Proposal: A Workshop for Developing Story Ideas

Ari Meermans

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What If We Got it Wrong From the Get-go?

Not all of it, of course. When it comes to the market and the tastes of readers and agents and editors, so much really is subjective and unpredictable. But, what if there is something within a writer's control that we don't know or rarely think about?

So I got to thinking and I went spelunking into the interwebz trying to discover what might be sending the manuscripts we spend months, even years, of our sweat, our hopes, and our dreams into the trunk and us into rejection and dejection. Sure, the usual suspects come into play: the rush to submit a not-yet-ready book, the already mentioned subjectivity and taste, or the poorly executed query. But do we really know everything that is and isn't within our control? What if there is something else, something more?

Most of what I found was about this or that process and was unhelpful at best; books which are the products of this process or that process are published all the time, so it can't be only down to process. Dispiritedly, I was on the verge of concluding that what we writers really need is a crystal ball to know, and thus improve our chances for success before we pour our hearts out for months or years on a manuscript.

A crystal ball.

Wait! Wait a minnit! What if a sort of crystal ball does exist? Something from the before-before?

What if?

The Story Idea or Where It All Begins

Almost everything I found regarding the story idea was about developing (fleshing out the premise) and nurturing our ideas before we start plotting or pantsing. But do we really know how to select the right idea from all those we have swimming around in our heads and on little pieces of paper scattered around our work areas?

The spelunking eventually yielded two books (surprisingly enough to me) on scriptwriting: Blake Snyder's Save the Cat: The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need*and Erik Bork's (From the Earth to the Moon and Band of Brothers) The Idea: The Seven Elements of a Viable Story for Screen, Stage or Fiction.* (Both books are easily adapted to writing novels and I recommend them**. I do. Strongly.) Then I came back to Brainstorming Sandbox and spelunked through several years of threads to verify what I had read.

So.

So, what I propose is this: how about we discuss those principles and methods for evaluating our ideas over here, then for anyone who's interested, toddle on over to Brainstorming Sandbox together to workshop our new ideas or even the ideas behind our current WIPs?

What say? Wanna do that? See if we can give our ideas and manuscripts a better chance? Try to polish our crystal balls?

* AW Affiliate Link(s).

**HUGE Disclaimer: We're not going to "lift" anything from these books. We respect other writers' toil too much to pull shenanigans like that. We can talk only about the evaluation techniques from a relatively high level. That's why I recommend the books for the nitty-gritty and if you must choose only one as an aid then grab a copy of Erik Bork's The Idea: The Seven Elements of a Viable Story for Screen, Stage, and Fiction to start with.
 
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CathleenT

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This is a terrific idea! I haven't read the second of your two recommended books, but I have studied Save the Cat in some depth. I have some quibbles with Snyder's work, at least as it applies to novelists--I believe he relies too heavily on stock characters because they're easy to cast, which is unnecessarily limiting in our case. (For those who haven't read the book, he talked about writing a character that could only be played by a particular actor, which would then kill the project if they couldn't get the actor to play the part.)

But in terms of story structure, types of stories, and character development, I found Save the Cat quite a valuable resource. I'd love to discuss the ins and outs as they apply to particular projects. :)
 

Taylor Harbin

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I'm in! I've been plagued by self-doubt over the last week and a half, wondering if I'm wasting my time trying to do something I'm not meant for, producing work that's only a pale imitation of meaningful work. Trying to polish a 1300 word short story right now for a brand new magazine, but I've only got seven days before the deadline.

How do you want to start this discussion?
 

Ari Meermans

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I'm in! I've been plagued by self-doubt over the last week and a half, wondering if I'm wasting my time trying to do something I'm not meant for, producing work that's only a pale imitation of meaningful work. Trying to polish a 1300 word short story right now for a brand new magazine, but I've only got seven days before the deadline.

How do you want to start this discussion?

Seven days! Yikes! Tell you what: if you want another pair of eyes between now and the weekend and want to discuss what you really need to take a look at, shoot me a PM.

As for the discussion & the workshop: We be talking about and making checklists for "Where ideas come from", "How to make your character relatable", "Identifying the big story problem", "Nailing your pitch and/or the heart of your query", and a few others. I'll put up what you need to consider for each of those and you guys will add to and discuss. (I hope to have those up by this evening.) Then we'll create the checklists and toddle on over to Brainstorming Sandbox to put our ideas through the wringer.
 
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Ari Meermans

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This is a terrific idea! I haven't read the second of your two recommended books, but I have studied Save the Cat in some depth. I have some quibbles with Snyder's work, at least as it applies to novelists--I believe he relies too heavily on stock characters because they're easy to cast, which is unnecessarily limiting in our case. (For those who haven't read the book, he talked about writing a character that could only be played by a particular actor, which would then kill the project if they couldn't get the actor to play the part.)

