“Where do your ideas come from?”
Writers frequently tag that question as the single most frustrating inquiry we get from non-writers. It’s frustrating because it’s nearly impossible to answer. We get ideas from everything. Getting ideas isn’t usually the problem for a writer…herding the ideas is.
Plot ideas from current events:
The local newspaper has given me plenty of inspiration as a mystery writer. There have been stories this past week in the paper that completely horrified me. These stories will not fit in with my cozy writing. But they can send your mind into a whole different, dark direction.
Plot ideas from others:
Sometimes other people unwittingly give you plot ideas. I’ve overheard bits of conversation that have really made me raise my eyebrows…and reach for a pen. This is an advantage of being a wallflower and sitting quietly in public places. As a mystery writer, I’m particularly interested in what makes people upset with each other. I’ve heard stories of people angry with coworkers, spouses, and family. Motives galore! I can dream these motives up…well, I could. But I don’t have the violent emotions that some people have. I’m usually pretty calm. When I’m around people experiencing these high-powered emotions, I do jot down notes after they’re gone.
Character ideas from people we come across: My favorite people to bump into at the store or at the bank are people who surprise me or make me smile. I was at church a couple of weeks ago and a very stern old lady with tightly coiled curls put her elderly husband down firmly in the pew ahead of me. “Now don’t move! Don’t talk to anyone! Stay put.” And she stomped off to join the rest of the choir. He immediately got up and started talking to people in another pew. “Ohhh…he’s gonna be in trouble,” said my son. The best part was when she went up the aisle with the choir in the processional (singing an ancient…maybe 17th century, solemn hymn) and her husband reached out to pinch her as she went by. Her face was priceless. I jotted it all down on my bulletin so I wouldn’t forget her expression.
Plot ideas from our own experiences: I don’t plan to write about myself. But there’s a little bit of me that goes into my protagonists—usually a bad part. I think writing down my shortcomings is good therapy in a way. Other people put a lot of themselves in a book.
Plot ideas from the world around us:
Plot ideas from music we hear. Plot ideas from something we see while we’re out running errands.
I pick up facial expressions, names, emotions, outfits, and settings when I’m on the go. It’s a constant stream of inspiration—bits and pieces of things to eventually make up a big picture.
Where do you get your ideas from?
What is with all the spam lately?
My plot ideas tend to come from stories that just kind of float in my dreams. Usually I just know what I’m going to put a character through and it is just a matter of working out the finer details and how to get between the different segments.
If I’m between ideas but am wanting to write I usually just try playing the what if game. If this happens, what happens next. Then if this happens what could happen. I usually end up with an entire page of branches off an original idea nad finally decide on some vague outline of a plot.
Some great advice in this post and some great ideas. Thanks Elizabeth.
wow. awful spam from the lovely anonymous. Well, personally I find that like you I get inspired by everything and anything. I can be talking to someone and the light will shine on their face a certain way and suddenly an idea will just pop into my head or I can be out for a walk and see people interacting and it will just come to me. Though lately I had my very first dream inspiring plot. Normally I wouldn’t find myself dreaming of completely new plots I had never even thought of (though I guess the fact that I dreamed it meant I had) but ya, guess you can add that onto the list. Great post!!!
Lovely post. And I quite agree with you – the difficult thing is not getting ideas, the difficult thing is choosing which ideas to use when. Or, as you mentioned some months back, being able to hold onto an idea till you are ready to tackle it.
And if you have an older man pinch his wife in a church in any of your books, you are going to be accused of having your mind in the gutter. Life is so much more colourful than the fictional world, isn’t it?
I am probably the least “inspired” writer around. My ideas only begin to filter through when I’ve started writing. Everything else can be marked down as unusable ramblings.
My mother actually asked me the same question last time I was back home. “I don’t know” was my knee-jerk answer, followed by a fumbling explanation.
I have toooooo many ideas traveling through my brain daily. I have no problem with finding ideas. I have a problem sorting them, recording them.
If I hear or see anything on the tube or in life I think hmmm can I use it?
As always thanks for the information. It is wonderful.
