Everyone wanted to know where I get my ideas as I talked up my book and other projects this Easter weekend. (Hey, it's better than talking BabyBoys potty training failures, the half-abet, and BigBoys obsession with the color orange.) But...I never understand this question. There is no lightbulb that turns on over my head, because unfortuantely, it's always on.
My first book, Just One Spark, came from seeing a really hunky firefighter in a grocery store, I mean, so cute. And he came right up to BigBoy and gave him a sticker and talked with him so I could do the checkout line without a struggle. No wonder I fell in love with him a bit. Not to mention it was late October and I needed an idea for my NaNo. He'd be the guy. The idea was that fast.
On the drive from the egg hunt to brunch I thumbed through the latest Working Mother magazine and snagged three - a May Day secret admirerer story, a ADD heroine who has to hold meetings while walking and the hero who never sees the daylight because he works so much, a make your own luck story where the shy heroine follows the advice in a book. All romance ideas in one magazine. Took me a half hour, and I spent most of that time looking at the recipes. I snagged a great one from a book review paper I pick up at the library -- Being Dead is No Excuse. What a title. Perfect for a vampire romance. The title refers to the official Southern Ladies Guide to Hosting a Funeral. The book interests me naught, but the title? Love it!
Ideas are everywhere; I can't turn off the part of my brain that finds them. But like gold prospectors, I have to sift through them. Just because it would make a great story doesn't mean it is something I could write best. If someone can write it better, they should be the one to run with it. I only have time to run with the ones I know I can do better than most. That sifting through is the hard part for me.
4 comments:
I get a lot of my ideas from magazines too. And people ask me that question all of the time and sometimes I just don't know what to say. It's true, there's always something brewing in the back of my brain...
But you seem to get A LOT of ideas. Your brain is always in story mode! I think that's cool.
People are starting to ask me this too, and I don't really have any answers. I get near the end of one project and new ideas come to me. *shrug* Sometimes the're from something I've seen or dreamed or whatever, but they haven't dried up yet and hopefully they won't!
My ideas have mostly come from dreams. I, of course, always star as the heroine so when I write it I have to make plenty of notes so taht the h doesn't constantly look like me (blonde, hazel eyes, adventurous). I find lately, now that writing as a career is something that is possible, I notice more in others authors books, their drama, characterization, detail. When I'm watching movies I find myself critiquing them instead of just enjoying the story. I see a cute guy, I go home and make notes for a story later down the line. I hear a word or phrase and I start dreaming of the book it would title. Also love play on words titles for books. Ex: My daughter (6) is a drama queen, patching her up as only a mother can do after they fall and get scraped up, I thought of myself as a nurse, as such the title Trauma Queen came to me. Weird, I know. But that's me.
I love Trauma Queen!
Shopping does it for me too - well, shopping alone so I am not racing through. I wonder what kind of person would need/buy this? And then my mind starts spinning. Before, people thought I was spacey. Now, they think I'm working.
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