I love writing stories.............?

Question

For some reason Im having writers block and I don't now what to write about.....any suggestions of what to write about?

please.....actual answers!!!! + i'll dedicate the book to you when i get it published!! 10 pts for the best answer!

Answer 1

I want to read a book where someone has the AMAZING adventure. Totally out of control stuff, an entirely other world they live in. And then as a twist at the end, you find out that it's some person in a mental institution or something similar. And all of these amazing things are just in their mind, it's really just them doing the every day, mundane things. (ie. They have a grande feast, amongst royalty...only to find out later, it was them just eating in the cafeteria)

Answer 2

There's an adage that says "write what you know," meaning write about something that's familiar to you so it sounds like you know what you're talking about. I would also suggest writing about something that you are passionate about so that you will put the time and effort into making your story complete. Do you have a favorite hobby? What about a movie? How about writing about an event that's similar to one in your childhood?

Spend a lot of time developing your characters before you try to develop your story. Are your characters tall, short, old, young, college educated, high school dropouts? Once you develop your characters, you'll find it easier to write realistic scenes in your story.

Good luck. If you are really into becoming a good writer, you might want to check out the forums at AuthorZone.com.

Answer 3

I'd really love to help you, being a writer myself and having experienced writers block, but it's almost impossible for one writer to give another writer an entire idea and be helpful. I'm sorry to say this, but, in order to write a good novel, or even just a good short story, it has to all come from you. If you're taking someone else's idea, your muse is almost completely nonexistent.

Try listening to music. It sounds stupid, but I've found it really sparks ideas. Just listen to the words, the music, whatever. It sparks emotions, lines, etc. Or, what I also tend to do: really listen to people, look around you. You'd be surprised how many stories are just waiting to be written, and are happening every day in life. You'll find a muse, eventually. But in order for your writing to be any good, it has to be your own.

Answer 4

The best way to get rid of writer's block is by keeping a journal, though that might not help in your case, since you need to get rid of it NOW. If you just write a bit every day, it really helps when you're writing something else, like a poem, story, etc. Right now, however, I suggest ice cream. That always helps me think. :)

Answer 5

As a writer myself, it is very important in the writing industry to 'write what you know about.' Soooooo, think about your accumulated knowledge, then also consider that you have to research this subject again for any updates or changes that have taken place since you acquired that knowledge.

If you are considering fiction, then try thinking of some things that you are very passionate about. Foreign intrigue, or it could be Si-Fi fantasy. Which are your favorite movies? Write a sequel in which you create different character names and augment the subject by additional situations to it.

Those are a couple of ideas that will work. They did for me. Are you passionate about any issues that are current? Elaborate and imagine yourself in that exact situation and let your mind wander and go to the extreme.

Hope this helped. Good luck.

Answer 6

Before you go to sleep put a notepad and a flashlight by your bed. When you wake up for that early morning bathroom trip write down what you either thought or thought you should have while urinating.
This may sound strange but it works great. Read it the next evening and tweak it. It will inspire you.

Answer 7

How about a story about a bunch of the people here on Y! Answers? You could do something like talk about each person separately and then maybe they can be passing each other in person without even knowing it but communicating on-line. That might be fun to work out.

Answer 8

Write out a particular define, no longer purely significant activities. Then write little issues you may choose to happen in it; e.g. Sarah the main significant character and Bianca, her new pal, take a walk jointly. Sounds stupid, yet i stumble on it consequences in significant issues. do no longer STICK fullyyt on your define! that's what alot of persons do and that they lose interest. be happy to combine it up and upload stuff and take stuff away. do no longer bypass forward into the tale, which will in basic terms make the bridging up deathly uninteresting. i'm winding up a fifty two,864 be conscious manuscript. :)

Answer 9

A woman has a recurring dream about her husband who was killed in a car accident. She is eventually able to communicate with him and she finds out that his ghost is communicating with her and trying to warn her about something. She can't figure out what he's trying to tell her. She works harder and harder and becomes more and more obsessed with dreaming. She doesn't even want to be awake, so she can spend time with her husband and find out what he wants.

