Spoiler alert: Story ideas come from everywhere. From seeing three kids with band instruments standing in a yard (creeped me out a bit) to listening to a podcast and thinking, “This would be a great story...IN SPACE”.
One tip I’ve found incredibly helpful when it comes to story ideation is to write everything down. And I mean everything. Keep a running list. I started an Evernote note (is that redundant?) so I have it available whenever I need to jot a story idea down (usually in the middle of the night).
If you get a story idea, no matter how dumb you think it is, write it down. There will be dumb ones. Here are a few from my running list:
Echo stain.
Human grant and dog grant.
"He came to his census.”
Space elevator.
Yes, seriously. I wrote down echo stain as a story idea. Your story ideas don’t have to be complete either (or make sense). If it’s just “X goes to Y,” but you think it could be an interesting story, write it down. You’ll be surprised how often you can string those story fragments together into one story.
Sometimes I’m afraid if I stop writing down ideas when they come to me, then I’ll stop getting ideas. I’ve lost four story ideas that came to me in the middle of the night and I thought, “Must sleep. I’ll remember it in the morning.”
Now they are gone forever.
So, start your list, and write down all the ideas!
Jump. Build. Fly.
F.C. Shultz