Goodreads Authors/Readers discussion

It amazes me as to the unlimited variety of sources to capture story ideas. A couple of my favorite sources for plausible story ideas is listening to National Public Radio's "Science Fridays" and reading National Geographic... my mind reels at tweaking reality and/or extrapolating the facts to create fiction! Where have you gotten story ideas?

Ideas are absolutely everywhere. A while ago I wrote an article for Writing Magazine called 101 places to find writing ideas. The hardest part was deciding which to leave out.

If the passenger sitting next to me on a bus or plane knew how his/her face was inspiring a character, they would be amazed [or horrified]. And a photo of a building or scene can evoke imaginary events and people. It all goes into the kaleidoscope of creating a story.

Patsy wrote: "Ideas are absolutely everywhere. A while ago I wrote an article for Writing Magazine called 101 places to find writing ideas. The hardest part was deciding which to leave out."

Do you have a link to that article? I host a writer's group and would love to share that.

Beth wrote: "If the passenger sitting next to me on a bus or plane knew how his/her face was inspiring a character, they would be amazed [or horrified]. And a photo of a building or scene can evoke imaginary ev..."

I've experienced the same... I would love to snap a photo of some individuals or video an interaction or situation... just don't want to invade their privacy. I have hundreds of images of different places/buildings/scenery around the world to reconnect with a specific location... still have to do research, but the photos ignite so many memories to incorporate into a story.

There are two individuals that live locally that I HAVE to figure out a way to capture their images... they are so out of character with the rest of the world and would be fantastic colorful entities to any story.

My story ideas either come from watching television, taking in what I see around me when I'm out and about or the biggest one being they just sort of form and pop into my head.

I got story ideas for tv shows, movies, and books. But mostly, I get ideas from what's around or from personal experiences that I had. So I try to incorporate my feelings and personal experiences and roll it all into one story. But I try to see if it works or not. :)