Looking For the Next Big Thing

Happy Tuesday!

I know, it’s just not the same as saying Happy Monday, but you know, Tuesdays are a weird day too. It’s not quite Wednesday, so you haven’t made it to the hump, but it’s better than Monday, when you’re just starting to get back into things. It’s always been one of those days where I don’t quite know what to do with myself.

At least now I get to write to you guys. ;-)

Last week we talked about two things that writers always do, no matter what: we always think about our plots, and we always assess people as characters. Can’t even help it, it just comes naturally to us. But there are many more things we do too, when push comes to shove.

Writers are always on the lookout for the next good idea

And they come from unexpected sources. Seriously, they do. I was in a Viking Mythology class when I got the idea for the Druid Novels. And I was in a class at my church when I started writing my Earth-Space series (the first of which is due out sometime in the next decade, I hope). They come when you least expect them, and you have to be constantly prepared to receive them.

Why? Because we never want to run out of ideas.

I think it’s honestly a bit of a fear, in many writers. We don’t want to run out of ideas, to get to the point that we’re not sure what to write next. And if we’re honest, it’s happened to all of us at least once or twice. We finish a book and we feel like we have nothing else in us. But we’re wrong, and that’s where this comes in handy.

No matter where we go, no matter what we’re doing while we’re there, we’re always looking for the next big idea.

Ideas are where we thrive, when it comes right down to it. Every book is a series of ideas strung together, a group of notions that we put together to form a complete story. How are we supposed to finish the book if we run out of ideas in the middle?

So then, it’s not just about new novel ideas, or new ideas that will lead into a new novel, but about new ideas to string into the group of ideas we’re currently working on. A novel isn’t just based off a single idea, most of the time.

But for those of you who aren’t writers, I’m sure you’re wondering where we get these ideas. In fact, I know you wonder that, because it’s one of the questions I’m asked all. The. Time. Here, I’ll answer it for you.

I get my ideas from the back of my head, while I’m doing something completely normal and mundane. I get ideas from random phrases people spoke on accident. I get ideas from the Word of God, from the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. I get my ideas from television shows, but I usually take them in a different direction than they did. I get my ideas from all around, from everywhere, and I do not intend to stop. Because I’m a writer, and I need ideas. I thrive in them, and they in me—as with every writer before me, every writer around me, and every writer who will follow us.

We need our ideas, and our ideas need us, if they’re going to come to fruition.

[love]

{Rani D.}