Finding ideas for stories

Before you can start writing a story you need at least the spark of an idea.  That spark might come in the shape of a character, some real life happening, a theme, an emotion, an overheard remark, a dream, a nightmare, an object, a photograph – anything in fact. 

For me, buildings very often spark an idea – derelict buildings in particular seem to fire my imagination. At least two of my 30 plus books were inspired by the crumbling ruins of abandoned, derelict houses.

An old photo of Blackgang Chine on the Isle of Wight of a house on a clifftop shortly before it crumbled into the sea inspired my third children’s book, Disaster Bay. And a ramshackle old house I used to drive past on the way to Leicester inspired the house where my protagonist in Kill or Die gets held hostage.

Anything can spark an idea. The trick is to catch hold of that spark and keep hold until you can develop it into something more substantial. 

Inspiration very often comes when we aren’t looking for it. Ideas flit in and out of our heads at any time of day or night. Make sure you have ideas notebooks dotted around your home to write those ideas down before they are lost to you. Keep a box or folder where you can store cuttings and photographs which might be used in some way in your stories. And of course, have files and folders on your PC where images of people and places can be stored for later use.

Developing ideas

It only takes a spark of an idea to inspire you to write. But a spark is not a story, so how do you expand a spark into a fully-fledged story?

We all work in different ways. An idea might develop and germinate in your head over time. You might find it easier to get notes written down on paper or computer, where you can expand on them and let the imagination take over. Perhaps your idea is the ending. You visualize a scene crammed full of action and emotion, but you have no idea of the events or characters that have led up to this point.

With luck your idea might unfold itself from start to finish with a logical string of events and action that simply needs writing down.  On the other hand, (and most probably) it’s a confusing jumble of images and thoughts with no clear path in sight at all.

So basically, you have a spark of an idea which will not be ignored. From this point you need to expand on your idea. You need to develop a storyline and to do this you need to create characters. It may be that your characters have introduced themselves to you in your head already. Perhaps a character was the initial spark. Either way, spend time thinking about them and getting to know them. (More on characters later.)

Perhaps the setting for your story was your inspiration. If so, learn more about this place, research and explore, gather photographs of it. It’s fine to collect images from the internet for your own personal use.

The spark for my ‘Beast trilogy’ (The Beast, The Reawakening and Rampage) came when holidaying in Scotland. Sunlight sparkling off the mountain tops kept catching my eye making me think I could see something up there. But when I looked, there was nothing. That was my spark of an idea which I began developing. Maybe there is something up there, watching…

  

In my head I came up with lots of ‘what ifs’. What if it’s a dangerous animal living in the mountains? What if it’s growing angrier by the second and decides to stalk some unsuspecting holidaymaker? What if… and so on. Once I had decided there was definitely something up there in the mountains which was decidedly dangerous, the actual revelation of what that creature/character was, came about when I visited a little museum on that same holiday and saw the skull of a sabre toothed tiger.  

Development of the story was then well under way. The idea excited me, but, had I not held onto the initial spark of the idea, these three books would never have been written.

So, treasure those inspirational sparks and ideas, and store them safely where they won’t get lost. Develop them into something special and enjoy the process.

Today’s writing exercise

·         Get yourself all set up with an Ideas Notebook, or an Ideas Folder on your PC.

·         If you’re buzzing with ideas, get them written down – bullet point lists will do at this stage.

·         If you’re working straight onto your computer and are on the internet, squirrel away any photographs or images which have potential for story ideas.

Tomorrow: Stories need Conflict.