Inspiration

Last December I wrote about how Christmas is Inspiring. In the article, I covered how to use Christmas to your advantage: using the ready-made character sets and letting yourself loose with a fun, quirky story. This year I’m going to discuss inspiration again, but this time specifically focus on how I generate ideas. This list won’t work for everyone. Some people won’t find the same things inspirational as I do. I will describe my top three techniques to generate ideas. Bear in mind that you will have to take on the role of some unusual characters.

Toilet based inspiration
Image courtesy of Behance.net

Character 1:  The Faux-eco-nutter
Next time you go to the toilet at night, don’t turn the bathroom light on. People around you will think you an eco-nutter, but really you’re not trying to save the environment (I guess that just leaves nutter, then). Whilst you relieve yourself of urine and faeces, let your mind wander. Direct it down paths your characters could take, but then twist it at the last moment. The reason you do this in the dark is that images form in your mind much easier without glaring lights.
This technique is fantastic for generating fantasy fight ideas. If you go in knowing you want a fight, turn the lights off, sit on the bog and let rip (with ideas, of course). If you are anything like me, you will get fight scenes popping into your head a rate of ten a second. If any idea lingers, let it. Toy with it. Remember you are in the dark, nobody will see if you start waving your hands around to manipulate the scene unfolding in front of you.
Once you’ve finished you excretion get up, wipe, and flush. Then whilst washing your hands (still in the dark) you can finalise your concept. Work out who wins, and, equally importantly, who starts the fight. Now, with your bowels emptied and your hands cleansed you may leave the bathroom, no doubt to the concerned eyes of your co-habitants.



Character 2:  The Virtuoso
This one isn’t quite as mad as the first character, but if you get into it, your hands start conducting and well...

Kill Your Darlings

Kill Your Darlings Word Cloud
courtesy of alvaradofrazier.com

William Faulkner famously once wrote, ‘in writing, you must kill all your darlings’. This is rather extreme, though very true. It is a tough truth to face; a truth I have only just come to terms with.

It is a shame that some of the things we hold most dear in our writing must face the chop. It is as if the heart and soul we poured into creating this section of masterful prose is wasted. But, it needn’t be. See, when we kill our darlings we give breathing space to other ideas that had previously been suffocated by the greedy being we called our darling.

What is a ‘darling’, you may well ask. It is a hard thing to define, but I view it as something you as a writer really, really love unconditionally. For example, you may have this brilliant idea of a scene where the protagonist enters a witty riposte with the antagonist and comes out on top. You love like your first born. It is amazing. It showcases your clever mind and makes the reader see how much cooler the protagonist is than the bad guy.

Cut it.

Plain and simple.

Commitment

Writing is hard.

It just is.

That is why commitment is so important. If you start something, I think it is important that you try your hardest to finish it. I have been writing as a hobby for 6 years. In that time I have written some good stuff … and some not so good stuff. Despite the bad stuff, I pride myself on one particular statistic:  I have only ever stopped writing two pieces before they were finished.

For me this is important. The satisfaction of completing a piece of writing is one of the greatest feelings one can feel. The knowledge that you have crafted characters, worlds, civilisations, emotion, and more with just words. Since I joined writing.com, I have uploaded all but one of my stories. The reason is I get a thrill from knowing that someone, somewhere, has read those words and been transported to a world of my creation. What more could a writer wish for … apart from publication? However, if you don’t finish you leave yourself with half a world; a character left in endless turmoil; a civilisation, yet to defeat the evil wizard.

The decision to stop writing the two pieces was a tough one to make. The first one I stopped was a Christmas story that would be a sequel to one of my short stories. I stopped because I never really started. The feel was too different from the first story and my ability as a writer was not up to the level it needed to be to do the story justice. I wrote a different Christmas story that year that was, in my opinion, very good.

The second was more recently. I was entering a short story contest, but realised the story I was writing required me to write in early modern English for much of the dialogue. Without extensive support, I would not have been able to write it. Instead, I wrote a different story with a completely different plot and cast.

Both times, I stopped writing because I didn’t have the skills to do the story justice. I also kept copies of the stories I stopped; one day I may restart them with new skills and a fresh mind.

Top 10 Tips from the Masters

The following tips are from the Writing Classes website  . I have compiled a top 10 of these rules, with my own analysis.

