Where do you draw story inspiration?

[SeraphNocturne]

I’ve spent my entire day at the Georgia Renaissance Faire after an impromptu invitation… needless to say, I’ve got about a million and one ideas regarding fantasy worlds and characters at this point, and I can’t wait to get home to jot some of them down and start forming plots. It’s been an epic follow up to the Geek Pride event for me.

Do you guys happen to draw inspiration from interesting settings like festivals, faires, or conventions?

Momocon is going down this weekend as well, one of Georgia’s largest anime cons, and I’m honestly tempted to head down there too and see what ideas it might drum up!

 

[MrPixel]

I draw inspiration from a combination of real life events and life as I wish it was. Some of my writing is based on something that happened to us, or me, IRL, and then extended into fantasy territory, while some of it remains firmly footed in reality, anonymized. My wife and I led, and sometimes still lead, an interesting romantic life.

We have never explored the world of Renaissance Faires, at least not together. I had some exposure at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire in SoCal with my ex some 45 years ago, but I guess that experience may have been colored by the then-deteriorating relationship we (didn't) have. So no fuel for the creative fires there.

OTOH, my current and I met in an "alternative" - even counterculture - theater troupe. Lots of fascinating interactions there, one of which is the inspiration for the lengthy serial story I'm about to wrap-up.

 

[Blind_Justice]

Music, video games, the things which happen around the D&D/Cyberpunk/homebrew Sci-Fi setting gaming table or, as probably the most interesting source, spite.

I got asked to edit a "sword & sorcery" story with a female half-orc as the lead and despite the story being full of sex, it sucked as a sword and sorcery tale, the main character oscillated between unreasonably overpowered and shockingly submissive and the tone was all over the place.

Once I finished the assignment and burned all bridges with the author (I didn't sugar-coat my opinion and they didn't agree with my reasoning), I sat down and wrote "Twin Suns of Atlantis: Dorgon", taking the "Gladiator barbarian gets abused for sex" idea of the other author and spun it my way.

Something similar happened when a starry-eyed lady asked me to critique her attempt at vampire sex fiction. Repressed girl in a sex shop (uh, right) lays eyes on a tall, dark and handsome stranger, gets totally wet and revels in the mysterious attraction. You know the trope. Hypno-gaze and charm voice as the lazy writer's excuse for plot development. Another bridge burnt because I dared to suggest that vampires are predators looking to kill, not cheap romance options for desperate housewives. Got two story nuggets out of that one, one for a gritty supernatural thriller and one lighthearted comedy spoof. Neither is quite finished just yet, but they're on my "to-do" list.

And most of my fantasy catalogue is one big stonking middle finger to R.A. Salvatore. Who says you can't mix D&D with adult themes, eh?

 

[ElectricBlue]

I get inspiration from walking down the street, commuting on the bus (when I did that), at my favourite cafe.

I was chatting to two women at my local cafe just the other day, they introduced themselves as Emma and Bobbie. Attractive young women, bright and friendly. They'll probably turn up in a story one day. For me, it's that simple. Life happens every day, and I write about people living everyday lives.

 

[Blind_Justice]

I get inspiration from walking down the street, commuting on the bus (when I did that), at my favourite cafe.

I was chatting to two women at my local cafe just the other day, they introduced themselves as Emma and Bobbie. Attractive young women, bright and friendly. They'll probably turn up in a story one day. For me, it's that simple. Life happens every day, and I write about people living everyday lives.

Unless you're deep-diving Arthurian myth, I reckon.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Unless you're deep-diving Arthurian myth, I reckon.

Ah yes, but that one was from walking over the sites.

Anyway, it's got stables and horses and women in long flowing dresses. In the fifth century, that's every day!

 

[SeraphNocturne]

Music, video games, the things which happen around the D&D/Cyberpunk/homebrew Sci-Fi setting gaming table or, as probably the most interesting source, spite.

I got asked to edit a "sword & sorcery" story with a female half-orc as the lead and despite the story being full of sex, it sucked as a sword and sorcery tale, the main character oscillated between unreasonably overpowered and shockingly submissive and the tone was all over the place.

Once I finished the assignment and burned all bridges with the author (I didn't sugar-coat my opinion and they didn't agree with my reasoning), I sat down and wrote "Twin Suns of Atlantis: Dorgon", taking the "Gladiator barbarian gets abused for sex" idea of the other author and spun it my way.

