What does your Story Idea list look like?

[geronimo_appleby]

Whatever system you try, make sure it's expandable.

When I wrote my first story here, I never dreamed I'd write as many as I have. The process can be addictive. So something like naming files by the title of the story would never have worked for me once I got past about ten stories.

i use a label of month and year. imperfect for several reasons. and my 'abandoned' file is huge!

 

[Dunes_et_Soleil]

I use a piece of software called Scrivener, which I really like.
I only started posting here very recently, but I've been writing fiction and poetry for years using it.
I keep one file called "Story Ideas" that has a list of ideas that I want to write eventually. Each one has a working title and some notes about what I want to cover in the story. It has folders where I can drop notes, research, outline ideas, pictures, links, inspiration, etc. It's like a story binder.
As I get ideas, I add comments to the story idea card.

Here's what that looks like:

https://imgur.com/a/ld47Dgj

Then, when I feel like I've got enough to flesh out a real story, I take everything I've accumulated in the draft and move it over to its own document to get fleshed out and finalized.

Here's what that looks like:

https://imgur.com/a/ROc9S6u

I use a short story format, which also has folders for research, scenes, characters, etc. I love doing character profiles before I write because I can get that character's motivations down. maybe add some quotes. Flesh out their personality before I write them. It's got alot of great features for writers that I really like. On export, it can be turned into nearly any format. Wanna double space, do it on export. Wanna change -- into emdashes? No problem.

Character profile:

https://imgur.com/a/uzXUOn6

I write stream of consciousness and then go back and edit, so I love being able to just write an outline and get my thoughts down and then go back later. This helps me do that and to visualize the entire story from one place. After I write 10k words, I forget some dialogue, but I remember what scene it took place in. I look up the scene and bam - i'm right back into it.

Thanks for sharing this, I have a similar process but I use a spreadsheet in OpenOffice. Needless to say that this seems like a much better solution!

 

[ElectricBlue]

Why not? That's the beauty of inspiration, it has no rules. I can put a story aside and continue it months and years later. There is no contradiction. If an idea for a new story/scene suddenly pops up, it's a crime to ignore it.
On the other hand, I can't understand people who just sit and force themselves to type. I understand some have mouths to feed, but it's still a crime against the creative process.

Well, I agree with you wrt your second para, but if a story idea was once a turkey, I'd suggest in 99 times out of a 100, it's always going to be one.

People seem to have this notion that it will suddenly get better. I'm realistic, I recognise when I've written garbage, and it's deleted, put out in the trash. I think I've got maybe three or four story drafts that are more than a year old, and that's only because I couldn't be bothered finding them, to delete.

 

[KelvinBlack]

I use a piece of software called Scrivener, which I really like.

Me too. The only difference I can see is that all my erotica is held within the one file, separated within the Scrivener binder into categories. I sometimes don't go into too much detail for my character notes, but will certainly have a photo of each one at least.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Well, all I see is a common theme of a whole bunch of unfinished stories, some of which, authors admit, have been that way for years.

If you weren't inspired to finish it then, why all of a sudden do you think it's going to get legs tomorrow? That makes no sense to me. Kill your turkeys, don't wait for Thanksgiving.

Well a story ideas file isn't about unfinished stories, it's about unstarted stories (although the thread has drifted back into partial drafts as well). The idea I had yesterday is conservatively a 20k story and there's no way I'm starting to actually write it because I'm currently trying to finish another 20k story thats currently about 1/3 of the way through (and that was an indulgence as I'm supposed to be working on the novel). Still, enough of the ideas were intriguing to me that they were worth noting down. The truth is that ideas (good or bad) tend to come far faster than they can be realized in prose.

 

[DarkSollat]

I keep a list in my mind only. But honestly there's a little planning at all - I just write when I feel like it, and what I feel like.

 

[SimonDoom]

I've gotten to the age where I realize writing systems are like diets and exercise plans: the best one is the one you actually use.

I never write anything on a phone. Ever. The thought of doing so is unpleasant to me, because I need glasses to see the small screen and my fingers stumble over the little keys. I like leaning back in my ergonomically adjusted chair with a keyboard and large monitor in front of me when I write.