1. Write. (Neil Gaiman)

It goes without saying, if one wishes to be a writer, one must first write. Writing is not easy. Although his second practice starts with ‘put one word after another’, it is important to take note of the full practice:

2. Put one word after another. Find the right word, put it down. (Neil Gaiman)

Anybody can jumble together a collection of words, but it takes true skill to get words that portray the meaning you want. There are 26 letters in the alphabet. Even simpler there are four squiggles that make up all 26 letters: the line, the curve, the dot, and the flick. It is our job as writers to give meaning to these simple squiggles on a page and to give the reader a reason to want to find that meaning.

3. Never open a book with weather. (Elmore Leonard)

Readers don’t care what the weather is like in your story. Of course, there is an exception to the rule: if the story is the weather, you can open with it. I mean, if there is a storm in your world and the story is about the storm, it is OK to start your story with it.

4. Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip. (Elmore Leonard)

Obvious really. If the reader is going to skip over it, don’t write it in the first place. This goes hand in hand with another of Elmore’s rules: ‘Avoid prologues’. Some readers don’t read the prologue; therefore, you shouldn’t put one in. At least that’s how I view his rule.

5. Never use a verb other than "said" to carry dialogue. (Elmore Leonard)

Meiosis and Writing

Meiosis Diagram
courtesy of sciencegeek.net

As an A-Level Biology student, I strive to understand the world around me. From learning how water gets from the ground to the leaves of a giant Oak Tree to how insects survive without blood, I am fascinated by nature.

One day, whilst learning about how meiosis causes variation I had a brainwave. What if I could cross my love of writing with my knowledge of meiosis? At first, I struggled to think of the connections, but I think I’ve managed to work it out.

I will be using three key ways that meiosis causes variation to think about how we, as writers, can vary our writing. This article will form the final part in my three-part series on being unique in writing.

Please note that I have simplified the biology in this article and missed processes out to make it more approachable for those without a scientific background.

Independent Assortment (of chromosomes on the spindle)

In biological terms, this means that chromosome pairs will align along thread (the spindle). This means that it doesn’t matter where the other pairs go on the thread, each pair will go wherever it pleases.

So, how can writers apply this principle?

It doesn’t matter what Stephen King is writing, or what Tolkien did – you are you. Put your characters in the situations you want to put them in. Sure, the Lord of the Rings is a successful series, but that doesn’t mean you need to copy it.

Be your own writer. You know what you want to write better than anybody else does, and the chances are somebody, somewhere will want to read what you have written. You shouldn’t ignore other writers, but you should remember that the best writing often comes when the author writes their piece in the way they wanted.

There is every chance somebody will suggest a change to the plot and by all means embrace the opportunity to make your piece more appealing, but if it goes against everything your piece stands for … well, don’t do it.

Crossing-over (of alleles)

Embrace the Cliché

Last month I spoke about being unique in your writing and how to not be a copycat. In the second part of this series of articles, I am going to cover the embracement of clichés.

The other week, I was looking through my twitter-feed and came across a tweet from Amanda Wilcox that proves I am not alone in embracing clichés:

“The art of story writing seems to be simply re-writing clichés in your own words.”

I don’t know if I can attribute it directly to Amanda, or if someone else said it first, but story writing certainly seems that way.

I touched upon genre property last month, but not all genre property is cliché. Magical schools are not yet cliché and still have much uncovered ground. However, vampires are probably now cliché, what with Dracula, Twilight, The Vampire Diaries, and The Secret Circle to name but a few.

That isn’t to say that vampire stories should be avoided. If approached sensibly and with the right mind set any cliché can be turned into something new and exciting.

Before we go any further, perhaps an exploration into the definition of a cliché is needed. According to the Collins dictionary it is:

“An idea or phrase which is no longer effective because it has been used so much.”

This definition states that it can’t be used effectively any more. However, that doesn’t explain why some clichés are effective even after they have become ‘overused’. Perhaps I am being too broad with my own definition of:

“Something that has been used so much that it becomes predictable.”

Even with my definition, you probably would think it best to avoid any cliché where possible. Nevertheless, I am a firm believer that we shouldn’t waste clichés and should whole-heartedly embrace them with open arms. After all if you don’t try, you’ll never know, and knowledge is power. Remember that with great power comes great responsibility and that to use clichés is a privilege, not a right.

OK, so I went a little overboard with my clichés there, maybe to serve as an example of what not to do with them.

Be 'Younique'

This article is about the variety of ways any writer can use to prevent themselves accidentally becoming a ‘copycat’.

