~Ideas Corner~

[Malyssa Rahl]

I'm having a hard time getting started with one I'm writing. The main character is a slave, at the start she is about to be sold, and knows nothing of the world outside the walls of the city. I've got the opening scene kindof in my head... But I can't make it come out of my head, and get on the page... It's stuck, and I think something is missing.

 

Should I immediately start with the slave auction? Or start with a little bit of background info, and have a briefish intro scene before it starts? I'm leaning toward the latter.

 

I've also got plans for how to get her out of the city later, but I'm planning for at least a couple good chapters of city life.

[Dark_Angel13]

If it were me writing this I'd do as you said, start with a little background info or just make it obvious to the reader she's a slave so for example have the opening scene with her just before the slave auction, so she'd be serving her master at that time or w.e. That'd be enough to clarify what she is. Then maybe a little brief thing like on the way to the market it has like a flashback with her or she's reliving the past as she walks and how she came to be what she is now. Just my thoughts for it, hope this helped

[DuLake]

My policy is always "start late, leave early." If you can skip exposition and get into the action, by all means do so. It's not always possible, but usually a lot easier than it sounds and always more compelling for the reader. Start us off right on the auction block if possible. An audience can usually pick up small back story details from context. And if your back story is too big and complex to be revealed organically, then you should probably start your story a bit earlier -- if it's that important, then it's probably interesting.

[Malyssa Rahl]

My thinking was, just a little bit about the city, then a brief scene before she's brought out to be bid on. The auction scene won't make much sense without the little bit of background on the city itself... So I kinda have to put it in there.

[DuLake]

If you need to show it for your audience to get it, then go for it. Maybe it's just because I don't know your story, but as a general rule of thumb you can trust your audience to fill in blanks. Slave auctions are pretty well built into western cultural thought (thanks to stories like Spartacus or Roots), so I think your audience would pick up on a lot right there by throwing in a little description of the city at the same time. Again though, if your scene hinges around some kind of dynamic that we won't see in playing out or understand, then show it.

 

And I'm sorry if I seem like I'm butting in or anything. I'm sure your story will be a lot of fun and I can't wait to read it!

[† Emotional Outlet]

I agree that you should be able to trust readers to fill in the blanks and make connections. I daresay they'll even fill in blanks you didn't know you had and make connections you didn't realise were there at all. If TV Tropes and Tumblr has taught me anything, it's that people will analyse and read deeply into almost everything.

 

Exposition has its place, I think as long as it doesn't detract from the story, it's cool to have. It's only a problem when you break into the middle of a dialogue to explain the entire economic state of the story's world and how its international relations have affected trade. Even if the dialogue is about shopping, the info-dump just feels out of place and makes the writer's voice extremely transparent.

 

It doesn't sound like you're going to info-dump, so I say you're safe to go ahead, especially if it helps put things into context.

[Dark_Angel13]

I was looking through my stories folders today on my hd and stuff and I found my ideas section on there, I have one that I'd really LOVE to write but I'm not 100% sure how to go about doing it because it needs to be really horrific and I need to work on that dark ambience. So any help on how to write it like that would be appreciated

[Breathless]

Maybe you could try reading dark stories. I find reading something with the same atmosphere that I'm trying to convey helps me when writing. That being said, I personally feel that the 'dark creepy' atmosphere (not sure if that's what you're going for), is the hardest to create.

I can only recommend reading what scares you, haha. Best of luck, I can't wait to read it!

[† Emotional Outlet]

Yeah, it depends on what kind of scary you're going for. The blog I follow has some articles on different types of horror (from Lovecraftian to erotic) that might be of use.

[Dark_Angel13]

Thanks for the help guys and I should have something up soon =)

[Dark_Angel13]

Okay so my work on eerieness has currently met a halt since I couldnt find a place to let the story go furthur just yet. My next idea comes from something I wrote into my phone the other night. I wrote like 9 little pages into my phones memos of a random story idea that just spewed out of my mind. I wanna know if you guys think I should turn the basic idea into a story or what, cause right now I'm a little sceptical because I wrote it at 4am and it was so random. I'm thinking to just go with it and see how it goes.

[Breathless]

My personal opinion, is keep the plans/outlines/details written down, and if it seems interesting to you, definitely go for it. But I do that a lot and end up with a bunch of half-finished stories, so from experience I can tell you it'll feel better to complete one story, rather than having 500 unfinished ones littered over your computer.

[Dark_Angel13]

My personal opinion, is keep the plans/outlines/details written down, and if it seems interesting to you, definitely go for it. But I do that a lot and end up with a bunch of half-finished stories, so from experience I can tell you it'll feel better to complete one story, rather than having 500 unfinished ones littered over your computer.

 

Lol that's how my computer is right now, so many stories/ideas half finished...I'll leave this as an idea until I really feel like turning it into a half wrote story lol

[† Emotional Outlet]

I also have a bunch of half written stories. If only you could put two random halves together and just call it good!

[Breathless]

I also have a bunch of half written stories. If only you could put two random halves together and just call it good!

Wow... That's actually an awesome idea. I could have so much fun merging stories together! What I tend to do now when they're half finished, is just kill all the characters. Works the trick every time.

[† Emotional Outlet]

Then it's a finished story! My favourite ending is hitting everyone with a truck or having a meteor crush them all in a freak accident. ouo

[Dark_Angel13]

Then it's a finished story! My favourite ending is hitting everyone with a truck or having a meteor crush them all in a freak accident. ouo

 

I prefer the random zombie plague where they all get eaten but I get the sentiment lol

[LTJG RIO]

I usually use people I know and work with to create character's and plots. Or you can try mixing two people together to create a new person. For some reason my stories mostly involve older gentleman in there 40's, 50's, or even 60's and 70's doing things and performing feats that older people really shouldn't do. But I read an inspiring article today about  a 74 year old women who can dead lift 450 lbs. Since I don't know many people who can do that it kind of inspired me to keep up with my stories of old folks doing incredible jobs in down in the dumps plots.

[Dark_Angel13]

I usually use people I know and work with to create character's and plots. Or you can try mixing two people together to create a new person. For some reason my stories mostly involve older gentleman in there 40's, 50's, or even 60's and 70's doing things and performing feats that older people really shouldn't do. But I read an inspiring article today about  a 74 year old women who can dead lift 450 lbs. Since I don't know many people who can do that it kind of inspired me to keep up with my stories of old folks doing incredible jobs in down in the dumps plots.

 

Old folks=Superhuman! I hope I'm like that when I'm at 70, just be at the gym and pumping iron LIKE A BOSS!

[LTJG RIO]

I know right. I actually kinda see the world having a very hard future in the next 20 years. I look forward to retirement all the time but, something tells me I'm still gonna be working when I'm 90 years old. As for new ideas I think I know what I want my Camp Nano story to be about but, I need to figure out how to start it.