got a ready-made character.

IDEA 5: THINK OF A CHARACTER IN TROUBLE

What's the worst thing that could happen to you? If it's life-threatening to you or someone close to you then you get bonus points. Now, create a character, make that thing happen to them then write a story showing how they get out of that trouble or try to.

Examples of characters who are in trouble include a child kidnapped, a man in an abusive relationship, a gay woman in a country where a law has just been passed making homosexuality illegal, a family man who just lost his job. Conflict is after all the most important part of the story and if you already have character conflict straight off the bat you'll be ahead of the curve.

IDEA 6: EVEN THE SETTING COULD BE A STORY

Don't underestimate the location of your story. A pregnant, unwed girl in Coté d'Ivoire will have a completely different set of complications compared to a pregnant, unwed girl in Russia. A unique enough setting will not only allow you to introduce your readers to new locales but it also help you explore the challenges that people living in those areas undergo.

Sometimes even just moving your character from their expected habitat and putting them somewhere they would never be found would be enough to give you a good story; an ex-con as a security guard, a twelve year old in college, a white southern woman marrying into a Hindu family. Those stories could practically write themselves.

Let's say we're writing Dhalia and Seth's story, changing the setting could completely change the direction of the story. For instance we could move the jewelry shop from New York to Qatar, make Dahlia the uppity daughter of a sheikh and Seth an immigrant from Ghana working as janitor in the jewelry shop. Let's see how easy a romance between those two will be now. Add in the stolen diamond and a few paranormal powers for Seth and we've got the makings of a decent fantasy-mystery-romance.

IDEA 7: GET IT FROM A THEME

Many writers are in the 'let the theme come naturally' camp but some writers use theme as a foundation for their writing. The foundation of this method is to choose the theme/moral you'd like to focus on then start from there. It could be something like the pitfalls of drug abuse, dealing with mental disorder, crime doesn't pay, value your friends, weight is nothing but a number etc

Once you have the theme write a story about one of your main characters' exploring that theme and changing to reflect the lessons they've learned. If you want Dahlia to embody the idea that we should never judge books by their covers, you would have Seth giving her a really hard time for being an ex-con and believing along with everyone else that she is the thief, when the end proves that she isn't they are all embarrassed and have to seek their behavior.

I hope the above suggestions will help you come up with a good idea.

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Comments? Questions? Ask below and I'll see what I can do