Is it a contest? Is it writing advice? Or is it something altogether new?

Since we have neither gotten the old content up, nor posted a new contest, I have decided to deliver both in bite sized pieces until we get the ball rolling again. My last bit of advice revolved around idea generation in fiction writing. The gist of the article was that in order for a writer to generate ideas, the writer must train the mind to think in ways that are friendly to fiction. Yesterday I took part in one of the many odd things I do for fun that often spawns story ideas as a byproduct.

I was thinking of buying "www.(my real last name).com" for another website I have wanted to build off and on for the last few years. Just to see what would happen I typed the url into my address bar and met a family of strangers with my last name, and a little girl with the very same name and age as my daughter. I promptly e-mailed a link to a picture of the girl to my older brother with the subject heading "My daughter has an arch nemesis," thinking of the baby with one eyebrow on The Simpsons. As usual with this sort of message, it prompted a conversation that lasted for the better part of a day. Below is each message with the author's name and subject heading.


From: Gordon
Subject: My daughter has an arch nemesis.

Here I placed a link to a picture of a girl the same age as my daughter, but blond, and not as adorable.

From: Gordon's Older Brother
Subject: Your daughter's evil twin.

No, it is your daughter's evil twin from an alternate universe.

From: Gordon
Subject: Re: Your daughter's evil twin.

That can not be. The other girl didn't have a goatee.
(For those of you who are not sci-fi fans, the goatee is a Star Trek reference, not random nonsense)

From: Gordon's Older Brother
Subject: Re: Your daughter's evil twin.

True, but how could a girl grow a goatee. It is the blond hair that gave her away.

From: Gordon
Subject: Re: Your daughter's evil twin.

Wouldn't that make my dark haired daughter the evil one?

From: Gordon's Older Brother
Subject: Evil baby from an alternate universe.

Wow, you got me on that one. You're the father of an evil baby from an alternate universe! She must have been switched at birth, and is actually an evil baby genius. Have you checked for any secret doors that lead to her laboratory?

From: Gordon
Subject: Re: Evil baby from an alternate universe.

No, brother, you got me. No alternate universe. No door. No lab. Not a genius, and not switched at birth. Just evil, and she got it from her father. You should not have been so persistent...

I'll see you when the lights go out.


My brother has not responded to this last message. It might be that he tired of the conversation, or it might be that he is holed up in his panic room. In either case we can use this real life occurrence to generate a nugget of story. If you take the flow of our e-mail conversation, particularly the line, "Just evil, and she got it from her father," and roll it around in your brain for a bit you might come up with an idea like this:

A young girl commits an act so horrible that she is locked away in a mental institution. As the extended family gathers to comfort the girl's parents, it occurs to an uncle that the situation is suspiciously similar to an event involving his two brothers thirty years before. His youngest brother died as a result, and his other brother, the girl's father, was the only witness. Did the girl's mental instability come from her father, did this instability cause him to kill the youngest brother, and what might happen if a concerned uncle brings the subject up after the rest of the family has gone to bed?

I freely admit that this is not the best story ever conceived, but it is at least as good as the premise for a number of Dean Koontz books I have read, and it could easily be incorporated into a larger story as a complication or subplot. This idea (and a host of others) occurred to me because I've been making my brain think this way for fifteen years or so. It's reflex now, and it's a whole bunch of fun.

You might also consider the wider implications of the genetic madness. Does the patriarch of the family also hide a dark side? What about the uncle, does darkness lurk in his soul, waiting for the right moment to take control, or has it done so in the past only to be buried in the deepest reaches of his subconscious memory by his better nature? Think about it, play with it, and see what you come up with.

Because I have deprived you of a contest for the last few months, I give this story nugget to you. Take it, write about the confrontation, and submit your story as a comment on this post. For that matter, feel free to write any story that occurs to you after reading the e-mail conversation between me and my brother, then follow the guidelines below, and I'll pick a few of my favorites to post on this site. Since I'm still blissfully unemployed I'll have to send the lucky winners a writing journal instead of the big bucks my contributors are used to. Good luck all, I hope to hear from you soon.

Guidelines:

-As usual, excessive sex and vulgarity will disqualify your entry. "Excessive" can be defined as anything not crucial to the progression of the story.

-Try to keep this one short. 1500 word limit.

-Leave contact information in your comment. Nobody but me will see it, and nothing will be viewed by the public until I have reviewed and edited it.

-Deadline: Keep them coming until I say otherwise, but I'll wait a month before I post anything.