You know the most difficult part in creating a story? The idea may be sound, but the practical difficulties of bringing it into a descent-length narrative can be downright impossible, regardless of the chosen genre.
Take this scenario: you are someone who doesn't like the Superhero comic or film genre that much, but you've created a wonderful concept around a masked vigilante who you think you can fit into sci-fi genre and keep as your own work. But something goes wrong. At whatever point, you look forward or back and see that it doesn't quite work. The problem is that the premise has been greedily taken by the comic creators of this world, and worked to such a degree that trying to do something with those elements results in it becoming part of that genre. This has happened to me.
I'm not discarding this project entirely, but it can't continue in its current form. It's a neat idea, and the world I've created for it is well-worth preserving, but the things I was trying to do are too like those from a genre that I don't like. It's like trying to plant a bush you like into soil that won't take it. You either need to find a new place for the plant, or it will die and need to be replaced with something suited to its conditions. In my case, I've rescued what still lived of the plant and put it in a safe place for later reference. Quite sure this kind of thing has happened more than once to every single author who has ever lived.
For something else in a similar vein, I would recommend this article on how to bring old failed story ideas back to life. Personally, I didn't find it as helpful as I might as I have my own concepts on the matter, but anyone else might find it useful.
No comments:
Post a Comment