abduction and inspiration
Mar. 23rd, 2023 11:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliAbduction is useful when starting out with a story.
By which I do not mean stealing a story idea from something (even something copyrighted) and then running off with it slung over your shoulders, though abduction is good for that, but logical abduction, where you start with things and try to fit them together.
Because, after all, you start with what you start. There are how-to-write books that tell you to start with a one-sentence summary of your story. Others talk about the character, or even the character's lesson, or the plot structure.
This doesn't help when your plot bunny is an inciting incident -- The Maze, The Manor, and the Unicorn started with a story about Queen Elizabeth I and a lady in waiting -- or a conclusion -- Dragonfire and Time started with the notion of what the wizard would discover -- or even an element that's not so much as as a scene -- The Witch-Child and the Scarlet Fleet stemmed from a complaint that in Conan the Barbarian's world, the pirates are not on trade routes, and some philosophical reflection on how they could work in a fantasy.
Logical abduction involves looking at the idea and seeing what it would logically imply as an overarching idea. Introducing it to other ideas and seeing if they click helps, because the number of explanations that can cover two, or more, things are fewer, and also more complex.
Scenes are more easily developed than non-scenes, but that's just in general. The Maze, The Manor, and the Unicorn required a place for the lady-in-waiting to be sent, and an excuse for her to be sent there (for her health), and who else could be sent there (for, obviously, his health). The Witch-Child and the Scarlet Fleet required a character to deal with these magically transported pirates, and so it clicked when I ran across the notion of a spy trying to work out where pirates would raid.
It can help file off serial numbers, even. Suppose you want to write a love story inspired by the story of Tonks and Remus from Harry Potter. You could look at Remus's objections that he is poor, and old, and mistrusted, and abduct another reason for him to be all these things. (Time for old, of course, but why he is still single at that age. . . .) Perhaps he's simply under a curse of misfortune. Perhaps it's not severe as people think, but they still fear it.
Pulling together ideas like that is often the very first step.
By which I do not mean stealing a story idea from something (even something copyrighted) and then running off with it slung over your shoulders, though abduction is good for that, but logical abduction, where you start with things and try to fit them together.
Because, after all, you start with what you start. There are how-to-write books that tell you to start with a one-sentence summary of your story. Others talk about the character, or even the character's lesson, or the plot structure.
This doesn't help when your plot bunny is an inciting incident -- The Maze, The Manor, and the Unicorn started with a story about Queen Elizabeth I and a lady in waiting -- or a conclusion -- Dragonfire and Time started with the notion of what the wizard would discover -- or even an element that's not so much as as a scene -- The Witch-Child and the Scarlet Fleet stemmed from a complaint that in Conan the Barbarian's world, the pirates are not on trade routes, and some philosophical reflection on how they could work in a fantasy.
Logical abduction involves looking at the idea and seeing what it would logically imply as an overarching idea. Introducing it to other ideas and seeing if they click helps, because the number of explanations that can cover two, or more, things are fewer, and also more complex.
Scenes are more easily developed than non-scenes, but that's just in general. The Maze, The Manor, and the Unicorn required a place for the lady-in-waiting to be sent, and an excuse for her to be sent there (for her health), and who else could be sent there (for, obviously, his health). The Witch-Child and the Scarlet Fleet required a character to deal with these magically transported pirates, and so it clicked when I ran across the notion of a spy trying to work out where pirates would raid.
It can help file off serial numbers, even. Suppose you want to write a love story inspired by the story of Tonks and Remus from Harry Potter. You could look at Remus's objections that he is poor, and old, and mistrusted, and abduct another reason for him to be all these things. (Time for old, of course, but why he is still single at that age. . . .) Perhaps he's simply under a curse of misfortune. Perhaps it's not severe as people think, but they still fear it.
Pulling together ideas like that is often the very first step.