I'm stuck and I haven't started yet.

[jaF0]

I have the basic concept (family that plays), but I can't get the opening to seem realistic or believable. The intent is to start off as sort of a surprise shocker and then build, backfill and expand.

But nothing I've come up with seems anywhere near plausible.

Guy finds something in an area controlled by one family member that he knows belongs to another family member .... but HOW does he know? How does he explain it? That he's a complete and total perv? Does he give away a secret, possibly betraying the second member in hopes it won't sound as bad as he thinks it does?

 

[TadOverdon]

When I'm stuck I just try to start writing something.

Often enough I have problems with the opening paragraph of a book or a chapter. But I'll have pretty clear images, as you seem to, of what follows. So I start writing some of what follows. And the problem with the opening generally solves itself after a while, either while I'll filling in some description or backstory, or later while I'm rinsing dishes after dinner or driving to the car wash.

I don't know why this works for me. Maybe trying to write a later part makes my mind better identify where the "missing pieces' were in the opening.

Sometimes I just accept that the first version of my opening is going to be bad, write it and keep on going. It turns out later that the "right version" of those sentences and images pop up in my thoughts as if they were obvious. Which, in retrospect, they were.

The unconscious psychological aspect of writing is part of what makes it such an interesting thing to do.

But one just has to be absolutely willing to throw out writing that one has spent a lot of labor on when one recognizes what it was supposed to be, instead.

 

[AlinaX]

For me it started the day I discovered my sister's dildo buried beneath my mother's underwear. There like a pea beneath a hundred matresses, or in this case a plastic penis beneath a dozen layers of neatly packed and variously coloured lace, lay the offending member whose contours I was intimately familiar with...

 

[jaF0]

I'm leaning towards sort of a double twist ... it isn't the secret he thought it was. If fact, the thing was planted for him to find and create the situation.

 

[MelissaBaby]

No rule says you have to start writing the story at the beginning.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Write something else. You can't write a story that doesn't want to be written. Mind you, it's easy for me to say that, because I'm a pantser writer and usually have no idea where a story will go once I start.

 

[jaF0]

It's starting to feel like this poor sap has stumbled into the middle of a story everybody knew but him.

 

[ericrodman101]

It's starting to feel like this poor sap has stumbled into the middle of a story everybody knew but him.

Then write it from the point of view of the unreliable narrator. He is naive or stupid or distracted, he finds stuff, observes things, describes them to the reader, but has no idea what's going on. The reader and all the other characters do, but he's still to work it out.

 

[SimonDoom]

My way of approaching this is to ask of myself, What's the most erotic thing about this story to me? What turns me on the most? Distill the story to its erotic essence. Build everything -- characters, scene, plot points -- around that.

I can't tell from the scant information you've given what turns you on most about this concept. What its essence is. Nobody can answer that for you. Figure that out and build the story around that. If you keep your focus on that it may be easier to construct the story.

 

[jaF0]

^^ That's the angle. The kink and how to make the story work around it.


Taking a stab at it, but I've got a point of view issue. I switch from first to third and back to first. It works OK, but I'd like to highlight the third a bit if possible. In all the formatting question threads did we decide Indent doesn't work?

 

[ElectricBlue]

^^ That's the angle. The kink and how to make the story work around it.

Taking a stab at it, but I've got a point of view issue. I switch from first to third and back to first. It works OK, but I'd like to highlight the third a bit if possible. In all the formatting question threads did we decide Indent doesn't work?

Why not write it all in third person, and use the narrative voice to zoom into the character you're writing in first?

 

[AlphaLyon]

First thing that came to mind was the plot of "Ready or Not", where an outsider marries in to a family, and on their wedding night, has to play what turns out to be a murderous game of Hide-and-go-seek. The story actually has several plot twists, but maybe think about constructing your story like that, through the eyes of a "normal" outsider who has been brought in to this "strange" dynamic which isn't strange to those already established there.

I think you're getting a little too carried away in having multiple twists. Just start with one really good one, and build upon it. I'm a plotter, not a pantser, so I know EXACTLY how frustrating it can be when certain square elements won't fit in your round narrative.

 

[jaF0]

1700 words in, it's trying to take shape. Mostly first person, except for that narrated section which could be changed to first, I guess.

Not really that many twists. I don't really do twists well. Just trying to get the shock/kink out there for the hook.

The character is an insider who is really the outsider, who is being filled in on the guts of the story as he goes. Kind of naive that this all happened while he was right there and is not being brought into the loop in way he doesn't realize yet.

 

[jaF0]

Pants out 3500 words. Might read it once more to try to catch errors. Caught a few last time like 'sensing' instead of 'sending'.


It's fast moving, but I don't like too much filler. Probably chapter one. If I get to two or three, they might be more kinky.


I don't pretend to be a writer. These are not novel worthy types of things. These are LitStuff.

 

[jaF0]

Two days, six parts, roughly 3000 words each. One part in the middle missing, one part that needs work.

All crap. Not a single word that is realistically believable.

 

[SimonDoom]

Sorry you are having some difficulty. I have no idea if this is helpful but here are a couple of ideas:

1. Keep thinking to yourself what's the erotic focus of the story. I think this is helpful. It sounds like your story covers a lot of erotic ground, which would be a challenge for any writer, but it might help if you try to figure out what is the one thing above all you want to get across erotically with the story, and always keep that in mind. That's what I do.

2. Don't worry too much about realism, and instead focus on the characters -- what they do, why they do it, what obstacles they have. If the readers care about your characters they will forgive you for some of the implausible things that happen.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I recently looked at my old computer, and I found about ten stories and a couple of essays that I had started and never finished. Many of them are three years old now. I have to look through them to see if any are worth restarting.

I also have some series - I think three - on this computer that got stuck around the second or third chapters. Those can be more difficult to complete than stand-alone stories.