Okay, all, I wanted to get this one off my chest.

The subject is inspiration for your books. Where do you get ideas from?

I find that ideas, chiefly for novels yet to be written, pop up all over the place, usually when I least expect them. Maybe my brain is strange that way, but if not, I'd like to hear what gets your imaginative wheels spinning.

I'll start it off.

Dreams are one convenient place, but dash it all if I've forgotten half of them already!

Things in nature are another great trigger for me: sparkling sunsets; dark, misty nights; broad mountain vistas; the list goes on. I even had a moment of inspiration staring into the dying embers of a campfire one night.

How 'bout you?

Dreams are good, Tarin! I agree there, but there is the problem of forgetting them, hehe. I wake up some mornings, and know I've had a really weird dream but seldom do I remember what the dream was!

Actually, I do like to go to my Mother for inspiration. That might sound funny, but she thinks up the most amazing ideas. I don't know how, she just seems to have lots of different story ideas in her head, and she can tell me something that I could work into a plot for a novel! She even thought up one of my fantasy creatures in my recent writing, and she had seen that in a dream. I find it hilarious, because she's never liked, or rather has been suspicious of, fantasy, and yet since I've been on Holy Worlds she's really gotten into giving me ideas for it!

Yes, another for me is walking in the countryside, or sitting in the garden on a summer's day and dreaming up ideas.

I can get inspiration whilst listening to music too. Not music with words, I can't think with that; but classical music and the like, that can really inspire me.

Great thread!

I think usually I'll think of a concept I find really cool and think about it for a while and a story kind of forms in my brain... that's how my work in progress was created.

Also, I write fanfiction for old TV shows or books or different things... There I think I usually think of a way I wish the TV show went or just want to write a fanfiction involving the characters. Or, usually when a book is involved, I like to take a scene and write it from another character's perspective.

However, I did just recently have one dream that I remembered pretty well, and it was involving old TV show characters. It was a strange dream, but awesome at the same time... Anyways. I'm using an element from my dream to create a fanfiction.

Did all that make sense? Thanks for the awesome topic, Lord Tarin!

Great topic, Tarin!

That's awesome Elanor!

I can be inspired by music, with or without words (the one that inspired me that did have words is called 'Get Out Alive' I think...by Three Days Grace, I haven't utilized anything from it, but it makes me think "there's a story idea in there somewhere...").

I have a couple threads in my subforum that I felt were very inspired. They are about gigantic trees that inhabit Vadra, and they were inspired by gigantic trees from our world coupled with my awe and amazement of them.

If I have dreams I usually don't remember them at all by the time I wake up (so in effect I haven't dreamt at all), or if I have they are not inspiring.

Inspiration can hit at anytime so I carry a pocket notepad or use my cellphone to record a memo. I keep my laptop next to my bed so when I do have a crazy dream I can start writing immediately.

I get a lot of inspiration while driving. For some reason driving relaxes me and gives me time to think. There's this stretch of road I drive home from work at around 4am and most of the time I'm the only one on the road. I'll slow to 15 MPH and just take my time driving down this road and just think, and when I hit the end I'll sometimes turn around and do it all over again.

Listening to music also inspires a lot ideas as I like to think about what kind of scene or character would fit the song. Reading song lyrics along with song does the same thing. Sometimes quotes from books, movies, or from history can inspire story ideas. Phrases from random people walking by or the conversations I overhear during lunch, these little tidbits people say that can lead to stories.

I also like to browse through art and pictures. As I do with music, I’ll think up stories that fit with the images. They say a picture is worth a thousand words and I believe it. I’ve written a 14k short story before based off a single image.

I try to put myself in situations where inspiration will hit the most. Inspiration is the same as lightning, you can either wait for the bolt to hit you naturally or you can climb the tallest building and start waving a metal pole around like a maniac.

I love that comparison!

I think I can relate, art can be inspiring to me as well as stuff people say... I can't drive yet so I'm not sure if that would help me think or not, but that's pretty cool the way you can utilize that to your advantage.



You on Pinterest by any chance? Lotsa inspiring images to be found there.

Those are some great thoughts, Roager. Books are especially key for me. I find when I'm reading a good novel (preferably in the genre I'm writing in) that it cultivates my imagination, and I can pick up a thread here or a phrase there that I can tuck away and use later or turn into something entirely different. The hard part is not copying.



Same here regarding the words. Give me Bach and Beethoven, Handel and Chopin to listen to while I write, and my writing shall conquer the world! ...Or maybe I'll just stick with finishing my next book. *nods of approval*

Everywhere I go, I run into music! I think it's great. Maybe we should start a thread sometime about the effect music has on the creative process and on the mind in general. It's truly one of God's greatest gifts. Just stop for a moment and think what everything would be like if there was no such thing as music.

"The world without music would be like a rainbow without colors." - A certain philosopher wannabe.

I am not usually inspired plot wise from anything outward. I get inspired in my plot by writing the book. I'm not a pantser...I plan excessively. But I have almost never written any kind of substantial story without having written a scene or two before I know much about it. A scene or a character will pop into my head, and I'll have to write it down...and as I do, all these details appear, as they always do...and I start trying to figure out what would happen next, or how that situation could have come about...and then I get into figuring out the plot...and then I have a story.

I have occasionally been inspired by an outside source... * thinks * Only by having a discussion with someone about something, and suddenly getting this brilliant 'what if' question that the story is based off of. And not very often at all.

I get "what ifs" all the time, and some of them are wild enough to qualify as plot material. Such as:

*comes out of writing hole in den and finds a quiet house* What if there was tear in the space-time continuum and I've been transported to another world?

*looks at a high cliff dividing two valleys, one shaded and one sunny* What if that ridge is a rift between worlds?

*sees a plane flying overhead at night, lights blinking* What if that was some type of transport ship coming to dock on another planet?

*gazes down into a gorge with a river flowing through it* What if a boat swept into sight around the bend, carrying travelers far from home on a dangerous quest?

Sometimes I think my imagination is too hyperactive.

Good idea to start this, Tarin.

Yes, dreams are a major source of inspiration for me! I frequently have the weirdest dreams just begging to be written down. I find that if I sketch a scene from the dream I can usually remember it.

Other times I just get random ideas...like two people dueling with swords and one cheats with a hidden gun incorporated into the sword, etc and they just kind of grow from there.

Funny how the mind works, isn't it?

You're right that ideas for novels pop up during the most unexpected times. I find it helpful to have a notebook and pen in hand, just in case you think of something while you're riding the train or bus, or walking around somewhere, and you're afraid you might forget, you can scribble it immediately.

I get my inspiration from...I don't know where.
Some of it comes from observing people (that's how I develop characters--I people-watch ). Or it comes from dreaming in the night (when I woke up, I had to jot it all down immediately just in case I forgot). Sometimes, it comes from asking the question "what if?" and twisting stories around to create a new plot.

If it makes you write books, it isn't. * grins *