Writing Life - An Idea Is Born

On any given day, I will have three of four story ideas pop into my head. Sometimes they come from dreams, while other come from things that I see or overhear. Both Crueller and Odd The Grid came from little conversations with my wife that had little or nothing to do with the eventual story, whereas Black Roses was from a dream.

Something I often think about is how non-writers process these little nuggets. Do they ignore those intrusive thoughts or forget about them moments after they arrive in their head.

Perhaps the ideas come because I am so open to them. When I am out and about, I have a process that I use without even really thinking about it. I tend to pay attention to interesting people that I see, building backstories for them in my mind. I'll do the same with buildings and locations, imagining how they might fit into a bigger story. Throw those two things together and you have a main character and a setting. Creating a story from that tends to, for me, not be that difficult.

In fairness, some of the basic ideas get lost in the shuffle, simply because they are not that interesting, but there are always a couple that stay in my head and eat away at me until I start committing the words to digital paper. I'm always afraid that the ideas will dry up, but as I grow older, they seem to come much faster.

Long may it last!!