A Story Idea Developing in Real Time

As Recorded on a Facebook Post

by Shelley Burbank

One of the perennial questions readers ask authors is, "Where do you get your ideas?"

Well, the other day I accidentally recorded the exact moment when an idea--starting with a story title--occurred to me. Here's how it went: 

In past months, I've tried to wean myself off of Facebook and Instagram and had some success. However, as I'm in the end stages of revising my novella and the beginning stages of publishing and release it into the world, I'm back on the platforms a bit more because . . . that's where readers continue to be. 

As an experiment, I decided to ask readers a question about preferences regarding chapter headings. 

Post: Do you like numerical headings, ie. 1,2,3, etc. or catchy phrases? 

Commenter: Catchy phrases and numbers.

Shelley: Both??? Like 1. Call Me A Cabernet?

Note: I came up with that title on the spot, trying to think of something fun in the moment. Unfortunately--or fortunately--I ended up liking it. 

Shelley [A few seconds later]: I'm not drinking these days, but that's CUTE! I should use that sometime.

Note: Uh-oh. It's starting. 

Commenter: Yes! Or 1

                                    Call Me a Cabernet 

Shelley: Hmmmm. Much to consider. 

Shelley [looking at the title again]: Now I want to write an entire novella with that title. Damn. I don't need any more projects.

Shelley [now warming up, ideas flashing in brain]: It would be about a mid-life woman who makes a mess of things and decides to try out sobriety for thirty days and the wacky things that happen when she tried to avoid it. What could go wrong???

Note: I'm sorta laughing to myself and staring into space, imagining a scene or two, vague, vague.

Shelley [another flash goes off because I remember something I read on a Substack newsletter about appealing to agents/publishers by going the opposite of the expected.That would look like]: Or MAYBE I turn the story inside out and a sober-all-her-life good girl reaches middle age and decides to give DRINKING a try for 30 days, haha.

Shelley [Remembering her current WIP is waiting for revisions]: Okay, now you all see how my brain works in real time. Do not wish this on yourselves. I'm actually avoiding revision work.

***

A day later. 

Do you know what is now happening? I can't stop thinking about this story and how much I want to write it and how it would be a fun novella and oh, maybe a SERIES of novellas--all stories with a booze-themed title but not idealizing drinking because, you know, it's not healthy in any way for our bodies but the covers would be soooo cute! And what is going on in my MC's life that sets her off on this weird adventure? A dare? No, too trite. Something. Something...

I'll keep working it in my brain for a few weeks or months or years, but I'm trying to not do that anymore. Too much time and the ideas get stale. Also, I'll do a little "recon" and see who's used that title in the past. I'm sure someone has. It's too delicious. 

Meanwhile, I have about two chapters left in my novella revisions and can finally send it off to my beta readers and hopefully they won't have too much in the way of objections. 

I've been looking up how to self-publish on Amazon's KDP. Partly I don't want to do it that way and have considered other options. I could use it as a reader magnet, perhaps, and give it away free to people who have already signed up for or will sign up for my newsletter. But really, I think it's time for me to explore the wild world of indie publishing. I'd love to find an agent and score a Big Five publishing deal, but I'm not holding my breath. 

I've never even tried to go that route. The process seems both daunting and SLOOOOWWW. But maybe someday, if I write the right kind of story. Meanwhile, it's probably gonna be indie-pubbing for me. 

***

Anyway, I hope you found this entertaining and enlightening. Ideas just spring up out of nowhere, like the title, but then the brain latches onto something in the original idea and works at it, connects other information to it, expands it. It's like daydreaming, really. Anyone can do it. 

Writing, on the other hand, is the craft and discipline part. That's where writers are made, not in the ideas arena but in the craft arena. It's putting the sentences together and learning the right structure for a paragraph and making a ton of decisions about point of view, theme, narrative device, etc. 

Writing is a wonderful, challenging, fun, rewarding hobby and vocation. I'm not sure it's a great "job" these days, but for some, I guess, it does bring financial rewards, as well. I'm no longer holding on to any expectations in that regard, but if I were thirty years younger, maybe. For now, it's enough to have fun with it. 

Enjoy the remaining days of summer, all you lovely readers out there. You also make it fun. 

Hurry up and wait

 I had intended this post to be the revelation of my new book title, the twelfth Inspector Green mystery, featuring the disgruntled, exiled Green toiling away in the "Siberia" of police assignments and even contemplated retirement. Like THE DEVIL TO PAY, the previous  book, it also features his daughter Hannah, now a young patrol officer, and her boyfriend Josh, a newly minted homicide detective. I submitted the manuscript to my publisher on January 10, five days before the deadline. The publication date is January 2025, so I know it's going to be a glacial process. I heard nothing back until this past week, when I learned who my editor will be, and later exchanged emails with him. Luckily, it's the same experienced editor I've had for almost all of my previous sixteen books. So unless I have really missed the mark this time, it should be a fairly smooth and amicable editorial process.

To me, the title is the crucial crowning touch of a book, which captures its essence, creates intrigue, and matches the mood of the book. Thrillers and cozies both have identifiable qualities that capture the essence or at least the mood of the book. The single work FEAR would never  work in a cozy, and many thriller readers would run screaming from a pun. 

I want my titles to be unique, sophisticated, and thought-provoking as well as emotionally gritty, because that's the kind of book I aspire to. Sometimes I discover the title early on but other times the book is written but has an unfinished feel because I haven't found the perfect title. 