I've used Word and Excel for over 30 years. I have no doubt that their manifold flaws could be explained to me, and the case made that some other system is better, but to the extent it would require even an incremental investment of time to get up to speed on the new thing, I'm not interested.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I've gotten to the age where I realize writing systems are like diets and exercise plans: the best one is the one you actually use.

I never write anything on a phone. Ever. The thought of doing so is unpleasant to me, because I need glasses to see the small screen and my fingers stumble over the little keys. I like leaning back in my ergonomically adjusted chair with a keyboard and large monitor in front of me when I write.

I've used Word and Excel for over 30 years. I have no doubt that their manifold flaws could be explained to me, and the case made that some other system is better, but to the extent it would require even an incremental investment of time to get up to speed on the new thing, I'm not interested.

Agree the best one is the one you actually use.

So in contrast, I write and do everything on my phone, typing at near touch-typing speed with my thumbs, generally in bed, or standing in queues, or while on hold on the phone. Currently lying down on a pile of pillows under a cosy duvet.

I use WriterPad, a free app that lets me have many text documents, one of which is entitled Plotbunnies and has a bunch of headings with some text under.

Once any bunny gets to being a couple paragraphs, it gets its own file. About 10k words per file works fine.

Then I email the text to myself, play with it in LibreOffice on the desktop to make all the formatting work, and post it by copy&paste.

 

[Vivid_Astronomer]

Me too. The only difference I can see is that all my erotica is held within the one file, separated within the Scrivener binder into categories. I sometimes don't go into too much detail for my character notes, but will certainly have a photo of each one at least.

Kelvin the only reason I don’t put everything in one file is I’m always afraid if something happens then it’s gone. With computers and backups these days I know it’s super rare and not likely to happen. It’s probably just me being overly safe.

But your way certainly makes it easier to access everything in one place.

 

[Vivid_Astronomer]

Well a story ideas file isn't about unfinished stories, it's about unstarted stories (although the thread has drifted back into partial drafts as well). The idea I had yesterday is conservatively a 20k story and there's no way I'm starting to actually write it because I'm currently trying to finish another 20k story thats currently about 1/3 of the way through (and that was an indulgence as I'm supposed to be working on the novel). Still, enough of the ideas were intriguing to me that they were worth noting down. The truth is that ideas (good or bad) tend to come far faster than they can be realized in prose.

Yeah this is how they come to me. I might have a convo with someone or hear a story I want to put an erotic spin to so I capture the idea and move on with my day until I have time to think about it more.

My only issue is they I write all day in my job and sometimes when I get home it’s the last thing I wanna do.

 

[oggbashan]

Story ideas? I don't record or catalogue them. I have several hundred a week.

Part written stories? They vary from a few hundred words to a few thousand, all as Word files. Now there are about forty. I try to aim to have no more than 20, but the Muses are insistent bitches.

 

[rosebudliquor]

Anything that isn't for Literotica gets a document on Google Drive as soon as it is even a sentence. Some Literotica stuff does too. I started writing the ongoing Candy episodes years before I first posted here & have a half-dozen waiting in my head.
Ideas for Literotica stories that I expect to be brief stand-alones get a file right here. I just finished writing one that got to be around 10k words, not as brief as I expected, and possibly the first of several in a series.
There are only two other ideas pending right now, and one of them might fit as a turkey deserving of killing asap. It's an egg for a take-off on 'The Gift of the Magi' that's been incubating for two Christmases now.
I write slowly and not often enough or for long enough.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Can you please explain to me why almost every person of color feels the need to indicate the amount of melanin in their body in their pen name? Is this what defines you? Should I add Jew to mine? Should everyone add yellow, white, or brown to theirs? what the hell is this? It's almost self-serving racism and quite annoying.

Maybe it's the guy's surname. Did you think of that?

 

[ElectricBlue]

Why didn't I think of that myself? It makes perfect sense, just like my last name is Lan and yours is Blue. You were born in 1966 and I was born with Jesus... wait! Is it zero B.C. or zero A.D.?

Wrong on the birth year, and the EB came from another website unrelated to this one.

