This past weekend my wife and I visited
a home improvement show.
After attending the show last year, we
bought a set of replacement windows and had our house painted. So did
our son and daughter-in-law.
But this year, we don't have any home
improvements budgeted. So why attend?
To get ideas. Even if we don't initiate
any projects right away, we'll have fresh ideas—of what we might
want to do and also what we don't. Until we're ready to take action,
those ideas we gathered can percolate in our minds. What we eventually decide
will be better than what we could have chosen on our own.
Where do you go to get writing
ideas—not only for your work-in-progress, but also for what you
want to write next? Besides reading other authors to see their
techniques, where do you find plot elements, lifelike characters,
evocative details, and realistic dialogue that you haven't already
stored in your idea stockpile?
You can't get ideas from aisle 7 of a
big box store. But neither do you have to worry about whether they'll
fit in your minivan.
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