I read a good idea from an author on Writer’s Digest the other day. I get daily emails from them, which admittedly, I don’t usually read; there’s simply not enough time in the day. Sometimes I’ll take a minute to scan the latest email, look at the headlines, and nine times out of ten I still hit the delete button. But every once in a while an article’s title will grab me and I’ll give it a click. Such was the case with this one:
I Quit Writing and Then I Wrote My Debut Novel
Written by Katie Bernet, author of Beth Is Dead, the article talks about how after many attempts to get published, she walked away from writing. Her departure didn’t last long, but it gave her time to hit the reset button and approach writing again, not with the purpose of getting published, but of doing what she loves. And when she made that change—voila! She got published.
A Good Idea
But my favorite idea from her piece was the creation of a love/hate list. What you do is write down all of the things you love and hate in life, and then use them to instruct where your tale goes. So say you love people, movies, hiking, skiing, and travel. You find some aspect of two of them (you don’t want to cast your net too wide) to conquer the things you hate: pettiness, greed, deceit, etc. She didn’t say this explicitly in the article, but I think you can make this list as long as you like, with as many bizarre and meaningless things as you wish.
For example, if you really hate turnips (and I do), write it down. Who knows what might come out of it? Maybe a short story about a kid who finds a way to dispose of the ones his mom cooks, without getting caught. How does he do it? Where will he put them? How will he hide the smell? The story isn’t really about turnips, of course, but about cunning and revolt. Turnips simply serve as the catalyst. And I have to say, I suddenly want to know how he’s going to pull it off.
Putting It in Practice
I’m currently twenty-two chapters into my new book, without having ever done this exercise. But I know I’ve been subconsciously writing with this approach. And while I didn’t discover this tool at the start of my book, it still seems like a great way to create new ideas and make sure the ones I’m already working on are heading in the direction I want. So, I’m going to try it here and see if my book is going where I want it to. I’ll limit the number of things on each list to ten, so I don’t go overboard. Okay, here it goes.
Things I love: Dreams, Truth, Grit, Adventure, Sailing, Being Outside, Storytelling, Good Humor, Possibilities, New Places
Things I hate: Lies, Tattletales, Attention-seeking, Greed, Pride, Vanity, Unnecessary Drama, Gross Smells, Negativity, and of course, Turnips
Now these aren’t the end-all and be-all for me, just the first ten things that came to mind. Some of them relate to the book, and some just popped in through general word association. But upon review, I can see that my book is really about Grit and Possibilities overcoming Lies and Negativity. You can add a few other things in there as well, like Unnecessary Drama, but Negativity, and perhaps Lack of Faith are the big ones.
Another Tool for the Toolbelt
Storytelling isn’t always so exact, of course, and there will be plenty of sub-ideas that my protagonist will overcome, but I like this idea of naming the essential battle. Because that’s the purpose of a good story, isn’t it? To show how something good can defeat the bad? How something we love can handle that which we hate? Otherwise, what’s the point? A story that doesn’t try to show a path for how we can handle the things we don’t like, doesn’t sound like a story I’d want to waste my time on. So a little gut-check system to ensure we as writers are getting it right, makes good sense, and I hope I keep it in my mind for the start of the next book.