It turns out that he is trying to warn her to stop dreaming about him, as she is keeping him from going to the light. When she finally discovers this she has gone insane.

Sorry - I like downbeat endings! You're welcome to make it a happy ending if you want.

You'd better send me the story if you use my outline!!!! IM me!

FP

FP

Answer 10

Why would you want to write someone else's idea?? Your trouble is with a lack of research and frankly having nothing to say.

Stories are a metaphor for life. Before you even begin to write you must have something to say or else your characters go from scene to scene without any meaning. There are three things that I believe are important and these three things are often confused with each other. Learning about these I think will help you to move your story:

1) Premise
2) Setting
3) Theme

Let me illustrate the difference so you can easily find the theme and understand its difference from the setting and premise. By seeing how a writer creates stories, you can see it from his or her point of view and clearly find the theme, create a premise and setting and learn to do it yourself.

The controlling idea is the meaning of your story. It is another word for "theme". The premise is what happens. The setting is the place and time where it's set.

For example, when you ask someone who just watched or read "Lord of the Rings" what it's about, they'll probably say something like, "it's an epic story about a hobbit who is given a huge responsibility to take a magical ring into a mountain to destroy it and save the world and elves and men unite to....etc.." Or they may answer "It's about Middle Earth". These are not themes. The first is simply the premise. The latter is the setting. What the story is *really* about is: "Freedom is attained when we risk and sacrifice ourselves." That is the controlling idea (the theme) of the story. Of course, we can debate if that is the true controlling idea but I'm only giving you my interpretation.

Harry Potter's premise contains magic, and the setting is in a fantasy land, but the theme is not about magic nor fantasy. The theme of Harry Potter might be: "Happiness prevails when we are confident of our own gifts and individuality." Discuss. =)

Now you can apply this understanding as I'll explain below with a story to any story you read.

First, I'll explain the premise. This way you'll see the difference.

A writer finds a premise through research and asking "what if" for any situation. If you read the news, one can find many ideas if you simply ask yourself "what if" as you read through it.

For example, I randomly selected a news article on Yahoo News:
Survivors recall horror of flu pandemic

As I'm reading through each line, I'm thinking about story ideas and asking "what if". For example, I read this line:

>> The flu swept through the nation's capital, which had attracted thousands of soldiers and war workers.

Now I'm asking myself, 'what if someone built a virus and orchestrated a large event so they could infect everyone in it to inflict the most damage?'

That's a start, but sounds a bit cliche, but that's okay. Let your mind race and you'll then ask "what if" upon "what if". What if the person accidently released the virus and kept silent while everyone around them died? What if the event was organized by a force where people are called to gather in one location but everyone made excuses for going there without realizing they were being forced -- only a supernatural force could do that -- and the reason is the supernatural force wanted to end the human race? hehe...this gets into some horror or science-fiction if that's your bag. But you can see the magic "what if" at work.

Let's choose the supernatural 'what if' as the premise in this example. Now we're going to start thinking of the controlling idea. This is what is the heart of your story -- the story you need to tell and what the story is *truly* about.

The controlling idea is not a single word; it's not going to be about "viruses" nor "aliens" nor "Civil War". The Controlling Idea tells us, "life is like this!"

The controlling idea will be a sentence that tells us how and why life changes from one condition of existence to another (again, theme and controlling idea are the same -- I prefer to use controlling idea). This change will show up in the climax of the last act of your story. That's where you will find the controlling idea.

Concerning how I came up with Harry Potter's controlling idea, I looked at the last acts' endings of every Harry Potter story. What value changed? Harry went from being unconfident to confident and therefore was happy whereas each story opens with him in a situation and the world crumbling around him and constantly being challenged. Look at the last act's value change.