But in terms of story structure, types of stories, and character development, I found Save the Cat quite a valuable resource. I'd love to discuss the ins and outs as they apply to particular projects. :)

I'm almost ashamed to say how many books on the craft I added to my already bulging library of such-like over the summer; but, as far as I'm concerned, those two are among the best and most helpful.
 

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I'm almost ashamed to say how many books on the craft I added to my already bulging library of such-like over the summer; but, as far as I'm concerned, those two are among the best and most helpful.

Snyder’s Save the Cat: The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need* was praised so often when I interviewed writers for the Absolute Write blog that I added it to the sidebar.


Bork’s The Idea: The Seven Elements of a Viable Story for Screen, Stage or Fiction* is frequently used as a textbook at UCLA’s film school.

*AW affiliate link
 
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Cobalt Jade

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A version of Save the Cat! for novelists just came out this year.

Author: Jessice Brody
Publisher: Berkeley, California : Ten Speed Press, [2018]

Edition: First edition
Copyright Date: ©2018
ISBN: 9780399579745
0399579745
 

Ari Meermans

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A version of Save the Cat! for novelists just came out this year.

Author: Jessice Brody
Publisher: Berkeley, California : Ten Speed Press, [2018]

Edition: First edition
Copyright Date: ©2018
ISBN: 9780399579745
0399579745

I bought that one too, but I'm only part-way through it and I don't yet know if it makes the concepts easier to understand or adds anything. It's worth a look-see, if anyone wants to get it.
 

onesecondglance

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I didn't find Save the Cat! nearly as useful in isolation as when read with its companion volume: Save the Cat! Goes to the Movies.

Goes to the Movies shows the core beats to be vastly more flexible than a straight reading of StC might imply - GttM basically sets out to prove that following the beats won't produce a cookie-cutter movie - and there's a lot of useful discussion about Snyder's genre types, including common motifs and character types.

If the parts of StC about "you must hit this beat on this page" annoy you, give GttM a go instead - it's much more focused on showing the theory in practice.
 

Ari Meermans

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So far we have:
Ari Meermans
CathleenT
Taylor Harbin
Kjbartolotta
Snitchcat
ElaineA
Silva
Jason
AgathaChristieFan
Harlequin
Barfus
iszevthere


As others sign-up, I'll update this list and we'll move on to creating our plan and worksheets and checklists for the workshop we'll have in Brainstorming Sandbox. Lisa has graciously volunteered to help with creating those printable materials when we're finished here and are ready to move to the sandbox—and I'ma gratefully take her up on that.
 
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Ari Meermans

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The Plan: To take our bare-bones story ideas and flesh them out to create strong story premises. The premises would then be the ready-made pitches (all done), which could then be the basic structures for writing our queries.

Note: From everything I've read over the years, a strong premise helps the writer structure the story and its goals. This makes sense to me when I think about how I try to analyze and corral a rather scattered idea I have floating around in my brainpan.

A lot of people like to use the movie Jaws to exemplify the process and one of the better ones I've seen is this one:
When a fish-out-of-water, big-city cop moves to a small, coastal town dependent on tourism, he must team with an oceanographer and a crusty sailor to convince the doubting, money-grubbing townsfolk to close their beaches because a giant, man-eating shark is lurking just offshore, until the shark strikes, forcing the townsfolk to allow the cop and his buddies to take on the shark mano-a-mano.

What we'll do is present our ideas in the workshop and work together to critique and suggest strengthening each of the elements of the idea.

Thoughts on the plan?
 
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Maryn

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Is it cool if I watch and encourage rather than participate?
 

Ari Meermans

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It's cool. But DO post any contributions or thoughts you have, please. Establishing the criteria for assessing our ideas is meant to be a group effort; I really don't want it to come only from my brainpan. Iow, we're brainstorming over here. :)

ETA: I've been studying this whole readin' and writin' thing all my life, but specifically the story idea/premise for only the last six or seven years. I could give y'all the structural elements for a strong story idea that I think should be addressed and let you deconstruct them and add-to if that's what you want to do to get your juices flowing. Want to take that approach?
 
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Kjbartolotta

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:blushes:

Quite interested, as someone who is both woefully ignorant and uneducated in these matters, but also pitches premises all day in order to eat.
 

Ari Meermans

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Hey, we're all learning this together.

A good question just came up, and that was why I selected the premise for a movie since we're adapting the process for novelists. I did it for a couple of reasons:

  • I think most of us have seen or are more familiar with the movie than (maybe) have read Peter Benchley's book and there are visuals we can mentally refer to.
  • The premise is simpler for our initial sally into the process. (The book is more complex and has a whole slew of elements the movie doesn't have, not the least of which the book includes the shark's POV.)

So, we have this idea and the mental process might look something like this:

  • I want to write a man against nature story.
  • What are some challenging situations I could put my character in? (lost camper surrounded by wolves? a grizzley hunt? No, something on the water. What's the biggest threat I can think of or the one that would scare me the most? A shark! Yeah, that's it and a really big one.)
  • What would make it the greatest possible challenge for my character? (never encountered anything like it and is totally unprepared for this particular challenge and . . . oh, yeah . . . let's make him scared of the water.)
  • Where might this story take place to really amp up the stakes?