Something similar happened when a starry-eyed lady asked me to critique her attempt at vampire sex fiction. Repressed girl in a sex shop (uh, right) lays eyes on a tall, dark and handsome stranger, gets totally wet and revels in the mysterious attraction. You know the trope. Hypno-gaze and charm voice as the lazy writer's excuse for plot development. Another bridge burnt because I dared to suggest that vampires are predators looking to kill, not cheap romance options for desperate housewives. Got two story nuggets out of that one, one for a gritty supernatural thriller and one lighthearted comedy spoof. Neither is quite finished just yet, but they're on my "to-do" list.

And most of my fantasy catalogue is one big stonking middle finger to R.A. Salvatore. Who says you can't mix D&D with adult themes, eh?

I feel you on this--though I typically avoid touching anyone's poorly done ideas, they can drown in their creative failures. Kudos to you for even attempting to work with such difficult writers! I do often have to remind myself that many writers have rather two dimensional characters, focus on all the perks and none of the flaws when creating said characters, and naturally believe that excessive sex scenes equates to a well done piece of erotica. Growing pains for most, I'm sure.

I am one hundred percent with you on tough ass orcs (half or otherwise) who don't bow for shit though, and vampires who are creatures of horror and apex predators (who do not sparkle, or fall in love with weak-willed FMCs perusing sex shops, of all places). I'm all for spicing up the dungeon crawl any day of the week, and Salvatore doesn't have exclusive rights to fantasy races!

 

[SeraphNocturne]

I get inspiration from walking down the street, commuting on the bus (when I did that), at my favourite cafe.

I was chatting to two women at my local cafe just the other day, they introduced themselves as Emma and Bobbie. Attractive young women, bright and friendly. They'll probably turn up in a story one day. For me, it's that simple. Life happens every day, and I write about people living everyday lives.

Simple and sweet, I love that! And it's really fantastic that it's just that simple for you... I have such a hard time writing in the 'slice of life' style. I do find myself far more happy reading such stories than writing them.

I've never modeled a character around anyone I know, but I've never really tried. I might give it a go sometime in the future.

 

[KeithD]

From wherever I go, whatever I see, whatever I hear, whatever I observe, whatever I remember.

 

[SeraphNocturne]

From wherever I go, whatever I see, whatever I hear, whatever I observe, whatever I remember.

I've perused your listed works, I can surely see this reflected there. Heheh, I envy how simple inspiration comes to you!

 

[Djmac1031]

I'm often inspired by Indiana Jones, in that I'm "just making it up as I go."

 

[Voboy]

From everywhere and anywhere. I'm a curious person. I like exploring. As a kid, I was the little boy who paged through the encyclopedia endlessly, getting lost for hours, soaking up stuff. The internet has been a magical playground in that way.

A lot of my stuff is an offshoot of things I see on the news or in my usual life, where I "what if" them with a sexual overtone.

I watched a news report about puffins in the Gulf of Maine, looked up the organization they profiled, and then thought "I wonder where the researchers masturbate." Presto. A story came to me. Another time, I saw footage of someone fleeing a shark and thought, "I wonder what would happen if they were skinny-dipping and a cop saw them." Presto. Another story. Another time, I read about a local wildlife officer having to tranquilize a bear out of a tree. I wondered what would happen if the responding wildlife guy had a relationship with one of the responding cops. Presto. Another story. I found out that naked calendars are a thing in the Antipodes and the UK; that story wrote itself.

It's about imagination. And tweaking reality in a way that remains believable while being entertaining and, on this site, sexual.

 

[EmilyMiller]

I draw inspiration from a combination of real life events and life as I wish it was.

What he said

For even my totally batshit crazy fantasies, the above remains true.

Em

 

[SeraphNocturne]

What he said

For even my totally batshit crazy fantasies, the above remains true.

Em

Nothing wrong with that at all!

 

[SeraphNocturne]

I draw inspiration from a combination of real life events and life as I wish it was. Some of my writing is based on something that happened to us, or me, IRL, and then extended into fantasy territory, while some of it remains firmly footed in reality, anonymized. My wife and I led, and sometimes still lead, an interesting romantic life.

We have never explored the world of Renaissance Faires, at least not together. I had some exposure at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire in SoCal with my ex some 45 years ago, but I guess that experience may have been colored by the then-deteriorating relationship we (didn't) have. So no fuel for the creative fires there.

OTOH, my current and I met in an "alternative" - even counterculture - theater troupe. Lots of fascinating interactions there, one of which is the inspiration for the lengthy serial story I'm about to wrap-up.

If you get a chance to delve into the Renaissance world, and high fantasy is what you're looking to write, I couldn't recommend it even more. I jumped out of my bed and literally into a car, did make up on the way and was literally in another world for most of the day... the costuming and attention to detail they put into the Faire compared to visiting when I was younger was just out of this world.

