Taking those initial ideas and piecing together a story...

[MinionZombie]

I'm working on my second book at the moment and thought I'd share a few thoughts on the subject of turning my intial vague notes into an actual story: http://deadshed.blogspot.co.uk/2014/...ys-jigsaw.html But I also wanted to know how do you dream up your stories? Do ideas come mostly formed? Do you think about a protagonist or villain first and then start placing plot points around them? Do you get random ideas and then try and make sense of them all after a while? What's your method for creating a new story?

[thesurvivor]

Robert mckee says that theres 2 types of tallents writers have. Literary tallent, which is common, it deals with descriptions and general writing. The second tallent is story tallent, which he says is rare. This is the ability to come up with an intereating story and tell it beautifully. I have story talent, not so much literary tallent, but when i make a story i start with a genre, like fantasy, post apocalyptic, ect. Then i build up things around that, like lore and such.

[MinionZombie]

Yeah, I'll often start off along the lines of wanting to tell a particular type of story, or look into certain themes, and oftentimes that'll spark little starter ideas about characters, scenarios, scenes, dialogue, etc, and it grows from there linking the pieces up and rejecting/creating old/new ideas that'll fit with where things are going. I've now found myself within a world I've created populated by characters I love, despise, and am fascinated and entertained by ... so now I'm expanding that world and exploring extended themes along similar lines as before, but with new characters that are tangentially connected to those that came before in my previous writing project. It's really satisfying to establish a world in your mind - and on the page - and then dive even deeper.

[thesurvivor]

Thats exactly what i do. I have specific plot points that i want to have and i place them where they fit in to the story (begining, middle, end) and i then begin to fill in the gaps between 2 plot points i want. It works out most of the time but i get kind of ocd about my writing and i tend to try to make everything perfect as i go (write, then fix, fix again, edit, fix again, then write.) Lol it takes me a while to finish sometimes because i always believe that something can be fixed. Right now im reading story by robert mckee, i would suggest any amature screen writer read it.