Where does the inspiration come from?

[Marie]

I would LOVE to write a story, whether a full length novel or a short story. But I have NO INSPIRATION whatsoever.

Which is kind of okay, thankfully I earn money by doing very boring professional services stuff for clients.  A lot of my time is spent writing, reports and letters for the most part for clients, though I'm currently working on a book about tax (I know, tax, yawn!).

Thing is that I really enjoy the process of writing.  When I have an idea in my head, I love to write it down and see how it looks. Of course it's easy when it's about something like tax.  The subject itself is very dry but I'm on a mission to explain the subject to people in a more accessible manner, lots of practical examples and how it applies to different businesses.  So when I come up with a new idea for explaining something difficult in easier terms, I actually get quite excited!

Oh I need to get out more....

But anyway brings me back to my question: where do fiction writers get their ideas from?  I'm a middle aged woman and have never had an original idea in my life!  I've been reading the posts on the Author Craft board on and off for hte last few months and I'm amazed by the ideas people come up with and their fantastic ideas for plots and characters, but I just can't EVER come up with stuff like this for myself.  I really admire Jim and all the wonderful story writers out there for their wonderful creations.

Anyway I'd love some suggestions or even just a bit of that magic to help me get started. And for all of you who post here, I'm sort of in awe at your creativity.

[Ulfgeir]

I know for me, inspiraton sometimes comes from more or less mundane things that I tweak, or combine with something else.  For example I wrote a short story called "Nebula Travels" after having overdosed on the reality-tv shows from Heathrow Airport  a few years back, and then learnt of the existance of a company called Unclaimed luggage

or I had another one, that started by someone as a joke mentioning  wandslingers, so I got that as a sort of D&D meets the Wild West. Yes I have posted that one in the Creative forum.

But yeah, it is often painful trying to get the creativitity to come forth. My muse seems to be on a long-term strike. =^_^= My suggestion would be to try small, as in just writing ranomd scenes, and don't try to edit while you write. Do I follow my own advice? Nope, thus my poor result so far.

/Ulfgeir

[Marie]

Thanks for your reply, Ulfgeir. I like the idea of the D&D meets the wild west! 
I always assume that authors get inspiration in big bucket loads, such as Jim with Dresden; one brilliant idea that blossoms into a series of great stories.  Although I'm sure it wasn't anything like as easy.
Sometimes I get ideas of words or sentences in my head, maybe a description of a place, a person, an event, but it's always just a few lines long.  Maybe as you say it's a case of writing around something small lots of times and seeing if any of the ideas lead anywhere.  I've had lots of little snippets over the years.  I think I'll just start writing them down, without any particular order or subject just to see if anything comes together after a while.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Steal ideas from Shakespeare.  He stole almost all of his and they are well out of copyright now.

[Marie]

Yeah, good idea for plots. But I never liked his work. Not a single space ship, actively employed wizard or other believable supernatural or other worldly character in sight!   

[gatordave96]

My ideas come from coffee after not enough sleep the night before.

Notice I didn't say anything about whether they were good ideas.

Honestly, I don't think you need to do your world building, characters, or plot from whole cloth.  There are several known stereotypes or tropes that you can play with.  Personally, I stole Snidely Whiplash's penchant for tugging at the end of his mustache for my villain.  Another character could be Uncle Fester's twin.  My plot steals from X-Men, an old Dragon magazine article on psionicists, some knowledge of political conflicts from an undergrad class, and every D&D adventure I went through in my demented youth.  There is something old and familiar, and something new and unique.

If all else fails, bust out the Dungeon Master's Guide and funny looking dice and roll for character traits, random encounters, etc.

[The Deposed King]

If you can game master a D&D campaign without having to slavishly follow the adventure modules every time the characters do something, then you too can be ready to come up with ideas for a book.

Personally I like to write what I like to read.  Keep it in genre and think about half a dozen books that are similar to your favorite Scfi/Fantasy/Romance whatever story.  Its best if you've got an idea, phrase or mental image of an important event or main character.  If you've got this cool idea for a green eyed slave type with psychic powers who serves the slave princess of a worm-like Jabba the Hut type arms smuggler and is falling in love with the ruggedly ugly mercenary type who serves the arms-smuggler but has to help the Slave Princess escape anyway.  Then you already know a lot of things you're going to need to get right to both make your story hang and not just rip off star wars.

If you've always liked x to happen when you read or conversely wanted to see y happen in story type z you're already half way there.  You've got something you'd like to write about.  For instance why do the women in these stories always fall for the guy to save them, she should be a 'beast!' (as my sister puts is) and show how she doesn't need anyone else to save her.  Or conversely you could love the romantic angle and have the slave maid rescued by her ugly dude with the psychic powers of gold that makes her mind squirm because he's fascinated by her for the beauty of her mind.  From there you have to decide how much this books is going to be about slavery (the whole book, most of a three book series?) or do they escape really quickly and if so, how long does it take them to get off the slave ship and start turning heads in Masteria Port when they escape.  Are they on the run from law enforcers who view them as escaped property or does everyone they meet sympathize with their woeful plight  (in which case how has slavery as an institution survived in your universe?)  etcetra etcetera etcetera.  I came up with all of this on the fly from the logical extension of my original slave maid in service of slave princess idea.