To start with, it is important to note that copying from others is different from using the general idea. In fantasy, especially, most ideas have been done, but not every idea has been done in every way. These ideas are sometimes referred to as ‘genre property’ and include the concepts such as magical schools (Unseen Academy, Hogwarts), apprentices (Magician, The Magician’s Apprentice) and trolls, wizards, and pretty much everything else associated with fantasy.

To stop yourself from becoming just another copy that isn’t quite as good as the original, you have to become the original. You need to come up with something unique, clever, and new. I’m not going to lie and say this is easy, it isn’t – especially if you’re writing something like epic fantasy with dragons and knights. The way you go about creating something different will vary depending on the sub-genre, but there is one basic rule for all sub-genres.

Think. Now, this may seem to be the obvious thing to do, but it is surprising how often it is not done. If you know your story is going to be about a man who’s been an orphan since childhood but is going to learn more about his parents’ death through means of magic then you have a good start. By knowing what your plot is, it is much easier to make a few changes.

Let’s think about the first part of that plot; this man is an orphan. That’s definitely been done before, but comes under genre property. The unique part here has got to be how he became an orphan and how it has affected him. You would be copying if you had a dark wizard kill them and this caused you’re character to be the chosen one who is the only one who can kill this dark wizard. Perhaps making it an accident that killed the parents, but an unknown one. This helps with the second plot element and enhances the first one.

So, your character is going to find out about the death of his parents. This is more generic and so safer from you accidentally copying someone else. From the first plot element, you have created a unique death… or perhaps a unique known death. Maybe they’re not dead. If so, why did people think they were? Be adventurous here. Don’t have characters think the father’s death was caused by them falling off a cliff and then have the dad come back and explain how he climbed down the cliff face and had rocks thrown at him by an assailant but luckily he managed to escape. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has already done this. If you want to do something similar then perhaps have it be more dangerous, or maybe have somebody else save the character.

As you can see, there are a number of ways to stop yourself from copying and still have the same plot as you wanted. However, there is the issue of knowing what has been written. It is impossible to read everything and so you must do your research. If your plot is good and you haven’t read it before then a quick search on the internet is all that’s needed to make sure you are being original. Use Google to look for keywords from your plot. Using our previous plot example typing, ‘fantasy orphan magic dark wizard’ into Google had Harry Potter as the second result.

Of course, what I have explained is only the tip of the iceberg. To explain all the ideas under the sun would require forever and a day. Let your imagination flow from your pen and by thinking outside the box, you can prevent copying becoming a spanner in the works.

That paragraph beautifully flows to the other method of being unique. This is the one I employ most:  Embrace the Cliché. That, however, is one for another day, and another newsletter article.

So, I leave you with this quote from Terry Pratchett.

Most modern fantasy just rearranges the furniture in Tolkien’s attic.

Hope this helps,

Matt B



Also available at Be Younique (WDC)

Lazy, Good-for-Nothing People

Hi,

Some of you may have noticed I didn't post an article in January. I intended to, but must have forgotten. I did write one, honest! Here it is:

I read an article recently about how a lot of the problems authors have with characters is them not being realistic enough. A lot of authors would put the blame on the dialect or certain reactions and will add to the story to fix the issue. However, in many cases adding will make things worse, perhaps to the point of the piece being abandoned.

The truth is when writing about people you need to remember a key fact about human nature:  Humans will do as little as possible to achieve a desired result.

Put another way if your character, Bob let’s say, has to stop the bad guy, let’s call him Joe, from going to a party he is unlikely to plan meticulously for days with no sleep. What is more likely is that he’ll just go up to Joe and do either of the following:

1.     “Hey, Joe,” Bob called.

“Yes?” Joe replied.“Don’t go to the party next Saturday.”“Why?” 

“Nobody wants you there.” 

“Oh, that’s a shame; I was really looking forward to it.” 

2.    “Hey, Joe,” Bob called. 

“Yes?” Joe replied.“The party’s been cancelled, sorry.” 

“Oh, that’s a shame; I was really looking forward to it.”

OK, so perhaps they were over-simplified, but the point still stands. Bob is not going to try to manipulate Joe with hypnosis, or go to the effort of getting a gun and shooting him.

If you want your character to do something more complex you can either make a more complicated scenario, maybe Bob wants to go instead of Joe and has to persuade him to give his ticket over; or make the other character respond unexpectedly:

“Hey, Joe,” Bob called. 