This was the case this time.

I had a working title that I used through, but it never really felt right and I was concerned that it was too generic sounding and also too "thriller-like". At some point in the writing, another title came to me that seemed to fit almost perfectly, but because it has similarities to one of my previous book titles, I pushed it aside and kept looking. But my thoughts kept coming back to that title.

As I sometimes do, I asked my four beta readers (the Ladies Killing Circle) to vote on the two possibilities, and the results were split,  for the same reasons I had. So in the end, because the deadline loomed,  I sent the manuscript to the publisher and suggested they decide which title works best. That was six weeks ago, and although there has been progress, there are still some members of the publishing team who have yet to weigh in.

So that's where we stand. I'm hoping for an answer in the next two weeks, but in the publishing business, you never know. So stay tuned, and maybe by my next blog post, I'll have something to talk about. And crow about.

Finding the perfect title

 My apologies for the lateness and brevity of this post. Like Rick, I spent most of Monday and yesterday digging out from 47+ cm of snow (that's about 20 inches) that had blown all over the place. It was very pretty and I was happy to see it, but moving it off the car and driveway, as well as off the paths and my three porches (one I use, one the postal and delivery people use, and one the dogs use) took a large part of the day and blew all my other plans out the window. And in between, the delighted dogs needed their walks. All this on a strained ankle that I am supposed to be "resting". A concept unknown to the dogs.

My back deck

The positive in all this, besides the beautiful, fresh powder, is how much neighbours come out to help each other. The person with the snowblower becomes everyone's best friend. And the kids are thrilled. Watching them sliding down snow piles, making snow angels, and digging snow forts brought a smile to even the most disgruntled, exhausted passerby. The kids have had so much taken away from them the past two years that it was nice of Mother Nature to give them this little gift of joy.

While I was digging away, my mind was wandering around in alleys trying to figure out another title for my current book. I had just received word from the publisher that marketing did not like my title THERE BUT FOR FORTUNE. It doesn't roll the tongue. Does too, I thought, saying it fast several times in a row to prove my point. Besides, THE HUNDRED-YEAR-OLD MAN WHO CLIMBED OUT THE WINDOW AND DISAPEARED, doesn't exactly roll off the tongue either. My title is perfect and it captures the essence of the book in four words that harken back to the 1960s where the tragedies in my story began. That title hadn't just fallen from the sky; it came from hours and hours of searching. So I huffed and grumbled for awhile as writers always do when someone challenges a word of our perfect prose. Then the snow came, and I had to put all my grumbling aside to focus on real life. 

My front porch

Outside in the crisp, pristine world of white, I stopped mourning the loss of my beloved title and started to idly consider alternatives. Not staring at the screen demanding an answer but just playing with combinations of words and themes in my head. THERE BUT FOR FOTUNE is a perfect title, but it isn't the only perfect title. All day long I played, laughing at some of my comical creations, rejecting many as cliched or pretentious or meaningless. Nowadays snappy two-word titles are all the rage among the thriller crowd, also probably driven by the marketing set, but I did not want a title that sounded like everyone else's.

By the end of the day, I had a couple of viable alternatives – one of them only two words long! – and am now letting those percolate and roll around on my tongue for a few days before writing the publisher back. So stay tuned, and eventually I will announce who the winner is. 

Meanwhile, it has started to snow again. To the shovels!

In search of a name

It's two weeks since I wrote my post 'Ready, set go!' about putting my pen to paper and getting started on the first draft of my new, no-name Inspector Green novel. At that time I had about 10 pages written. I am now proud to announce that I have 73 pages! Mind you, it's 73 handwritten pages and half the paragraphs are crossed out, but still, it's progress! Moreover, while I was doing that, the proofs of my novel THE ANCIENT DEAD arrived from the publisher and I have been wading through those too. And I had to prepare a talk to give to the local editors' association.

As an aside, that group is impressive! It was a regular monthly meeting but almost all the seats were filled. Not only did they laugh at my jokes but they listened for nearly an hour and then asked questions for another half hour, despite a snowstorm brewing outside. One tip I learned for any association struggling with poor attendance: serve excellent snacks (croissants, cheese, strawberries, among other things), and in addition to coffee and tea, serve alcohol! I noticed several members pouring Baileys on their ice cream.

I also updated my website, did some social media fiddling, and spent hours researching on the internet. And by the end of two weeks, I had 73 pages and two problems. First of all, no body. There was lots of mystery and intrigue, but I was writing and writing and writing without ever reaching that crucial point in a detective novel: the appearance of a body. It arrives on p. 74, but it remains to be seen, once I get this handwritten scribble down on the computer where I can examine it, whether that's soon enough. I don't think I've ever put off murder for so long before,

The second problem is, no-name doesn't cut it as a title. A title is like the cherry on the top of a sundae, the perfect touch that ties the whole creation together. Sometimes it comes to me easily, even before I've started the book. Sometimes it jumps out at me from a phrase I've written. Other times I play with words, comb through Internet quotations and generally tear out my hair before I hit upon the perfect title that captures the essence of the story.

No-name is about domestic violence, so I toyed with variations on the wedding vows. 'For better or for worse' and 'Till death do us part' have both been done to death. To have and to hold... Meh. I combed through Shakespearean quotes online. Nobody does death quite like Shakespeare. But so far, I've struck out.

So the search continues. I hope that by the summer I will have found my answer. Stay tuned!