Authors, how big is your "Ideas" folder?

[Stultus]

On a really good week, I can get 3-4 stories done and finished. Usually I'm lucky to get that many done in a month.

My "Ideas" folder is now over 100 items. My "Pending" folder of stuff that I've already started to work on or have set aside half-done is at nearly 20.

Please tell me that I'm not alone... LOL.

/must scream
//must force myself to get some work done
:/

 

[snoopercharmbrights]

... Please tell me that I'm not alone...

You are not alone. I have, at a quick count, 53 stories in embryonic form, including several novels which are in the 10K+ words range but stalled.

That doesn't include the ideas I have offered (dumped) in here from time to time.

 

[DarkBee]

I have 5 stories in unfinished form and 4 more ideas floating around, waiting to be written, but my actual last poem was posted June 20th, my only submission that year...

 

[sweet_escape]

I have two novels and three short stories half done, with lots of ideas floating around in my mind as well.

Someone can make an offhand remark to me and that's enough to spark another story to life. I just can't get anything finished!

 

[Stultus]

Someone can make an offhand remark to me and that's enough to spark another story to life. I just can't get anything finished!

That's really my biggest problem at the moment. I start working on something and get it maybe half done and then a new idea hits me. I go "Ooooo, shiney!" and play with the new idea for awhile. Rinse, repeat ad nausium.

 

[Flashlight7.5]

Never out of ideas

I have several folders and ten journals full of story ideas, both erotic and non-erotic.

 

[RicoLouis]

I don't have a folder per say. Maybe I should. But i would say I have well over a hundred idea's running around in my head at any given time. Many I wouldn't write myself but I think would make a good story. Maybe someone should start a story idea grave yard for dead story idea's.

 

[Sean Renaud]

A few hundred. I try to dump them on the net from time to time or on my writer friends. Anything that I've been unable to move for more than six months simply isn't going to happen and maybe just maybe it's not for me to write.

 

[rydia57]

Hmmm,

Last time I looked about 37 in just ideas folder, but I have 12 that are enroute to being finished, and four that are finished. Sometimes I just decide the story is too weird for posting online and keep them to read over.... and over. I've dumped a couple here that went untouched, but I still wanna see them done. Go figure. I'm jsut a procrastinator. Welcome to Lit, Stultus, hope you enjoy your stay.

 

[mythtrav16]

I'm working on 4 different stories at the moment, and I probably have six or so other serious ideas floating around. I don't like to start new projects while working on others as I like to finish what I start and don't like letting myself get distracted. Nonetheless, as I've said, I'm writing 4 stories at once at the moment (one I haven't touched since last year ). On top of that, I'm also writing out a hot sex scene that I'll never be able to post anywhere because it's from a movie. Ever since I saw it, I've found myself obsessed with it, but i don't know why. I'm hoping that writing it out will purge the demon from my mind and trap it in MS Word.

You guys with dozens of ideas are putting me to shame!

 

[RodSamson42]

I try so hard to focus on one idea at a time, but it's hard when my brain feels programmed to think "sex". I'm currently working on a story and I've been so busy doing other, unrelated, stuff that I haven't had time to finish. However, during that down time, I've had at least twenty different ideas come up that I immediately want to attempt. Some are stupid and would probably only be interesting to me, but others seem really Lit worthy. I'm amazed that some of you can finish multiple stories in a week, but I'm sure that's just a time issue on my part. I wish I had more time to write---the quality of my stories would probably improve.

 

[PurpleTiara]

I have all of these size jokes going on in my head now... How big do you need it to be? It is the quality, not the quantity. It is not how big it is, it is what you do with it. And so on...

So anyway, my ideas folder is actually pretty small. It has probably 10-15 fairly complete ideas, and then a smaller file that is just small, one off things that will probably be combined with other stuff. They are more like details, or window dressing than ideas.

Once I start a story, I move the file to a "working" folder. I do this because I too, have the attention span of a kitten on speed. "OOoooOOOOoooOOO SHINEY"! happens to me a lot. If I leave the started story in the "ideas" folder, I will start wandering through, tweaking here and poking there and then I am off on a whole 'nother story. I have about 5 stories (one has just passed novella size and is still going. Will probably be a novel.) going right now.

I also have a file of stories that are completed drafts to look at later. I do better if I let them wait a bit before reworking it. There are three Nano's and a bunch of short stories in it.

 

[sunandshadow]

It's hard to count my ideas because they tend to blure together: A is halfway similar to B is halfway similar to C, and I'm not sure whether D would be better with plot A or plot B, and E is really C done with a three gendered race instead of the one-gender race which switches from male to female at age 30...

 

[JRaven]

Sheesh!
I have no idea how many. Many ideas are just super quick ideas that I write in Notepad and save. Probably about 100, scattered around different folders, different thumb drives, different PCs... Occasionally, the first paragraph or two are idea, but then I start writing it more in depth. But then it stalls and nothing happens. Or, I realize I'm only jotting down an idea and go back to the story I was working on before the brain storm. (usually just a slight drizzle)

I had started a novel when I realized I needed more practice writing and joined Literotica. That was a long time ago. (I don't remember. Check my join date by my avatar)

I have another novel about half finished when I realized I omitted a very important trait concerning the antagonist. I need to start over at the beginning. Will I?

I have a completely written story back from the editor more than a year ago. I still haven't finished writing up the editor's suggested changes. Mostly because I hate the ending (which was my own).


Jenny

 

[davion2308]

I know

I have maybe 15-20 stories that are floating around out there. I'll outline, draft a little, then lose some of the enthusiasm. I have three stories that are really getting worked over (innuendo intended) right now and I feel like I should be working harder to get these out.

I'll go on a run of typing, then walk away.

I'm working on bringing that number of incompleted works down.

 

[Stultus]

Glad to see that I'm not the only one.

One useful thing about having an ideas folder is that sometimes I think of only half of the idea, like how a story should start, or an interesting main character I'd like to explore... but no clear notion of the motivation or the ending. Then all of sudden a year later I'll see a news story or read a snarky comment on FARK, or somewhere, and the whole complete story pops into focus.

I've had one partial idea sitting in limbo since 2003... but just the other day I figured out how to get around a plot problem that had kept it grounded!

 

[AceStroker]

Wow when I saw this title I saw "How big is your" and just had to click on it.

I've got tons of ideas, tons of half finished stories, tons of finished stories that need to be proofread, reproof read and heavily modified. Ideas come constantly throughout the day, so I rarely jot them down unless they really stick in my head for a bit and begin to grow on their own.

 

[SweetDreamStories]

I am now up to 9 MS Works (size 10 font) pages full of story ideas. I'm talking titles and scenarios.

 

[IrezumiKiss]

My computer desktop is littered with my "ideas." Pictures, clippings, notes, stories, graphics and art, all partially and half-finished and strewn about because if I put them away in a folder I might forget about them. I don't even know why I bother having a wallpaper, 'cuz chaos theory rules on my iMac.

Most of the time I am getting something new out of my brain and I'll mine or cannibalize stuff from the unfinished piles, kinda like picking off the extra cheese and fallen pepperoni bits from a pizza box onto your slice. But it's hard for me to see things straight to finish because I am constantly being influenced and always on the lookout for inspiration. Two months ago, I sketched out a story to completion, but it all started by my looking at my bartender's ass peaking out from her lowrider jeans when she bent over to get some bottles of booze. I kept thinking, "I need to do something with that," and started jotting down ideas immediately. Things like that are an eternal occurrence in my brain. Outside of the thinking about sex all time.