The Edge of an Idea
Jan. 29th, 2017 07:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wickedaceI woke up today with a dream in my head that felt like the spark of a story idea.
It's been a while since that happened, so I snatched up pen and paper on getting out of bed, and scribbled down everything about the dream I could remember. Being a dream, it naturally didn't make a whole lot of sense in the cold light of day, but there was a solid core at the centre that I thought I might be able to work into something.
I've been turning over the idea all day while driving my friend back and forth from IKEA, and I started trying to actually write some of a story from it this evening. There's definitely a risk that this will fizzle, along with most of the other ideas I've had in the last couple of years, but I'd like to try anyway.
It's not a particularly well-formed idea yet, but the essential items are:
It's been a while since that happened, so I snatched up pen and paper on getting out of bed, and scribbled down everything about the dream I could remember. Being a dream, it naturally didn't make a whole lot of sense in the cold light of day, but there was a solid core at the centre that I thought I might be able to work into something.
I've been turning over the idea all day while driving my friend back and forth from IKEA, and I started trying to actually write some of a story from it this evening. There's definitely a risk that this will fizzle, along with most of the other ideas I've had in the last couple of years, but I'd like to try anyway.
It's not a particularly well-formed idea yet, but the essential items are:
- Romance plot along Pride & Prejudice lines. If I actually make something out of this, I'm sure the plot will evolve enough to be less of a copy, but for now I think basing things off an existing work will be useful in keeping me from getting bogged down over plot questions and help me actually get a complete story together.
- Magic! I have a particularly vivid image of the heroine, skirts swirling, flinging out a spray of sparking fire-blades.
- Image-based magic, and the idea that, unless properly protected, someone's image can be used to work magic on them. The better the likeness, the stronger the effect, so that full-length portrait is more dangerous than someone's stick-man doodle. (Lots of fun worldbuilding questions come out of this one: why do people still have paintings, then? Presumably lessons in artistic skills are restricted? etc.)