Annoyingly, EB no number is an existing account name here on Lit, but the bastard has zero activity, nothing at all. Shouldn't be allowed.

 

[ofbuttons]

I am trying to work out if the premise of this sidebar is that no white people (or anyone of any ethnicity) can have or choose to have the extremely common last name of 'Black' without it having to do with race. Seems patently ridiculous, so hopefully not.

I don't have story idea lists, just lists of stories. Ideas are cheap, you can get 'em anywhere. (And also, if I make a list of anything, I will procrastinate on it.)

 

[KelvinBlack]

Can you please explain to me why almost every person of color feels the need to indicate the amount of melanin in their body in their pen name?

No idea. In my own case, it's just a name, and not a real one at that. I'm generally pinkish all over, but my arms go a bit brown when the sun comes out...

 

[soflabbwlvr]

I have a word file with 100-140 ideas cataloged in serial order. Each one is numbered and contains a brief description -- anywhere from a sentence to a page or more of notes, sometimes a title or list of characters, depending on how well developed it is. I am constantly adding to it, but there is no method to how and when items come off it. Sometimes I pull an idea from the list and get started, sometimes it is the newest thing that popped into my head.

 

[davion2308]

I have five pages of Penzu documents that are either just spitballed ideas, halfway finished stories, crap, and lists of thoughts and ideas.

It's a mess and 2023 means I'm going to clean it up and get some of these things out there for public consumption*

*Maybe

 

[RoperTrace]

Simple enough question. I'm not asking about how many stories are on it necessarily, but how do you keep track of ideas? One file on your computer (text, word, excel)? A folder full of synopsis? A battered notebook under your pillow? How far do you raise a plot bunny before you put it into the deep freeze or into the pot (ok, unpleasant metaphor...sorry)?

Im in the process of moving a Word list with everything on one big table into an Excel spreadsheet - I usually try to think of somewhat witty title even as a place-holder and then have the probable catagory its going to go in and a one-line reminder of what its about. I've ended up with about 100 different story ideas in it, where a couple are just a title, most are a key concept that needs development and maybe 15 or so are ready to write or actually being written. I've also got a folder with about 10 word documents for more substantial plot outlines.

Hey TRC, I should apologize to you as I just put up a very similar thread as yours? I hadn't seen it earlier or would have just added my comment here. I have somewhere around 14-16 story ideas in a Word file. I usually write a synopsis on each one, some only a sentence or two, and a few have a rather lengthy description. Two on my list have been published, one only a week ago, but I'm working on part 02 currently. All of mine, are my own creation, but I have written two of mine at the request of online friends. The one online friend eventually became a friend IRL. My most-read story was loosely formed from the request of an online schoolteacher acquaintance. I never got much of a reaction from her, other than she wanted me to make it more violent, even a snuff story. I told her upfront I won't do that. That story has about 313K views, and one of my higher comments scores.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Hey TRC, I should apologize to you as I just put up a very similar thread as yours? I hadn't seen it earlier or would have just added my comment here. I have somewhere around 14-16 story ideas in a Word file. I usually write a synopsis on each one, some only a sentence or two, and a few have a rather lengthy description. Two on my list have been published, one only a week ago, but I'm working on part 02 currently. All of mine, are my own creation, but I have written two of mine at the request of online friends. The one online friend eventually became a friend IRL. My most-read story was loosely formed from the request of an online schoolteacher acquaintance. I never got much of a reaction from her, other than she wanted me to make it more violent, even a snuff story. I told her upfront I won't do that. That story has about 313K views, and one of my higher comments scores.

Its okay. Your question was more about how many whereas mine was about how people actually keep track of them, so the threads are complementary rather than the same.

 

[KeithD]

Whatever I write down by hand, I can't decipher ten minutes later.

 

[KeithD]

I have essential tremors. The whiskey might actually calm my hand down.

 

[Dunes_et_Soleil]

Mine is short, just like my .. uhmm ... temper

 

[theWollstonecraftWoman]

I have picture perfect penmanship and a calligraphers fair for celebrated hand written invitations. Yeah, I'm bragging.

 

[Rob_Royale]

I have a note app on my phone and an MSWord doc. with my ideas on them. It works.