Writing Blog

20231016 Stockpiling ideas

October 16, 2023, 7:30am

The idea is still there, and is looking like turning into a novel. Added another 7500 words yesterday, and hope to get it done by the weekend.

So much for giving my brain a rest before NaNoWriMo!

But I think this is what I would hope writers take away from my tale of mental regurgitation is this:

If you can, don't just let an idea fester or sit in your head.

If I hadn't started this story (in 2020!) and kept those old notes, then re-read them a few days ago, I would not have another novella on its way to completion. You don't need to finish everything you start when you start, but write the idea down and put it somewhere safe.

I have notepads everywhere. Even now, living in a pub, I have 2 notepads near my bed, one in my bag, two in my car and one in my spare backpack. Plus pencils. Yes, pencils - pens run out of ink, go dry, leak, etc.

And I have collated all the ideas into a folder on the computer. From an opening line, a rhyming couplet, a series of notes, a full scene, the first seven chapters of a book, you name it, I have kept it.

This story was first written in 2020 as three paragraphs of an opening scene of two friends belting one another over a girl. Just a scene I saw and wrote down.

The B-version started after the fight, with the protag having lost.

The C-version started 25 years after the fight, and the fight was a flashback.

The D-version went back to the B-version, and was turning into a time-lapse The Bold And The Beautiful.

The E-version, the current version, has become a paranormal story. The protag didn't fight and let his friend hit him.

So... don't throw anything out. Keep your ideas. You never know when they will come to fruition.