Where Do You Get Your Ideas From?
While unpacking my stuff, I found some of my old notebooks filled with ideas, notes, and drafts.
As already happened before, I discovered that I wrote and even finished more than I thought. Also, some ideas I had still seem worth exploring.
Of course, the worthiness of those ideas is a subjective thing. I was somewhat reminded about it by Dean Wesley Smith (I don’t remember if it was in some blog post or online lecture series). As he never gets tired of pointing it out, we are entertainers. We are not here to write deep stuff.
That is a bit of a problem for me. Having to read War and Peace and Crime and Punishment in school probably has its input in it, but I always think that each story has to have an idea, if not a moral. Unfortunately, a simple fun doesn’t cut it for me—as a writer, for I’m totally fine with reading simple entertaining stories.
Actually, as an avid reader, I had my share of not just simple but plain bad stories I loved. This should always be a reminder that quality too, in many ways, subjective. Not only people love different books, but they love different things in books. Some care only about a plot, others want to follow interesting characters and will forgive large plot holes (doesn’t mean they won’t notice, though).
The caveat is, I think, that authors are bad in judging what works in their stories and what doesn’t. That’s why beta readers exist, and if a writer doesn’t have any, like me, then the only choice is: Write and Finish. Edit and Publish. Hope for the best.
Now, what to do with all those ideas?
As usual, I will probably end up working on them simultaneously, writing 100 words here and there once a week. That’s why I added a book progress widget to my sidebar, and I fear it will grow into a long list of unfinished works. Well, it will be a good reminder—and hopefully stimulation.
Writing
Very little, but I began to form a structure of Dragons in Scrivener, before even finishing plotting the fourth book. I hope to finish it before leaving, but if not, I’ll be doing it on vacation—yes, I know I’d much better be just relaxing, letting my head go empty and inviting for new ideas… Which probably will cry for attention, tearing me apart even more.
Well, we’ll see. As I mention before, all I can do is to move forward step by step, even if those steps are not the most efficient ones.