“Yes?” Joe replied.“The party’s been cancelled, sorry.” 

“No it’s not. I’ve spoken to the host just now; she’s asked me to bring a friend.” 

“Ah!” 

“Why don’t you want me to go?” Joe thought and suddenly said, “You fancy Claire, you know I like her.”

As you can see that introduces another element, lust and fancy, both human characteristics. What would be unrealistic is this scenario:

“Hey, Joe,” Bob called. 

“Yes?” Joe replied.“The party’s been cancelled, sorry.” 

“No it’s not. I’ve spoken to the host just now; she’s asked me to bring a friend.” 

“Ah!” 

“Why don’t you want me to go?” Joe thought and suddenly said, “You fancy Claire, you know I like her.” Joe got out a gun he had been carrying around for moments like this and shot Bob stone dead in broad daylight. Bob, however was wearing a bullet proof vest, he had planned for this unexpected turn of events. A helicopter landed across the street and a law enforcement squad arrested Joe.

At first glance an author may think that’s fantastic it’s got a love affair, guns, helicopters, the lot. But anything more than a glance will tell the reader that the plot is unrealistic. The only case something like that would work is if you had a character like Sherlock Holmes who’s main character trait is connecting more dots than everyone else and working out the consequences to his actions ahead of time. The reason Holmes works as a character is because those traits are the story. Holmes is not an old gut off the streets – he is a detective who is great at what he does.

But why does Holmes work as a character? Firstly, people like to fantasise that they are like him, but most importantly is that Holmes has flaws. His abilities do mean he isn’t as adept at social encounters unless he wants information. It enflames his ego and causes him to seem like a popinjay a lot of the time.

What does that have to do with the main rule I’ve covered in this article? Well, every rule has its exceptions and that is one example.

Thanks

Matt B

Continuous Rewriting

Every person has a favourite aspect when writing. For me it is the development of an interesting plot and strong characters. Most of this happens during the first draft, at least for me anyway. So how do you maintain enjoyment in writing once your favourite bit is done and you’re left with the grammar and the dreaded rewrite?

Well, there are, as always, many ways to do this, but this article will focus on one:  Continuous Rewriting.

As the name suggests, this is where you rewrite your piece continually throughout the writing process. I don’t promise that it will always involve your favourite aspect of writing, but that isn’t what the method is for. The intention is through continuous rewriting you never have to go too long without being able to go back to your favourite aspect of writing.

I know I’m famous for plugging my work in these articles, but in this case I have to. Yesterday I completed a five-day tidy up on my novel. In the past this would have consisted of me going through sorting out the commas and referring to the reviews I have received. But this time it was different. I did more than just correct my mistakes, I added bits in. I did a proper rewrite of the chapters. Normally rewrites happen after the first draft is complete, but I know that once I complete the first draft I am going to be reluctant to go through and rewrite it.

The beauty of continuous rewriting is that consistency errors are a thing of the past. You write something in chapter five and you can go back and hint at it in chapter three. Or perhaps you add something in chapter one and you develop it in chapter four. Had you been forcing yourself to plod onwards with a plot you knew you were going to change then your rewrite would be a long and arduous process. Now your first draft will be the plot you want and the write will mainly be making what you have written clearer and more engaging.

Perhaps it shouldn’t be called a first draft anymore; after all a first draft is often said to be the basic shape and outline of your story. With continuous rewriting your ‘first draft’ will be a filled out, full story that’s a bit rough around the edges. You could view the traditional first draft as a photo of a squiggly circle and a continuously rewritten first draft as a fuzzy photo of a complete statue – complete, just not very clear.

OK, some people may still not get what I’m saying, I don’t know, so I’ll use a real life example:

I was writing the start of chapter five of The Magician’s Tattoo when I realised that gagging and tying one of the main characters to a chair was not the best way to go about things. I could’ve continued and worked my way out of the mess by having him escape, but why bother? So I re-wrote the start of the chapter to a new, less awkward of containment. This gave me an additional issue; I had to get the character to identify where he was and who had taken him there. I put some initials on one of the walls that he would recognise but then yet another issue occurred. It was important that the reader knew what those initials were, so I went back to chapter three and added them in there.

