Brainstorming

Enough!

I've spent a week posting blogs about the random things that fight each other for prominence and screen time. It's been good for the creative juices and other nonexistent hormones, but I love to write fiction. It's my greatest aspiration. I don't want to write a 300+ page book about my feelings toward belly button lint and the clouds' thoughts and feelings (Note to self: Future blogs?). I want to write stories about people who don't exist doing things that will never be done whose stories can affect real people who will do real things. So, at the behest of a very right friend who read the blog and made a suggestion, I will post some fiction on here.

The plan is to write a full-length short story (probably three to fifteen pages) and post it serially on the blog. Every day I'll post a different section of the story, thereby forcing me to do the sort of writing that is the ultimate goal of this. Needless to say, I am quite excited.

But how to do it? Months layered upon months of frustrated writer's blog can't be broken overnight. I'm not a very good brainstormer, but I've heard it helps other people, and we're all basically part of the same gigantic neural network, right? So here goes. This brainstorming thing.

The Idea

A surprisingly fast idea has occurred to me with this story. I've always wanted to do a good, old-fashioned crime caper. Jewel heists, that kind of thing. That's it: Crime Caper.

The Setting

Some city. Nondescript. In fact, let's make one up. Monutropolis. Sounds big and important. "The streets of Monutropolis are alive with traffic, regardless of which end of 24 hours you find it in." That sounds about right.

The Characters

Ummm...somebody basically my age...ish. A dude. Always easier to write your own gender. Poor. Then there's some reason for him to be involved in a jewel heist. But he has to be basically a good guy--easier to root for. He gets in with the wrong people. The "wrong people" can be a group of hapless Reservoir Dogs wannabes about to do the biggest job of their lives. (Their previous biggest should be something not horribly daring, like stealing all the candy in a 7/11 or something.)

The Plot

This is where I draw a line. I like the idea of posting my brainstorming process on here, but really, I'd like to keep the real plot details to myself until they're all posted on here. It will involve kidnap, priceless possessions, probably some sort of twist ending and lots of discreet trench coats and fedoras.

Oh, and cliffhangers! Lots of cliffhangers!

Well, there we go. My next blog post will be the first part of the story. I hope you'll hang in there with me, as I haven't ever written a short story in a serialized format and, more hazardously, this is basically me grabbing Writer's Block around its slippery neck and squeezing as hard as I can, aiming to pop the little bastard's head clean off. I know the image is violent, but it's okay--I'll make it quick and mostly painless.