All the same, I think it's awesome you can draw inspiration from your spouse--I like to lean on that angle often too, but none of that work is published onsite, it's mostly for personal enjoyment. I really prefer not to involve myself in the fantasy world of literature, I mean for it to be a total escape--nothing at all is real in the way I write, I enjoy fantasy and escaping the outside world of real life I live in, that's always been my angle for writing.

That's probably why I have such a hard time with writing 'slice of life'. It's almost as boring to write to me as it is to live out here in the real world. I almost always enjoy reading other people's work involving real scenarios and characters based on real individuals, but as a writer it does nothing for me.

 

[Voboy]

If you get a chance to delve into the Renaissance world, and high fantasy is what you're looking to write, I couldn't recommend it even more. I jumped out of my bed and literally into a car, did make up on the way and was literally in another world for most of the day... the costuming and attention to detail they put into the Faire compared to visiting when I was younger was just out of this world.

All the same, I think it's awesome you can draw inspiration from your spouse--I like to lean on that angle often too, but none of that work is published onsite, it's mostly for personal enjoyment. I really prefer not to involve myself in the fantasy world of literature, I mean for it to be a total escape--nothing at all is real in the way I write, I enjoy fantasy and escaping the outside world of real life I live in, that's always been my angle for writing.

That's probably why I have such a hard time with writing 'slice of life'. It's almost as boring to write to me as it is to live out here in the real world. I almost always enjoy reading other people's work involving real scenarios and characters based on real individuals, but as a writer it does nothing for me.

It's fun, yeah. But having written High Fantasy-type stories and then, also, another story set at an actual Ren Faire? The first kind of story is a lot more fun to write, lol.

Those of us who write "slice of life," remember, are doing it with a twist. We're what-iffing the hell out of those slices. It's what makes the stories fun.

 

[SeraphNocturne]

It's fun, yeah. But having written High Fantasy-type stories and then, also, another story set at an actual Ren Faire? The first kind of story is a lot more fun to write, lol.

Those of us who write "slice of life," remember, are doing it with a twist. We're what-iffing the hell out of those slices. It's what makes the stories fun.

Agreed, I meant entirely for the fictional high-fantasy type... I wouldn't much find writing a story about being AT the Ren Faire fun. I probably wouldn't enjoy that read, either, not in an erotica sense at least... Hawkeye and Loki did it justice on screen, but that's as much as I can hope for it as a setting.

The same goes for anime conventions. Not my type of setting at all. Now... taking some of the characters and costumes I saw, the jousting, the monarchs, the language--absolutely, I'll incorporate that into a story any day... and very much intend to!

I commend you slice of life writers, especially those of you who do it well--some of my favorite work here on Literotica have been exactly what you're describing. Enhanced pieces from the real world, quite beautifully done.

 

[Rustyoznail]

I have a bit of a mix. Some ideas are from daily observations, some are from snippets of conversation - "For fuck's sake, Johnno, lower. Hit me lower. And hard." Jen stepped back and slapped her boobs. "This is the target area in a fight." My Sempai actually said that to me.

Sometimes it's completely random, like my first Tales of Leinyere story which is a riff on the travelling salesman / farmer's daughter joke. No idea how I linked the two elements.

My mind works in mysterious ways. Wish I knew what it was up to half the time.

 

[Rob_Royale]

This forum. My tastes ran pretty vanilla, my first stories were all mature woman romance/porn stories pulled from my own fantasies. But here I've learned about so many kinks, fantasies and fetishes, and so forth that I've really been inspired and branched out into new categories. The Story Idea forum is very helpful in that regard. People post up their ideas, and I'll often come up with my own twist on the idea, that I share. If it's good enough I jot it down on my Ideas doc.
Without you depraved folks, I'd still be doing my happy little MILF stories, coloring in the lines.
Thanks, by the way.

 

[NotWise]

Some of my stories are inspired. Some of them are perspired.

Among those that were inspired, a fair number are from dreams, so that's about as internal as you can get. Others have some external source, and often the way they come out bears no resemblance to the original inspiration.

For the others, I get a general idea of something I want to write ("I want to write a swashbuckling adventure...") and I brainstorm from there.

Some are in between. One of them originated from the scene on a summer day as we drove north over the Mogollon Rim toward Holbrook, Az. That became the setting for the opening, and I brainstormed until I had "Sex and Dinosaurs."

 

[PennameWombat]

Specifically from a Ren Faire? Well, one of my WIPs involves my MCs spending time at one, as well as using a fictionalized version of the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism) and HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts) as backdrops. But I can't say any specific visit provided or provides the material.

