ideas

One of the agent blogs I read offered up some thoughts on the importance of unique ideas versus stellar writing. The two are not mutually exclusive, but need to work hand in hand. After all, if you have a neat story idea, you have to be able to put the damn thing down on paper.

I truly feel stories are universal and repeat themselves over and over. The settings and characters change, but the universal themes are constant. The trick is to find the unique angle. For me this comes down to the baggage the characters carry with them into the story. Then if you throw a bunch of conflict at them, they have to use that baggage to solve their problems. Makes for fun and usually good reading, if the writing can effectively communicate the ideas.

I've never really had a problem finding ideas or making the idea fresh. I like to look at the mundane and spice it up. To me, that is part of the creative process.

Because when you get down to it, isn't most fiction recycled? The human condition just doesn't change that much...our technology does, our stuff does, but what motivates us is eternal. Love, greed, corruption, power, compassion, understanding, strife etc can be found in books written and published today as well as in Shakespeare.