Come up with wizard idea one.  Decide how much you want to follow the tropes.  Male dominated society?  or do I mix it up and if so.  Female Dominated socity?  Or only female domination in the magical society thus adding twists and pressures my characters have to navigate.  For instance female dominated magic institutions in a male dominated society would probably have the female magicers getting 'some of their own back' on the guys.  Leading to muggle backlash at those high handed sorceresses that just want to dominate us!

Just think up an idea.  Figure out the standard tropes.  Decide at which points you want to make your story and characters and their society unique.  Then take it and run.  Nothing is totally unique.  I mean if it was we wouldn't have 'genres!'.  Just decide what you like the most and change enough things that you aren't plagarizing Captain Kirk and mister spock or the Klingon Empire and then run with it!




The Deposed King

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Yeah, good idea for plots. But I never liked his work. Not a single space ship, actively employed wizard or other believable supernatural or other worldly character in sight!   

Three witches and Hamlet's father's ghost not enough for you ?

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

If you can game master a D&D campaign without having to slavishly follow the adventure modules every time the characters do something, then you too can be ready to come up with ideas for a book.

..as Kipling almost said.

Liking to write what you like to read, or would like to read if it existed, seems fairly sensible to me; good editors by and large will be able to tell a book the writer believes in from one where they are going through the motions.  The balance of caring enough about it to make it good, without caring so much about it you come across as precious or a prima donna, is one of those things that there doesn't seem to be an easy way of working out in advance.  In my case, there's precious little SF out there that's simultaneously reclaiming the virtues of valour and honour (and all those other words Americans leave letters out of) from right-wing milSF, rejecting libertarianism, and critiquing feel-good futures like Star Trek which as a world feels shallow and insipid to me, as well as having internal contradictions of sorts in most attempts to get a decent plot out of it; probably the closest to a direct inspiration for the direction I am writing in are Iain M. Banks' Culture novels, and I am happy that my stuff feels quite distinct from those.

[LizW65]

How about a tax accountant hired to audit an intergalactic shipping company? I can think of lots of directions that might take: they're actually smugglers/pirates, the accountant is kidnapped and taken into space and forced to join the criminals (s)he is supposed to be auditing, discovers (s)he likes the lifestyle, etc. etc.

[Sully]

You could definitely make a story out of that.

Neurovore, I'm going to take a guess that you're, at the very least, occasionally exasperated by David Weber.

Yeah, good idea for plots. But I never liked his work. Not a single space ship, actively employed wizard or other believable supernatural or other worldly character in sight!   

Midsummer Night's Dream?

[Ulfgeir]

Yeah, good idea for plots. But I never liked his work. Not a single space ship, actively employed wizard or other believable supernatural or other worldly character in sight!   

Well you have a wizard and a spirit in The Tempest.
In Macbeth you have 3 witches
In Hamlet, there's a ghost
And finally in Midsummer Night's Dream there is a ton of the Fair folk..

/Ulfgeir

[CenturionsofRome]

I suggest playing around with two distinct and separate concepts, like mutants and aliens, spaceships and romans, familiars and steampunk, pokemon and the lost roman legion (*cough* Alera *cough*), and see how they could potentially fit together in different ways.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Neurovore, I'm going to take a guess that you're, at the very least, occasionally exasperated by David Weber.

I regard him as the proof that there is no setting, no universe, and no genre that a sufficiently determined author can't fold, spindle, and mutilate enough to force it to have Napoleonic-type sea battles or their exact equvalent in.

Why anyone who really wants to write Napoleonic sea battles would not just straightforwardly write Napoleonic naval novels is completely beyond me (well, except for the fact that the standard for comparison for those is Patrick O'Brian, and that would be terrifying because Patrick O'Brian was a genius.)

[The Deposed King]

I regard him as the proof that there is no setting, no universe, and no genre that a sufficiently determined author can't fold, spindle, and mutilate enough to force it to have Napoleonic-type sea battles or their exact equvalent in.

Why anyone who really wants to write Napoleonic sea battles would not just straightforwardly write Napoleonic naval novels is completely beyond me (well, except for the fact that the standard for comparison for those is Patrick O'Brian, and that would be terrifying because Patrick O'Brian was a genius.)

Perhaps its the desire to both continue advancing and at the same time return to some of the best or at least more exciting 'perceived' times of yester-years gone past?



The Deposed King