Question on Writing Website

[roger]

Hi all,
I have a question and I would like everyone and anyones opinion!

I'm not quite sure how best to explain so I will just jump in with both feet.

I have wanted to be a writer for a loooooong time. I can come up with non-stop ideas for Christian speculative fiction (i.e. like what you would find at Marcher Lord Press). But I have just never been able to complete anything I start...ever. But I do have a growing database of ideas and starts to my stories.

Then I had an idea. I could build a website that would supply members with ideas from a writing database. Ok, hear me out please. Imagine a website where writers could go, and search through a database for ideas, based on story parameters, i.e by Genre, or perhaps they are looking for character profiles that fit a story.

You could, say, pull up a list of Western ideas, and get a list of titles with a short synopsis (like 4 lines) below it. Click on the link and get a full story synopsis.

The story idea would be dated so you know how new it is. You would have access to all items on the site for a year for a very nominal fee (sidebar, how much would you pay?) If you wanted to you could use any idea you read for your yearly fee, as many as you want, etc. Like photo sites you could also purchase the idea for a fee and have it removed from the database. That way if you find a new idea you like and it was just posted and you don't want anyone else to have that idea, you could take it off the market for a modest price.

Would anyone use a site like this? What all would you like available on the site and how much would it be worth to you?

If you don't mind, please also let me know a little about you, background, published or not. etc.
Thanks!

[lexkx]

Hmmm. Because of various copyright and creativity issues, I think a lot of writers would be unsettled at the prospect.

What's interesting, though, is the process by which you come up with so many stories. A lot of people want to know how to build a viable story. That would be an interesting and useful tool to have in a writer's toolbox. Where does one start a fresh idea? A name? A character trait? A year? An event? A question? This kind of creative construction can vary by genre--because different needs must be addressed within different parameters--and knowing what kind of questions to watch for and answer is useful.

In short, what about an interactive rubric?

[Christian Soldier]

As an exercise, I'd find using someone else's ideas interesting, but not viable in the long run. That especially applies when it's not for free. The fact is, author's tend to be a poor(-ish) lot and have a hard time affording, or justifying the cost, of such services. I'm not sure how we could adjust this idea for profit, but I'll think on it some while I'm sleeping tonight, which is when I do my best thinking.

As for the issue of never finishing a story, let me take a guess as to what's happening here. Either you're: 1) Reaching a point where you don't know exactly where to go from, or 2) you're reaching a plateau/block and cannot continue.

Am I right?

God Bless -- CS

[roger]

CS,
You're right about your guesses on never finishing a story. I have run into both problems. I don't know if my focus is misplaced and should just concern myself with getting beyond these issues. It's just that I have a never ending tidal wave of "what if's" running through my head, I was just wondering if I might capitalize on that part of my creativity.

Either way I appreciate your response.
Thanks

[Christian Soldier]

You're very welcome!

So far, I've been able to get through blocks and such either by asking my character what happens, on paper, or through good outlining. I also hit one block because I was trying to force something on my characters. Once I stopped that, the writing went through beautifully.

Of course, I'm not quite to the half-way point, so we'll see if I hit another.

[tonylavoie]

Roger, I had the block problem many times (who hasn't?) when writing my pirate epic. It's now sitting pretty and complete at 160,000 words. Which is just to say that you CAN get past the blocks.

I found a couple of things that helped me to 'git 'er done', as it were. First, because the scenes and storyline kept playing out in my head too rapidly for me to keep up with while writing them down, I hit upon the idea of laying out the story in a screenplay format. Once I learned the basics (and after one false start) of screenplay setup, getting the story on paper went much more quickly, because the screenplay format focuses primarily on dialog and action. It really helped me to focus on the important bones of the story. Once the screenplay was done, I went back and filled in the blanks in the novel format. 120 pages of screenplay turned into 76,000 words in the blink of an eye (well, God's eye, not mine, but you know what I mean.

The other thing that got me past the blocks was - don't laugh - Abba's music. No, I don't know why. Whenever I came up against the wall (and it happened pretty regularly, despite the screenplay format), I'd throw Abba Gold into my car's CD player, sit back and close my eyes (not literally! I was driving!) and allow the scene on which I was stuck to play out in my mind. Nine times out of ten I quickly found out what happened next. (The tenth only came after sending up a solid prayer, but that *always* worked.) Other music didn't seem to work for that story, and Abba hasn't worked for anything since, but different music has (classical, most recently).

I'm not saying either of these will work for you, but there is something out there that will. Keep looking for it and you'll find it. Think of it this way...if God gave you the stories to begin with, He'll get you through them.

Keep us posted!

[torainfor]

We've seen the last half of Mama Mia twice in the last few nights and, as I read this, I have Voulez-Vous stuck in my head. Now it's going to be there all day!