Whilst over at chapter three I noticed a few consistency errors so I read through the chapter and corrected them. Half way through the chapter I realised I was no longer correcting anything and I had actually added two-hundred words to the story introducing two new plot elements and a twist. At this point I thought that it would be fun for the reader if they could pick up on a few of these things in the first two chapters without realising their significance.

Guess what? I went to chapter one and added a few bits in and started correcting the consistency errors my chapter three edit had made. Then I rewrote a whole page’s worth of story, adding depth to the characters. It was this point I realised what I was doing. I was rewriting my novel before I’d even reached the end.

After five days’ worth of work I had edited, rewritten and improved the first four chapters, added depth to the plot and filled in that shell of a story I originally had. Now, I’m on chapter five and am constantly editing and rewriting on the fly.

The best bit about this method is that the rewriting consists of both editing my work and developing the plot creatively. Another fantastic thing is that it works perfectly with my organic plotting method outlined in a previous article. I don’t have a plan in written form when I write as it prevents me working creatively, so being able to go back and add bits on the fly is really useful.

My guess is that most people do this method to some extent, but only when you realise that you are doing it can you maximise its full potential. Say goodbye to long rewrites and hello to fun writing all the to the very end.

Hope this helps,

Matt B

Christmas is Inspiring

Christmas is Inspiring

‘Christmas is coming,

The goose is getting fat

Please put a penny in the old man’s hat.’

Could be re-written as:

‘Christmas is coming,

The mind is getting fat,

Please put inspiration in your short works.’

Well, I doubt it would win any awards but it’s the best I could do! The point is that Christmas is an inspirational time of the year. We, as writers, should be ready to act upon inspiration whenever it presents itself to us. Sadly, many of us, myself included, often don’t have the time to act upon this inspiration.

However, I believe once a year we should allow ourselves to write free from the constraints of set word counts, planning, and the whole myriad of distractions which stops us acting on impulse and inspiration. This time is, if you haven’t guessed, Christmas. We all love a nice festive read so shouldn’t we all write one?

Last year I wrote a Christmas story in a day at college with the prompt ‘A Candle in the Dark’. It won the short story contest which was very good, but the main thing was that I wrote a good short story for the festive season in a set time with very few distractions. Granted it wasn’t complex; it was a quest story with a drunken Santa and an evil Jack Frost – but, it was fun to write and hopefully fun to read.

So, where does one look for festive inspiration? Christmas tales are always good to look at. Films, books, TV, comics will often have the same set of characters:  Santa, Frosty, Rudolph, Jack Frost, etc…. This base set of characters is fantastic as you don’t have to spend as long crafting the main cast of your story. Whenever I write with a known set of characters I always put a twist on the characters and add a new character to the group. I would advise you do the same.

This year, I have got my inspiration from another place as well. The good old Christmas Carol. Well, not just the good old ones but the good modern ones too. I’m not going to talk about my story this year as I don’t want anybody who plans on reading it to know what’s going to happen, but I will tell you that a lot of Christmas songs have inspired the plot.

To conclude:  Christmas is festive. Christmas is fun. Christmas is inspiring. Christmas is a good time to write. Christmas is great!

 Hope this helps,

Matt B

The Name Game

Name (n) – A word that you use to identify a person, place or thing.
The names you give to your characters will stick with them right up until the story is finished. By that logic it should be one of the most important things to think about before writing your story. The main characters name will be eternally connected to your piece of fiction and if chosen quickly and without reason, you may well regret picking it.
So, what should you think about when choosing a name?
1. Ease of pronunciation:
Your story is set in a foreign country and you obviously want to make the names as authentic as possible. A reader would probably not be able to read ‘Yudhisthir’ without stopping to work out the pronunciation. If you want an Indian name, perhaps going with something like ‘Gafur’ would be better. My reasoning behind those two names will become clear in my next point, but here they serve the purpose of showing how picking an easy name is better.
2. Etymology of the name:
This is what the name means. Both examples in my above point have some meaning of war behind them. The former name means ‘Firm in Battle’ and the latter name means ‘Invincible’. These names would be perfect for a Hindu warrior. The reader may not look up your name, but for those eager eyed readers it is nice to give them something to find.
3. Length of name:
This is similar to the first point, but more directed to the writer than the reader. Every time your character’s name is used, you have to type it. Which would you rather type: ‘Yashodhan’, or ‘Yash’? They both mean ‘Fame’ but one is nine letters and the other is four.
4. Purpose of Character
This links in nicely to point two and in some ways could’ve come before that point. Your character may be a fun, easy-going, party loving woman. In this case a name like ‘Prudence’ or ‘Camilla’. I’m not saying people with these names can’t have the above traits, but your reader will have stereotypes for those kinds of names. Similarly if you are trying to portray a really ugly character, perhaps names like ‘Brad’, ‘Hank’ and ‘Mr. Depp’ would be the wrong way to go simply because women supposedly find certain famous people with those names good-looking.
Of course, these rules are not set in stone. Breaking convention is fantastic to shock the reader or to add comic effect. For example (here we go!) in The Magician’s Tattoo I gave the eccentric magician a really normal name, Brian. I did so because I thought it would be funny to have this magician who is completely stark-raving-mad have such a normal, human, name. I also picked it because it is one of Dumbledore’s middle names.
But, what about the concept of not naming your character? Is that allowed? Would the reader feel cheated? The answers are yes, yes and no. Not giving the main character a name works really well in first person horror/dark stories. I did it in Positive Thoughts. By not naming the character, every time the reader reads ‘I’ the only person it could mean is them. They become part of the story which exponentially increases tension and suspense.
If you would like to have a look at some ‘normal’, ‘generic’ names, their meanings and also how to create normal names, visit my experiment- The Normal Name Experiment
Hope this helps,
MattAB16