I catch myself wondering how certain things I come in contact with would show up in mystery books. How would this author use this? Could this be a quirk of this character we didn’t know about? As a reader understanding how stories and characters are developed has given me more appreciate for the works I read. Day-to-day activities do throw some very intriguing characters and events into our lives.
In addition to all you’ve listed, I’ve had ideas come from music and food.
Elizabeth – As always, a fascinating question!! I’m fortunate in that I have a terrific family and good friends who frequently give me good ideas for plots. They’re also very helpful about telling me when my own plot ideas are – er – not so good. Just to give you an example, my first novel was the product of a dinnertime conversation I had with my husband and daughter where we were talking about the inglorious life that graduate students lead. Before I knew it, they’d given me most of the main plot ideas and the rest is, well, Publish or Perish.
I agree the world is teeming with inspiration. We only have to be present in every moment.
We were riding to church one day and my daughter looked up to the sky. She said to me and my husband, “look a plane scratched the sky.”
I had to pull over to get that down on paper!
I think it’s so hard to explain to people because generating ideas is really a process. You don’t just see them float by and pick them out. You build them.
When you develop the skill for doing that, then each idea becomes a thousand.
Emma–I know…I feel like singing the Monty Python song about spam! Twice in one day is really a little much. Oh well…it’s gone now.
I wish I had great dreams like that! I just woke up from an interesting dream last night, but it made absolutely no sense and is useless to me. Broken down trains with odd sleeping compartments. Hm. No, nothing I can do with that! :)
Rayna–Real life IS a lot more improbable than fiction! :) I’ve been told to cut a couple of things for being unbelievable…and it was the stuff that was real, every time.
Cassandra–You know, the spam tends to come in waves. But there won’t be any for months, so I just leave my settings as-is. I’ve deleted 2 LONNNNG medical spam comments, those of you who are wondering what we’re talking about.
I like the way you brainstorm. So you start with the germ of an idea and then take that idea in different directions as far as you can. Nice!
I wish I knew where my ideas come from – they just seem to show up. I’ve never had a full plot jump into my head fully-formed, but I do have kernels pop in from time to time.
Where do they come from? I don’t know. I just hope they keep on coming!
My ideas come from everywhere, like yours. But they play bumper cars in my mind and by the time they reach the page, nothing is the same as when I heard, saw, or read it.
I’m like you, Cassandra – I get some of my best ideas from my dreams. It can be anything from an image or a scene to a whole plot that sparks off the story.
Most dreams make no sense but every once in a while I’ll have one that will end up turning into something special. I recently had a short story published in Interzone that started off life as a dream!
I also get a lot of inspiration from music and visual art, things that don’t necessarily have a story in them, but are images or feelings that grow into characters and events. I ususally find the less lyrical the music is the better, or the words get in the way of what I am imagining.
People usually laugh when I say it’s from a dream but it only starts there and I have to develop it from there. I try to combine a few ideas into one because than it doesn’t just come from one current event.
Great thought-provoking blog.
ann
Like you, I can find inspiration anywhere. Last week I wiggled a bit, though (being very tired), until I came across this sentence on Margot Kinberg´s blog:
“… we know that if a book’s a murder mystery, someone’s going to end up dead.”
And there was my idea: a flash fiction story beginning with the words: “When did I first know that someone was going to die?”
Elizabeth, please stop by my blog when you have a minute — I’ve nominated your for a fun award.
You’re right, just about everything can be turned into a plot. My favorite is overhearing snipets of conversation. It’s amazing where they sometimes lead. Then two, past experiences or even current experiences.
My mom always asks me this question. I tell her they flit in through open windows and hit me between the eyes. Honestly, I get my ideas from everything, mostly from my own overactive imagination. I’ll be sitting, minding my own business and a snippet of story floats to the front of my brain and I write it down. Oh darn…I’ll say. Another one? I file it away for another day :)
Happy Wednesday,
Jen
People watching may be the best way to get ideas. So many! You can squirrel them away until needed.
