Where Do Your Ideas Come From?

Writing your first novel-Some things you should know,

d843805eede6d7643cb4e63abccb92f6--funny-writing-quotes-funny-sayingsI was lying in bed last night thinking about what I would write about today. I’ve been writing this blog for two years, and I have to admit, there are times when I’m at a loss. I want to share useful information, but I don’t want to sound like a broken record, and I don’t want to duplicate what someone else is writing.

How do you come up with ideas? I’m not just talking about blogs, I’m talking about with your novels. I’ve completed one story-minus a few revisions, and I’ve started another.

Both of my novels where the products of dreams. Maybe the info was hiding in my subconscious somewhere, from a movie or novel that I read in the past, and it manifested itself during my sleeping hours with a slight twist. Sounds like a good explanation to me 🙂

I base my blogs on my own experiences. I knew nothing about writing a novel when I started this adventure. I had written reports, habilitation plans, policies etc., but in case you didn’t know, they are totally different. That was one of the reasons I wrote a blog on English teacher writing versus novel writer writing. (That was a mouthful. Probably could have worded better. 🙂 ) Grammar Is A Must-But Lose That English Teacher Writing!

As I said, I use my experiences as the basis of this blog. There is so much new writers don’t know, and I’m hoping I provide enough useful info, that people that have been around a while, benefit from it as well.

So the question again, where do you get your ideas from? A few that I know and can relate too:

  • Dreams
  • Personal experience
  • Watching others
  • Current events (read the newspaper or watch the news)
  • Reading novels
  • Watching movies
  • Taglines

There are so many places to get ideas, you just have to look. You ever read a book and wondered why the author did what they did? Or thought, I would have gone in a totally different direction?

There are no new ideas out there. As a writer you want your work to sound original, but what you are doing, is taking an idea that exists and making it your own. Be Original!

-Something to think about. And yes, I am interested in where your ideas come from 🙂

-Jan R

 

Where Do Your Ideas Come From?

22 thoughts on “Where Do Your Ideas Come From?”

  5. I really don’t know where some of my ideas come from. Some I do know, though. Pictures is one. Paintings or photographs. Once, a name came to me, with a person attached. Straw coloured hair and blue eyes. No idea where he came from. Occasionally I’ll be somewhere and the surroundings suggest a story, or something I hear about in the news or something someone tells me. I’ve yet to dream a story, though, but many authors say they do.

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  8. Hard to answer. I’ve only written one novel based on real life experience. Places, events and people give me settings, but then ideas what to do with the setting pop into my head. What would this person do if the unexpected happened to them?

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