Seeds

Stories don't often start at the beginning, but with some kernel of a thought or idea in the mind of the author that causes them to say "yeah, I think I want to flesh this out in a really interesting way." It might be a kind of character, or a particular scenario, or it could be some random phrase or line of dialog or just an unshakeable image that pops into your mind. These are the seeds that eventually bloom into fully formed stories.

So, what are your story-seeds? How do they come to you? How do you nourish them and help them to grow? Are there any stories that you've written where the seeds were particularly strong or memorable? If so, what were they?

Just curious.

Mine are all over the place, different triggers, different journeys. I take a daily walk where I often get ideas. Late at night is fertile too. But something I have been doing that is working well is texts: I text myself whenever I get an idea, even if I have to stop what I’m doing. Like, a lot. Every morning, I go through them and add them as notes to the end of a story, or on a blank page of a new story. I ignore the bad ones, but I don’t judge much.

What I am noticing is, the more I stop and text myself with an idea, the more ideas I get. I am starting to get to the point where it’s habitual. I won’t recommend it to everyone, but for me, the habit of texting myself ideas 24/7 means I am more likely to have ideas 24/7.

Anyway. That’s my experience lately.

For me, most of my seeds come from within myself - a fantasy, longing, fear, or experience. I try to be honest with those, forget I have an audience, and write almost like I'm just telling my most trusted friend. Other seeds come from pictures or prompts in competitions. Those are a completely different type of writing where I have to work harder to find my voice.

Seeds for me are so random. A picture can form an idea in my head; A phrase from a TV show or movie. Even playing with words to make a random title, or even a fantasy I want to expand upon.

So yeah, I am all over the place when it comes to that sort of thing.

"Becalmed" was from a meme where a woman is shown putting her hair up and the tagline is "When he says nothing can make him feel better."

"Coming in Third" started with the memory of one of my buddies pulling off the mother/daughter hat trick for real, and the line near the end where the MC says "Tell your mom I said hi."

"You Serious?" is another meme start where it says "When you let your BF fuck your bestie because she's been single for a long time and you know we all have needs" and a picture of three in a bed where the one girl is reading a book and holding hands with her friend while her BF rails her.

"A Sale of Two Titties" comes from the title, which comes from a Monty Python skit. A lot of mine arise from a giant file of wordplay/pun titles.

My latest, "Catbird Seat" starts with looking for an idea for the Facesitting category. I started doing searches for phrases related to sit, seat, etc. That one popped up, the concept of the no pets popped in my head, and I was off to the races. I had to tweak it because it originally started with Alexa as the property manager's daughter, and that put too much of an air of real power dynamics that I didn't like. In the final version she thinks she has all the power, but in reality she's got no leverage, and they go along with it because it turns them on.

Not here and little chance it will be, because it's Sci-Fi/Fantasy and 100k words long, but "One Whore's Town" is another title start. Let me take a peripheral character from another story and give her a starring role in a tale of two prostitutes in a turf war that gets out of hand fast.

Honestly one of my best 'seeds' are improving on something I've read or seen. Sometimes I'll be watching a show and think it's going somewhere and then it goes another way. Then I might think, "Huh, I liked my idea better."

I'll strip down the parts I like and build up something new about it.

Occasionally I do just get a spark in a moment, but the best way to find seeds is to consume.

I am relatively new to writing fiction but I am very engaged with self discovery. So I like to take seeds from my own life story. Events, people and places that have captivated me in some way. That to me is a clue that there is something there that is worth exploring.

Quote by Arjun5691

I am relatively new to writing fiction but I am very engaged with self discovery. So I like to take seeds from my own life story. Events, people and places that have captivated me in some way. That to me is a clue that there is something there that is worth exploring.

A lot of my stories are like this too - not that my real life is all that exciting or sexy - but many of my stories center around 'what could have been' fantasies if the real world operated on porn logic. Sincerely-for-the-first-time which was the first erotic story I wrote (and I think the second I published here) was based on an old crush I had back in college that had been 'off-limits.' The-next-door-neighbour was based on a real very awkward night drinking with my parents and an older neighbor (she was actually a few doors down the road). A-cure-for-boredom was based on a work-trip I went on. I also went through a period where I was interested in the concept of cam-girls and sexting, so a number of my stories featured mediated sex - through videos, pics, etc. (americas-sweetheart; the-special-show; the-english-professor).

Other stories come from challenges that I give myself. Can I write a story where the characters never speak to or touch each other (across-the-tracks)? Can I write an epic erotic poem (Drunk, Alive, and Full of Night)? Can I write a one-sided dialog (workplace-productivity)? Can I write hallucinatory sex (Cambodian Tiger)? Paranormal sex (The study)? And of course, there's also LS' competition themes for inspiration (The Highway Girl; Shoot).

Our CO2 alarm started beeping at 3 a.m. last month. Low battery. It sucked, but I ended up with a story about a girl who can turn on fire alarms with her brain. Turns out she can do other things too.

Quote by Ensorceled
It sucked, but I ended up with a story about a girl who can turn on fire alarms with her brain.

A real ... 😎 ... hottie, eh? 🤣

I often start from an image and spin a story around it (a lot of my shorter stuff and micros come under this one). Or a character idea that I then expand into a story (the Tana stories on Storiesspace are like this, starting from "What if a fantasy world's Dark Lord was overthrown by his own daughter?").