Writing Fiction - Part Two: What If?
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In Part One I suggested you write a story based in some part on your own experiences. Now I want you to try to take your story in a different direction by using the simple question 'What if?'
My first novel was inspired by a TV documentary on homeless people living underground in a city somewhere. I'm not sure now if it was part of a rail system or something else. In any case what struck me at the time was an image of a young woman with a baby in her arms.
I had a sudden 'What if' moment seeing that child in its mother's arms. What if children were actually raised underground? Hopefully they aren't; hopefully that was only a short term problem for that child. Still the image stayed with me. What if for some reason generations of people spent all their lives underground while other civilizations evolved above ground? What would they be like?
There would have to be something keeping them there of course, so a kind of post apocalyptic world came to mind and my young adult novel, Sanctuary, was written from that 'what if' moment.
The most boring suggestion I made in Part One for your possible story was an ordinary day in your life. Going to work perhaps.
Let's say our protagonist, Martin, leads a boring life. He lives alone; he's in his thirties. Every day he spends twenty minutes on the train to work, where he then sits in a cubicle talking to strangers on the phone, selling insurance. He doesn't talk to the other passengers on the train--they all stare out the windows, careful not to look at each other.
What if one morning he glances at the passenger next to him and notices something odd? It's a cold day but the man is sweating--his upper lip shows beads of moisture--he fiddles with his mobile phone, constantly checking for messages. He feels under his jacket frequently and is clearly very nervous.
Now we have another choice to make--what if Martin is actually a war hero who served in Afghanistan? Perhaps he lost a leg and now leads what we perceive to be a boring life. Is he going to be a hero and approach the man he suspects of being a suicide bomber?
What if he decides to get off the bus at the next stop and save himself and the bus explodes as it turns the corner? How will he live with himself?
Of course your story doesn't need to be that dramatic. What if, instead of the bomber, an old man is next to Martin. What if, in spite of Martin's efforts to ignore the man, he continues to talk and eventually Martin realises he spends all day on trains telling complete strangers how much he misses his wife who died ten years earlier?
The best short stories are those where your protagonist changes in some way--so the main thing to remember is how does the 'what if' experience impact on Martin's life? Perhaps he sees his future in the life of the lonely old man and realises he must make the effort to change his life--perhaps accept next time his co-workers invite him for lunch or perhaps look up an old friend.
Good luck with your own 'what if' moment--I hope you enjoy it.
My short story, Brown Dog, is available as a free ebook at http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/220756 where you'll also find my young adult novel Sanctuary and a short book on English, What Did You Say?
My supernatural horror novel, Inheritance, is available as an ebook or Print on Demand at http://e6518c14hn1ncz8fwe4kjkts2a.hop.clickbank.net/
My supernatural horror novel, Inheritance, is available as an ebook or Print on Demand at http://e6518c14hn1ncz8fwe4kjkts2a.hop.clickbank.net/
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