by Silverhart » Wed Oct 29, 2014 12:16 pm
Do you ever get a good idea to use to write, but you aren't sure how to put the idea into words, then into a storyline? How do you eventually decipher your thoughts and get them down so others can understand you?
Do you mean how to take a random idea and turn it into a plot? Like say I was brainstorming and came up with something like "dinosaurs in the American Revolutionary War". That's not a story or a plot of course, it's just an idea (a good idea too... someone should write that). Then I'll take that idea and start figuring out many of the questions it brings up (Why are there dinosaurs in Revolutionary age America? What are they doing there? How does this effect the setting? Do they eat people, or help them? Do they talk? Dance? Can I put an adorable little tricorn hat on one? etc.)
Maybe one of those questions sparks another idea. What if there was a traveling troupe of dancing dinosaurs who wore cute little tricorn hats, and frilly shirts, and they escape and begin to wreck havoc? Now I have a problem. A little more brainstorming and maybe I decide to have John Hancock come riding in on his horse to save the day. So I have a character now. How to solve the problem? Let's have him round up the dinosaurs with the rest of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and then they all decide to ride the dinosaurs into dance-battle against the British. The British lose the dance-battle against the dinosaurs, because the stomping of the dinosaurs causes the house to literally fall down, and the day is saved. And that's how the American Revolution was won - at least in this alternate universe.
Now I have a plot. It has a beginning, a middle, a climax, and a conclusion. It has a setting, a problem, a solution, and characters - pretty much everything a story needs. And that only took me like 10 minutes to go from my first idea to a little story. Just brainstorm different ideas, when one of those ideas sparks your interest, think about that idea, and so on and so forth.
After that, you may have a few specific scenes or images in mind - perhaps a Triceratops in a pair of spectacles barreling through a market stand, as Mr. Hancock and the gang try to lasso it and herd it into Old Man McDonald's farmhouse before the British cavalry see it. Write them down, and keep thinking up new ones. Don't be afraid to go in a tweak your initial plot idea. Maybe we'll decide the dinosaurs got here in a time machine, and the time machine's owner is the one who enlists the help of the founding fathers. I think we'll name her Janet, and give her an adorable archaeopteryx sidekick who can mimic like a parrot. Or let's say we don't like the ending - instead of the dance-battle, we'll just have the dinosaurs chase the British out of Philadelphia.
And on, and on. You get the idea. XP What I'm saying is, just sit and think. Ask yourself questions. What's a problem this character might face? What's the reason behind this happening? Why does the world have this, or lacks this? What if the setting was this? What if I included this? What if I changed the genre? What if I focus on this character instead of that one? Eventually you should have enough ideas that you'll come up with a problem the characters can face, and then you try and come up with a solution. ^^ From there, you just continue to add and tweak - your final product may even be completely different from how you first envision it. Case in point, I once tried writing a dark historical romance, and over the years my view on it changed and it became a light-hearted comedy. XD The idea was the same, but I completely changed the plot. So figure out what you feel like writing - something silly, serious, adventurous, romantic, philosophical - and think of your idea in that light. I could just as easily take "dinosaurs in American Revolution" and make it into an action adventure piece about American and British dinosaurs in combat. Or maybe a love story about two nesting Troodons separated by the conflict.
Lastly, as these ideas start tumbling in, think about what you want to say with your story. Does it exist purely to entertain, is there a lesson you want to teach, or an opinion you want to express? What's the theme?
These are the questions I ask myself, and the way I think through plotting. Hopefully they help you!
