Why My Head Will Implode

4 January 2010 | Filed Under Tales from the Author's Desk 

I don’t know about you, but I have way too many ideas to ever write down. There are just too many choices. How do you decide which ones to focus on and see through to the end? (Heck if I know.)

In the About the Author section of Charles de Lint’s Wolf Moon, he says that he wanted to read a fantasy story that wasn’t full of epic battles and troubled kings, but a fantasy story about normal people. He couldn’t find one, so he wrote one instead. I intend to do the same.

For my 2010 project, I made a list of the elements I would like to see in a fantasy story. I enjoy divine-mortal interactions, the kind you see in Tamora Pierce’s books and the Percy Jackson series, so that went on the list. I enjoy hidden or mistaken identities. That was number two. I also included debates, like fate vs. free will, and tried and true topics, like the tension between mortality and immortality.

After I made the list, the story just seemed to fall into place. Or at least, the wide angle lens version did. I still have no clue how to get from point A to point B, but it’s a start.

But what about my other ideas? The stories I’ve been playing around with for the last few months? If I just toss them on the mental sidewalk, what will happen to them? There is no way all of these stories will come to be. I guess the trick to being a writer is knowing which ideas are worth pursuing, and which ones are better off being left in the mental trashcan. I certainly hope my 2010 project turns out to be the former, otherwise I’m in for a rough year.

Comments

7 Responses to “Why My Head Will Implode”

  1. ikehaus on January 4th, 2010 10:52 am

    I don’t know how accurate this is, but I read that Tom Robbins writes one line at a time without any idea of where the story is going. I thought that was an interesting way to write. :)

  2. jajohnson7 on January 4th, 2010 10:57 am

    If that’s true, it’s certainly impressive. I can’t write one line at a time without coming up with 10 different ways to go next, complete with major events down the road. I can’t help the planning. Can you?

  3. Dan on January 4th, 2010 11:18 am

    All of the short stories I ever wrote were basically stream of consciousness. They were usually done as part of the journal-writing requirement for some class or other, so I guess they were written a page at a time, and then eventually I’d realize it was time to wrap them up and figure out a way to tie things back together.

    The best attempt I ever made at writing a novel was a lot more planned though. I’d done some kind of a game design, only to never go anywhere with it beyond maps and characters, so I ended up trying to write it out as a novel instead. Sadly, I lost the file a long time ago, and the preview chapters I’d put online have been swallowed by the internets/I’ve forgotten the URL.

  4. jajohnson7 on January 4th, 2010 11:26 am

    I guess you can’t Google them, huh? What kind of game, rpg, computer, video, board?

  5. Sara S on January 4th, 2010 2:12 pm

    Charles de Lint wrote Widdershins too, right? I found it at a used bookstore and really liked it… I need to find the others! That’s a good tool for narrowing your focus.

  6. Dan on January 4th, 2010 3:49 pm

    No, I don’t really even remember what it was called anymore or any of the characters’ names. I think it was on some Angelfire site, which may or may not even actually exist anymore. I tried looking through my old emails because I remember having several positive responses to what I uploaded, but apparently they got deleted too :(

    It was intended as an SNES RPG design–this was in the midst of my big Final Fantasy phase :)

  7. The 7 Link Challenge | A Single Bell on August 4th, 2010 12:48 am

    [...] first post: Why My Head Will Implode was my first official post, and it’s still as applicable today as it was when I wrote [...]

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    Hi, I'm Jenn, new grad student and old YA fantasy writer. I've long dreamed of being a novelist, and I bet you have too. I hope you find my blog helpful, inspiring, and maybe just a little bit fun. (But not too much fun. Writing is serious business, you know.)

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