I didn’t have a story idea for last night, so I just sat down and started writing. It was a heck of a lot of fun and at the end of my two hours or so I had about 19 MS Word pages (forgot to do a word count, sorry). I also don’t think I had a story.
What I had were a series of vignettes, scenes with the same main character, some decent character development and a small character arc. But the theme, what was at stake, what changed…they were all small and subtle. I know, I shouldn’t start rejecting my own stuff…that’s what editors are for. I’ll clean it up and send it out. You never know. But I realized a few things:
1. Start with the question, ‘what’s your story about’. If I start, snowflake style, with a one-sentence description of the story, I’m more likely to get something complete at the end.
2. Just because a bunch of stuff happened, doesn’t mean you have a story. Yes, I had a beginning, middle and end. Yes, I had character development, decision and consequences. I even flatter myself to think I had good characters. But I didn’t have the right conflicts, and I didn’t have them obvious enough. There wasn’t a theme either, though I’m not convinced every story needs to set out with a theme.
3. Writing is fun. The first few minutes as I was struggling with what to write about were hard but after I started, the hours flew by. I had a great time.
4. Nothing is ever wasted. As long as you learn from what you did and improve from it, no writing is wasted. Even if you didn’t write a story.
Tonight is IM gaming night, so I’ll be telling stories when I get home as well. I just won’t be trying to sell that story the week after. Besides, Friday is coming and I’ll have a heck of a good idea by then
What I had were a series of vignettes, scenes with the same main character, some decent character development and a small character arc. But the theme, what was at stake, what changed…they were all small and subtle. I know, I shouldn’t start rejecting my own stuff…that’s what editors are for. I’ll clean it up and send it out. You never know. But I realized a few things:
1. Start with the question, ‘what’s your story about’. If I start, snowflake style, with a one-sentence description of the story, I’m more likely to get something complete at the end.
2. Just because a bunch of stuff happened, doesn’t mean you have a story. Yes, I had a beginning, middle and end. Yes, I had character development, decision and consequences. I even flatter myself to think I had good characters. But I didn’t have the right conflicts, and I didn’t have them obvious enough. There wasn’t a theme either, though I’m not convinced every story needs to set out with a theme.
3. Writing is fun. The first few minutes as I was struggling with what to write about were hard but after I started, the hours flew by. I had a great time.
4. Nothing is ever wasted. As long as you learn from what you did and improve from it, no writing is wasted. Even if you didn’t write a story.
Tonight is IM gaming night, so I’ll be telling stories when I get home as well. I just won’t be trying to sell that story the week after. Besides, Friday is coming and I’ll have a heck of a good idea by then
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