Generating Story Ideas: Example 1

Here's an example from an idea I generated for a Dare To Be Bad Challenge in February 2000. I had a good time writing this story.

First I generated some ideas to bump together.

Cosmic Thought: Who is to say the panda would not be vengeful; the pure own only themselves and maybe some toiletries; if you need a road, make a road.

Dramatic Situation: Murderous adultery (Elements: two adulterers, betrayed husband or wife).

Characters: Model, basketball player, and veterinarian.

I clicked the button for "character" three times, since the dramatic situation called for three characters. Then I cogitated on these things for awhile. I do a lot of my "thinking" about stories on paper, since I have a mind like a steel sieve and don't want to lose good ideas if I actually have any. I carry an 8-1/2" x 11" notebook around for that purpose; sometimes I also write ideas in my Palm Pilot (I have a keyboard for it). Here's my brainstorming on this idea.

Oh boy. I balked on this one because I have no wish whatsoever to write about adultery. But maybe I could twist the adultery idea some so it's some different thing going on. Something mental rather than physical, perhaps. Trying to make an SF story out of these rather prosaic elements could be challenging--but they only need to spark the story, not actually be in the finished product!

Jealousy is an old story element. Twist any of the characters--the model is male, the veterinarian and basketball player are female. Or one or all of them are robots. Set it in a space station. What would zero-gee basketball be like? Maybe a veterinarian is married to a female zero-gee basketball player. The model is a robot. In the future, you could have supermodels who were robots and could be changed for the clothing s/he was wearing (even change gender)--put on weight, take off weight, change as fashions change. Bigger or smaller hips or breasts. That's so much more practical than having human models! So why would a robot supermodel who could change according to what's being modeled cause a problem between a husband and wife? Especially if it can change its gender? I imagine it's programmed to act as human as possible, and be able to move, sit, stand, etc. like a human would, so it would show off the clothing properly. Would a zero-gee basketball player have to be tall? Probably not. But if she was born on the moon, she's probably very tall compared to humans born on Earth, but she also is more fragile, and can't stand full Earth gravity. I imagine dexterity and gymnastics would be more important to a zero-gee ball player. So she could be from Earth, and have been a gymnast or something there. That speed, dexterity, and ability to do fantastic gymnastic moves would serve her well in zero-gee. Of course, then I'd have to figure out how basketball would change in zero gee, and I'm not sure I want to do that research either. Either that or just say that's what she does, and not show any (or much) of the actual game.

So a veterinarian is probably involved in a lot more animal husbandry on a space station than on Earth. The animals will be in the part of the station that has gravity, of course. Some kind of forest or park or farm to have the animals on. Have both useful animals (cows, chickens, etc. for their milk and eggs) and animals mostly there because humans like them--horses, cats, dogs, unicorns (sure, why not?), etc. So he's a bit like a country vet in that he does pets as well as farm animals. They probably don't have a lot of animals for meat--they'll probably be nearly vegetarian, just because meat is so costly to raise up there. Or they can raise odd animals as meat--rabbits, guinea pigs, etc. Meat doesn't have to be on the hoof. If they use it like the Japanese do, as a seasoning rather than the main dish, they can have meat quite often in small amounts. People could probably raise their own chickens or rabbits, if that's allowed. Maybe there's a place "zoned" for animals besides pets, where you can keep the animals you're raising. Like those little garden plots in the cities that you can go and cultivate. Anyway, a vet will need to be able to deal with all of these various critters.

So what do these various ideas have to do with each other and the ideas from the generators? If the basketball player and the veterinarian are married, and the thing that's a problem between them is the robot supermodel, what is the problem and how will their various talents and negative aspects add to the problem and eventually solve the problem? A vet works with animals. Is there a robot animal that can be changed like the robot supermodel, to let the vet study various problems and diseases on it? Wouldn't a computer simulation be better? But there would be no tactile ability, no way to practice operations or delivering calves or whatever. Might this somehow relate to the supermodel? Maybe he orders a robot animal and GETS a supermodel! That might shift the story from serious to comedy. But that's okay. The robot animal is really expensive. The models even more so. So he wants to keep the model--he's fascinated by it--and his wife strongly nixes this. But that's rather cliché. Maybe his wife is fascinated by it. Wants to see if she can use its morphing ability to test some moves for her basketball game before she tries them. Cut down on hurting herself--letting something that won't be damaged as easily do it until she sees where the pitfalls are and how to do it properly. She can come up with wholly new moves and surprise the competition! But her husband really wants his test animal, and doesn't want to risk damaging the model. It wasn't built to do acrobatics, it was built to model clothing.

This would be a fun story to write. I'd have to come up with the stuff for the zero-gee basketball, but that might not be too difficult.

Now what were the other aspects I was supposed to work with for this story? I could either abandon them now, or see if they'll add anything else to this story. Don't know what to do about the panda. The pure is the model? {grin}. If you need a road, make a road. I like that one. It could be the wife's answer to her team getting out of a losing streak. She's been racking her brains, but hasn't had any ideas.

I guess that's about it. Have a story start pretty well going here. Don't have an ending yet, but that may come with a bit of thought. Of course they'll have to send the robot model back, but will she get to use it for her idea first? Will she damage it? What if his robot animal turns up too, and now he's got to figure out what's going on with the model. He hasn't heard anything from the company, he was only charged for the animal. So maybe he will let his wife use it. It would mean so much to her!

I kind of like the idea of her damaging it, and then trying to explain it. Or he's trying to figure out how to explain it. Or cover it up. Because that robot probably costs more than he'll make in a lifetime.

And there it is, a complete story idea from three elements. I changed what I wanted to change, trashed what didn't go with the idea as it shaped up, and did it all on the bus and the train on the way to work one morning. The story came out pretty much the way this brainstorming went, and I wrote the first draft in two days.

An interesting exercise would be to see what other people come up with from these elements!