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Story Ideas – Ask the Experts I
By Deb Gallardo
You thought it was only I who say that “Where do you get your ideas?” is the most-asked question of authors. Not by a long shot. Here’s the first in a series of top authors and their responses to this eternal question, from one of my favorite fantasy writers, Robin McKinley. She is author of “Dragonhaven,” “Sunshine,” “Spindle’s End,” “Water: Tales of Elemental Spirits,” “Rose Daughter,” “Deerskin,” “The Outlaws of Sherwood,” “The Hero and the Crown,” “The Blue Sword,” “The Door in the Hedge,” “Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of Beauty and the Beast.”
My hands-down favorites of hers are “Beauty,” “Spindle’s End,” and “The Hero and the Crown.” I’ve loved all her books, but these three I have revisited time and again, and will continue to do so.
Do read other parts of her site, especially where she talks about growing up in Japan and about riding horses all her life. The details of her life, more than anything, define where her ideas come from. In “The Hero and the Crown,” Hari, newly orphaned, is forced to move to a remote military outpost on the edge of a peculiar territory where her brother is stationed. It is the story of two cultures whose only hope is to fight a common enemy, but suspicion and odd happenings concerning the people from the distant hills keep them divided, until Hari is kidnapped by the hill people’s leader and she becomes more than she ever imaged she could be.
McKinley writes strong, well-rounded, vibrant and appealing female protagonists who capture your heart and imagination and make you want to be similarly courageous in the face of insurmountable odds and unexpected circumstance. If you’ve never read her, then RUN, don’t walk, to the nearest library or bookstore. Barring that, shop online and get yourself an early present. You’ll thank me.
Where Do You Get Your Ideas?
From Robin McKinley’s FAQ page:
The short answer is: I haven’t a clue.
This is the mother and father of all standard questions. I guess this is probably true for all writers. Maybe there is some writer out there who would declare that Why did you make character x in book y run off with the plumber from Vulcan? is their most frequently asked question, but I haven’t met them or read their web site.
The reason this question makes a lot of us writers, me for one, wilt, is because there isn’t really any answer to it, and trying to say anything at all responsive about it is just so enormous: it’s a question like, ‘So, how do you write? Tell me everything.’
Or, ‘So, what is your life history, from birth to this moment we’re now in? Don’t leave anything out.’ Where I get my ideas is part of who I am, and while I have some guesses about some of who I am, the mechanism of idea-production is totally a mystery. I think possibly you’re born with story-telling like you might be born with math ability or sprinting speed. Read entire entry ยป
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