Mostly, it's... I can't say. Not because it's a secret, but because I don't rightly know. As others have said, seeing people at a store, on the bus or train, or simply in a park, can trigger thoughts. Many of my stories draw on some specific event, then twist it massively. For example, I did decades ago work for a while at a municipal swimming pool, but absolutely none of the events (other than cleaning up vomit) that I incorporated into Chlorine Dreams actually happened. It's just set at a pool.

This year's Valentine's Day entry was me asking myself "how can I incorporate a real, torn-from-a-body human heart into a Valentine's Day story?" For April Fool's, I had the idea for a breast milk fetish story... (from I cannot describe why, though) but wasn't sure how to hit the contest theme, until I focused on "deception" in the contest description and not "prank."

 

[gunhilltrain]

I was going to flap my gums about the inspirations for The Geek Pride story, which actually had its roots in my childhood. Maybe some other time, or maybe if somebody PMs me and is really curious about a fairly long tale. It is slowly going up in score, and I got a couple of nice comments, so I chalk it up as a win.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I commend you slice of life writers, especially those of you who do it well--some of my favorite work here on Literotica have been exactly what you're describing. Enhanced pieces from the real world, quite beautifully done.

I call mine "urban erotica" with an overlay of "erotic nostalgia" - me being older than you I have examples of both. Enough to get on with, anyway.

But then I'm also quite happy to go back to the fifth century and write my version of the Arthurian legend, and wander off to Titan to write about angels and astronauts. One mustn't place limits on your imagination .

 

[ronde]

I’ve spent my entire day at the Georgia Renaissance Faire after an impromptu invitation… needless to say, I’ve got about a million and one ideas regarding fantasy worlds and characters at this point, and I can’t wait to get home to jot some of them down and start forming plots. It’s been an epic follow up to the Geek Pride event for me.

Do you guys happen to draw inspiration from interesting settings like festivals, fairies or conventions?

Momocon is going down this weekend as well, one of Georgia’s largest anime cons, and I’m honestly tempted to head down there too and see what ideas it might drum up!

I've been to a renaissance Faire a few times and did get a couple story ideas. I'm not much into conventions because most people are acting, not being real people. For real people watching, I prefer to sit on a bench a the local mall and wonder at the people who walk by. I watch what people are wearing, and especially if they have on T-shirts or sweatshirts with wording on them. If you watch carefully, there are a lot of potential stories there.

Walmart is a good place to watch if you're into humor, but there are some sexy women there during the week.

County and State Fairs are also a good place to get ideas. People tend to be relaxed and enjoying themselves, so you can get some idea of their personalities.

I also read a lot, and history of the US and parts of Europe, as well as several wars are some of my favorite reads. I don't write about the actual history usually, but about how I think the people in those situations might have felt and reacted.

 

[HordHolm]

I used to be heavily involved in the European version of the Renaissance Faire (Fayre?) scene, and with only a limited knowledge of the North American version I think I can state that in Europe it's more 'hardcore' (but I must accept it may have changed in recent years). There was a lot of steel weapons fighting (in my case with limited or no armour, so you had to know your stuff, even with blunted weapons), and the real fun started when the sun went down and the tourists went home: there are a lot of very serious drinkers in that scene. But... as I was so deeply involved with it over so many years (20+) it actually hasn't ever featured in anything I've ever written, either here (under a previous pen-name or my current one) or out in the non-kink world. I don't think it ever will: the whole thing stopped being unusual for me and became just a bunch of guys drinking and being political with a small 'p' and telling jokes.

There was sex going on, of course, and I still chuckle when I remember fucking my ex-wife in a tent before the market opened one day. The market was next to the shore on Oslofjord and we were in an A-frame Viking tent, so it was quite big, with room to *ahem* 'move around'. She was on all fours and I was in the 'approved position' behind her, a heartbeat away from penetrating her, when a big, dumb Norwegian tourist, who shouldn't have been there for another hour, stuck his great ruddy (literally) face in between the tent flaps. I got very English, and did my Lady Bracknell impression, "Do you mind?!", and he was out of there like a scalded cat. Despite being amused, I still get mildly indignant about it, even though it happened last century - I mean, the tent was closed, and how would he have like it if I'd just wandered up to his house, opened his door and stuck my head in to take a look? Or perhaps he might have enjoyed it...

I have a multitude of other stories about the whole scene, the individuals, the absurdity, jokes we played on each other and on the tourists.

But as for inspiration, it comes when I least expect it, it's never there if I ask for it, and it usually strikes from a direction I wasn't anticipating. It is both a blessing and a curse.