Helen
Straight From Hel
Nicholls–I think most of us don’t really KNOW exactly where they come from…they just kind of show up. Sometimes if we just open ourselves up to the possibilities of inspiration (during the day), then we can get a lot of ideas that way.
Teresa–Me too. I usually just jot them down in a Word file in case I need it later. Otherwise the ideas bump around in my head all day. :)
Rebecca–I need to have better dreams!
Music I can definitely see. Particularly for evoking emotion. I can also see what you’re saying about lyrics messing up the process a little.
Ann –Y’all have the best dreams of anybody I know. My dreams are either completely pedestrian or so nonsensical as to be unusable.
Mason–And that’s absolutely what we do…what would my character do if confronted with this person or this situation? And finding new quirks is the best!
Terry–Food! Great point. Actually, I need to get more of my inspiration from food, since I’m writing an epicurean mystery. :)
Margot–That’s amazing! Y’all have some really good supper conversations. Ours tend to center around what happened in math class. :)
Tamika–You’re so right! If we tune in to everything around us, there’s inspiration all over. And what a cutie your daughter is!
Helen–Because we never know when something will be a perfect fit for a novel we’re working on.
Daring Novelist–I think people believe the ENTIRE thing comes to us in a vision. Maybe it’s that way for some people…for me, I piece it all together.
My ideas for my first novel actually come from all sorts of resources and at one level, it is a reflection of where my life is while writing. My being college so you will find a lot of historical references as well as other liberal arts courses. I also love films and the arts so that is also incorporated too.
Then there are also themes of my own personal life, sort of a symbolic idea of things: colors, art, statues, paintings, use of certain animals; the story is very complex with the ideas I have.
But fun to use and work with for my trilogy.
Everything. Usually it’s the unusual, something that sticks out and makes me notice it.
I too get myriad plot ideas. I jot them down and run them by trusted friends. Then I’ll narrow it down to 2 or 3 and even do a blog post and ask my readers which synopsis or plot blurb idea is most appealting to them. It helps.
Marvin D Wilson
Hey Elizabeth –
Enjoying the insights here on your blog. As for me, my ideas come mainly from my own life experiences. I tend to do a lot of self-reflecting and through it all it tends to work well when I throw some of the ideas or situations I’m wrestling with into a story and let the protagonist figure it out. It turns out to be cheap therapy too.:)
Jonz–It sounds like your work is an amalgam of a lot of different influences. Sounds rich and complex!
Elspeth–Let’s not jinx ourselves! The ideas need to keep coming.
Carol–And that’s the thing…these people we get ideas from may not even recognize the part they played in our story–it’s changed so much after we work with the original idea.
Marvin–That’s a very interesting approach–and actually, something I’m discussing on my blog tomorrow: something that James Patterson does that’s similar.
Dorte–That’s a GREAT beginning! And the idea came from a blog post. It’s amazing how these things come to us.
Patricia–Thanks so much! I’ll pop over there right away.
Judy–Doesn’t it sound like we go around eavesdropping on people? But people talk so loud now..especially with cell phones. And I’m usually just quietly sitting nearby…
Jen–It’s amazing, isn’t it? And we just helplessly put the ideas aside until we’re ready for them. But I’m not sure we could ever write all the stories we get ideas for! We’d really be booked up then.
Steven–It’s great therapy! And it can really add depth to characters, too.
Kristen–The unusual stuff does really grab our attention, doesn’t it? But then, things need to be vivid for a book.
I’ve just started reading Stephen King’s “On Writing” (I know I should have read it years ago) and it was amazing to hear how he got the seeds for “Carrie” from his experience of cleaning the girl’s locker room as a janitor and reading an article on poltergeists. Most creativity is the mixing of apparently disparate ideas.
(BTW I just gave you an award Elizabeth, but don’t worry about passing it on, since you’ve already won it before. I just had to give it to you because you so deserve it)
Terrific subject.
Inspiration is everywhere!
I keep a file for ideas. I must stay focused, I must stay focused, I must, I must, I must…
Elizabeth–I’m with you! Keep focused on the current WIP, save the other ideas for later. As tempting as those other ideas are!
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