Ride on Time

I've started SIX ideas this afternoon. One is good enough to make it through to the second round, two are probably gonna become Twitter short stories and the other two I'll do as long form and try and see if there's a SciFi Contest that will take them…

All in all? GOOD WORK.

— S (@MoveablePress) March 11, 2019

This week, I will mostly writing short stories.

The plan today was simple: see if I could kick-start my brain into spouting forth some ideas. As of 18.00 this evening, there’s actually EIGHT stories in the folder designated for my output, an increase of two since my 15.00 update. However, only one of those isn’t speculative fiction, and in this particular case (considering whose contest I am entering to) it’s probably a good idea not to go down that route first of all. However at this rate, I’ll have multiple entries for any number of sci-fi sites…

How does this work for me? Well, it depends on the initial idea: some right now are two paragraphs of a narrative that is then sketched in as notes underneath. One is fully fledged, beginning to end with spots of dialogue that occurred to me whilst writing. The story we’ll be concentrating on has beginning and end, plus a very distinct structure, so the plan for that going forward is to complete the framework and then go back to add depth.

The stuff that doesn’t get immediately used is already being earmarked as short story material for Twitter going forward, so everything is likely to appear at some point on the website. However, if anything leaps out at me as being superlative it will be earmarked for commercial gain ahead of anything else because we are already halfway into March and these website upkeep bills are not going to pay themselves.

Content really isn’t my biggest concern right now, what mattered most of all were strong, compelling ideas. Without sounding like this is easy (really isn’t) adding depth to narratives considerably less stressful than making sure your story’s believable and immersive. The sweet spot, of course, is you idea combination of that and a little something special which makes your work leap off the page and grab your reader by the brain.

In my chosen story, that’s already woven into the fabric of the narrative.

I’m not gonna lie: I could not be happier. Tomorrow, hopefully, the rest of the meat is added to the bones and there’ll be a tentative first draft to play about with. At the same time some video gets recorded, am planning to start small at home. All of this will come to fruition for April, and then we can start getting some pennies in the bank. Let’s just hope the rest of this week is as productive as the start…