Original fic: Week Three

[haldoor.livejournal.com]

Hi original ficcers! It's definitely not too late to join in, everyone, whether you're an old hat at writing your own characters, or whether you're new to it! Give it a go!



I'm a bit late this week because the power was out at home all day yesterday, so nothing got done! But I'm on track again with posting today, if not for writing my own original fic! I haven't even pulled out the original fics to decide which one to tackle, so I am really not progressing well. I need to find them and get going! How about you? How's your story going? Need any new prompts? Here are a couple:

1. Time will tell

2. The moment he/she/they stepped in the room

This week, let's talk about what gets you started with writing something original. Is it an idea, a character, something that pops into your head, you open a document and just let the muses dictate, or something else completely? I tend to find a question usually sets me off; something along the lines of 'what would happen if...?' quite often, but not always. Sometimes it's dialogue that comes to me as I think about something; usually a couple of people discussing whatever it is that has hit me! Sometimes I know who the characters talking are straight away, sometimes not. I guess, being a bit of a mood writer, and someone who tends to let the muses take the lead, I sometimes don't even know what the story is about till it's written! How about you?

Comments

[cmk418]

With my NaNo novels, for some reason, many of my initial ideas for them come in August. Which is a silly time for ideas to assert themselves because it's three months before I can begin writing. Does it occur to me that I can start writing in August? Sure. Do I start writing in August? Absolutely not.

Many times it starts with a theme- I want to tell a story about X. How do I get to X? What genre will work for the story? What kind of characters do it need? For the one where I'm currently working on the second draft, it was... I want to write fantasy. There's going to be a dragon in it, but the dragon is going to be trapped in the body of a girl, and then the story spun out from there. But in my NaNo icebreaker meeting, I remember telling people- it's a fantasy and all I know is that there's a dragon in it.

In my revising, I've run into an age discrepancy. It's resolvable, but it skews things a bit and definitely raises some of the stakes which might not be too terrible.

I'm going to work on some more character development scenes this week.

[asphaltcowgrrl.livejournal.com]

This sounds like something I'd read, so I hope you do work out the kinks. Also reminds me of one of the D&D 'worlds' - I want to say it was Mystara - that only got one series of 3 books. It had a similar premise.

[haldoor.livejournal.com]

That's crazy, but I can imagine the sort of thing! If I was a Nanoer, I'd probably be thinking about it well in advance too, but not necessarily writing it!

I love the idea of a dragon in someone's body! And it's cool that all you knew at first was that it had a dragon in it!

Oh boy, I know that feeling of 'painting yourself in a corner' or close to it. Glad to hear the age discrepancy is resolvable, and that it could change things in an interesting way! Good luck with that, and with your character development - I hope you found time for that this week!

[asphaltcowgrrl.livejournal.com]

It can be a thought, a snippet of conversation, or even a, "No, that's NOT how it's supposed to go!" in a fandom. Travis and Ethan sprang from something like that.

An interesting thing that happens with me is almost fanfic of my original characters. I think, "Well, what if Andrej had confessed his crush to Zayne in the very beginning? What then?" And I find myself with a whole new set of characters with new options. Not sure if this is common or a weird me thing. :D

LOL - I can relate to that last bit. It's like that joke you see sometimes where the character pulls up and says, "Get in, loser, we're going noveling." Pretty much describes my creative process.

[haldoor.livejournal.com]

Yes! Exactly! And I'm so glad you found Travis and Ethan!

Oh boy, that is a good one! I can't say it's happened to me or anyone else I know, but it would be interesting to know if it ever has to other writers! I can imagine it would, somehow!

Yup, I am pretty haphazard, even when I try to prepare! Glad I'm not the only one! ;-)

[asphaltcowgrrl.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I kinda love them myself. :D

It doesn't happen with most of my characters but Andrej and Ali are two I often wonder 'what if' about. I would think that published authors have at least thought about it because you know that readers have asked questions that provoke it.

Hah! You're in good company there!