Contemporary Fantasy

Definition: The story must contain magical/fantastical elements within the real world, but these magical/fantastical elements must remain unknown to the majority of the world’s population. (Paraphrased from: Fantasy Book Review)

Often, people consider Contemporary Fantasy the same as Urban Fantasy. Urban Fantasy requires that the story take place in a city; Contemporary can take place anywhere on the real Earth.

The Percy Jackson and Artemis Fowl series’ are both examples of the Contemporary sub-genre, since both are set in the real world with fantastical elements added in.

This article isn’t just to tell you what the Contemporary sub-genre is; I hope to help you with writing it. In order to do this, I will be using my experience in the genre. I have written a few short stories and am writing a novel in this sub-genre, and have tried many different ways of using it.

The first thing you need to decide is what fantastical element you are going to introduce to the world. As a rule of thumb, you should introduce no more than 5, preferably no more than 3. The reason for this is that you need your reader to believe it is happening in reality on Earth they know.

You could add, as I did in The Greater Grater, fantasy creatures (element 1) and a hidden fantasy world accessible only by a select few (element 2). The creatures gave the story a definite fantasy feel and by adding the hidden world I stretched the reader’s imagination as to what reality can hold to its limit. I also pushed the definition of Contemporary to its absolute limits; having a hidden world perhaps doesn’t strictly count as Earth. Though the characters and entrance were on Earth, so it still can count as Contemporary.

A more subtle fantasy element could be angels. Angels can define the culture in your story through their association with religion. Angels don’t have to be good; you could, as I did in Trick or Treat, make them evil. The fantasy element goes deeper when the angels affect your main character directly. If the chosen element changes the protagonist, then you are showing the reader how the element affects reality.

Of course, the most-known element for you to add is magic, which I have used in most of my work including The Magician’s Tattoo. Now, I’m not blowing my own trumpet, but I think the magical system I have is unique. Excess magic is urinated out or converted into grey hair. The magic is stored in ear wax, and if this is eaten by another it is transferred to them. All of this occurs in a world where ‘magic doesn’t exist’. Normal people like you or me don’t see this magic – this is because the magicians have measures in place and humans are just plain ignorant. A line that I plan to write for one of my characters goes something like this:

“The majority of humans are ignorant and unobservant. If they saw bright purple lights consistently fly past, they would say it was a charity event; if they saw a person disappear, they would say they never saw a person there at all; if a whole car changed colour, they would think someone’s a really fast painter. That is why we can hide in plain sight.”

Remember, magic has been done to death over hundreds of years of literature. Before using magic, stop and think whether what you have in your head is creative and unique. If it isn’t, you have three options:

1. Don’t use magic
2. Make your system unique
3. Keep the system, but use it uniquely.

Of course, common systems can still work, but you need to be sure that your story has other unique elements to make up for it.

The key lesson in this article is that Contemporary is a wide sub-genre and there are almost limitless things you can do with it. The only reason it isn’t unlimited is because physics dictates there are not enough particles in the universe to allow limitless options!


The article can also be found here:  Contemporary Fantasy on WDC

Thanks
Matt B