Thoughts like those are what we're after as we deconstruct and build our story ideas.
 
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Enlightened

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I'd like to watch as well. Will this happen in one thread, or numerous threads in Brainstorm Sandbox? Or will this occur in a private group?
 

Ari Meermans

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Well, now, those are good questions too, Enlightened. I chose Brainstorming Sandbox (and got mod approval from Derek) because it's password-protected and I know some folks worry about such things. It's not a private group; anyone can join and anyone can contribute their thoughts in Brainstorming Sandbox.

Sign-ups are for folks who want to put up their ideas as part of the workshop project so that we can make sure everyone's ideas get coverage and don't get lost.

I'm thinking separate threads with a distinctive title structure; something like Story Idea Workshop: [Participant's Name or Working Title]. Again, so that no one gets neglected. (A better idea for structuring this would most definitely be welcomed.)
 
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Maryn

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Oh, I get it now. I'm happy to chime in with what I like or think might enhance someone else's ideas. Also to toss out ideas I enjoy but will not write up for myself. If somebody likes it and wants to run with it, more power to 'em.

FWIW, the most useful screenwriting information I know of was once given away at a website by its creator, Michael Hauge, who now sells it. I have my copy-and-paste from when it was free and use it to help me with structure and pacing all the damned time. I figure I'll master that part by the time I'm in my early 80s.

Maryn, not there yet
 

Ari Meermans

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Sure, why not? <g>

See, my own "story problem" has always been that I can't find an idea I consider novel-worthy. I'm hoping to learn—with everyone's generous help—how to see all the possibilities in an idea. Stretch my mind, so to speak.
 

Maryn

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Anybody want to play with an idea that's been in my file (aptly named IDEAS) for a couple of decades?

This came about at a screenwriting board (not AW's) I'd joined because I wrote a play. It predates The Walking Dead and other popular zombie and zombie-like movies, TV shows, and books.

Genre: Comedic Horror
Audience: Teens, Younger Adults
Premise: After being bullied and excluded by the normal kids at their high school, the zombie kids hold their own prom in a cool old industrial building. It's actually better than the real prom, and the drunken Normals who left the boring prom in search of something better (and more booze) are determined to ruin it.

That, of course, is a concept and nothing more. It's all situation, lacking characters and plot. Anyone feel like playing with it, as a sort of dry run for genuine ideas?

Maryn, who's never gotten anywhere with it
 

Kjbartolotta

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Genre: Comedic Horror
Audience: Teens, Younger Adults
Premise: After being bullied and excluded by the normal kids at their high school, the zombie kids hold their own prom in a cool old industrial building. It's actually better than the real prom, and the drunken Normals who left the boring prom in search of something better (and more booze) are determined to ruin it.

That, of course, is a concept and nothing more. It's all situation, lacking characters and plot. Anyone feel like playing with it, as a sort of dry run for genuine ideas?

But...it writes itself!

You got the zombie prom committee kids planning the idea in secret, the mean normie kids getting wise, the earnest zombie nerd with his crush on the cool human cheerleader who's mean to him. The prom happens around the halfway point, the cool kids crash the party, and then, final third, the adults come to break it up due to their distrust of zombies, everyone comes to together to fight for Zombie Kids Right to Party. The earnest zombie kid can either get together with the human cheerleader at the end, or the zombie girl who planned the prom and had a crush on him the whole time. Your call.
 

Ari Meermans

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But...it writes itself!

You got the zombie prom committee kids planning the idea in secret, the mean normie kids getting wise, the earnest zombie nerd with his crush on the cool human cheerleader who's mean to him. The prom happens around the halfway point, the cool kids crash the party, and then, final third, the adults come to break it up due to their distrust of zombies, everyone comes to together to fight for Zombie Kids Right to Party. The earnest zombie kid can either get together with the human cheerleader at the end, or the zombie girl who planned the prom and had a crush on him the whole time. Your call.

Those are some good elements to work with, Kevin.

Defined Character(s): earnest zombie nerd, "normal" cheerleader (love interest), zombie girl (second love interest)
Additional Event(s): prom planned in secret but "normals" get wind of it; adult intervention*
Defined Story Goal(s): zombie kids earn "Right to Party", resolve the bullying issue (comedically), and/or (depending on focus of story premise) boy-gets-girl or girl-gets-boy

Working with those, how about we practice on this idea using a flexible template like the one in the linked article from post #11? EVERYONE WELCOME.

[When] some event sparks a character to action, that [character acts] with deliberate purpose [until] that action is opposed by an external force, [leading to] some conclusion.


*Note: If we development premises using adult intervention and premises which force the zombie kids to deal with the problem themselves, we can see which makes the stronger story.