Fine writers filter everything they write through the controlling idea and then work up to the last climax -- look at the value that exists throughout the story because there will be themes that come and go. For example in Harry Potter he often seeks to befriend those who try to do him harm so we learn that "Trust is earned when we love our enemy" -- or because that didn't always work we could say, "Evil prevails when we try to love our enemies" but either of these is not the controlling idea of the entire story.

Going back to my story, by following the writer's work and using the premise that people are being supernaturally led to gather in one location, we need to come up with a protagonist. I'm going to use a "what if" and ask 'what if the protagonist is also under this supernatural spell?' That will make it more interesting because it will provide deeper conflict. Not only will he have to try to save the world but also get out the spell himself perhaps.

Some more questions I will ask myself and we're going to come to the controlling idea of the story I created: What is this spell? What is so attractive to force these people to gather without them even knowing they're being forced? Now this is starting to get rich. We know a lot of people do things they don't want because they're manipulated. Cults are famous for doing this. Charismatic leaders and propaganda are also effective. People are manipulated in many ways that many fail to see they're being manipulated. And those who best manipulate do it without you knowing. Life is like that! Now I'm starting to find my controlling idea.

My controlling idea is a sentence, it's not simply "manipulation". So, I start with something -- it's better than nothing: "Evil prevails when we fail to examine our conscious and instead follow others" or "Compassion prevails in humans only when we follow our conscious". Whichever we choose, it must be clear in the last-climax of the last act of your story.

As a writer develops the story, they work to that last act. Many writers paste that controlling idea onto the computer monitor and filter everything they write through it. Your characters may go in different directions, but this controlling idea is the writer's guide.

Concerning the setting, you can place this story in a different dimension, in a different time, or on a different planet. That will change the dynamics of the story but it won't change the controlling idea and that is where the power of the story exists -- it gives it meaning.

For the setting let's place this premise 50 years into the future on Earth.

The character will have an object of desire. In the premise that I've created, the supernatural force is manipulating people to gather in one location so it can infect them with a virus. Because I think this force is intelligent and sly, it's not going to be identical for every peson and is going to feed on the weakness of every individual. I think the best object of desire for the protagonist is going to be his pursuit of power within his sphere of influence. So, let's say he's an oceanographer (I pulled that out of nowhere). He would become famous and influential if he made an important discovery -- perhaps a discovery that can save lives such as tsumani detection technology (but in 50 years in the future we could make a more futuristic device). This is what he wants -- power. The force provides him the opportunity to seek this object and eventually he's going to have to go to this one location where the force intends to infect him. Now we have a lot more what ifs' to ask. As you can see, we're starting a great outline of the story and fleshing it out.

But we need to get back to the controlling idea.

I like up-endings so I want him to become redeemed in the end. I think his pride is too great and his pursuit of power is evil. His idea of saving lives is a great idea, but his reasoning is not -- he's doing it to gain influence for himself, not to help people -- this makes him conflicted and provides excellent dimension to his character. This force is going to manipulate his desire. But I am also going to add a subconscious desire to this. I want it so that he really doesn't want power...he simply doesn't recognize that the work he does already helps to save lives by adding to the research of others who are trying to find effective tsunami detection devices. He'll end up realizing this in the end. And this matches my controlling idea: "Evil prevails when we fail to examine our conscious and instead follow others." His pursuit of power only leads him into trouble as he follows others in trying to please them. But we still have to deal with this supernatural force that is manipulating everyone. Do we make our protagonist one who defeats the force, or do we make him lose by it. Either way, we must know the controlling idea clearly at the end of the last climax no matter what he does.

Although I went off in a science-fiction direction, the controlling idea I discovered can exist in any genre and any setting whether this is based during the time of the Civil War, the present, or on Mars.

Although I wrote a lot, I hope leading you through the writer's process will help you to see clearer how stories are developed and make it easier to find the theme and your premise and then things will begin to fall into place.