Where Writers get their Ideas: Bookstore Edition

I’ve written before about Where Writers get their Ideas. But getting ideas in the bookstore? This type of idea generation is a whole new bakery of ideas to explore. Working at a bookstore, I am exposed to books almost all the time.

I go through catalogues of new-and-upcoming publications and am often struck by the urge to write my own work. It’s an extremely clearheaded moment where I am totally ready to dive into my world of words and just get lost. And, of course, I am at work, on the clock, getting asked questions, and the feeling flees like I hadn’t gripped the thread at all.

But I love the feeling.

Sometimes, it’s the covers. Seeing so many covers, I get an itch, wanting one of my own. Sometimes it’s one cover to a page. Other times, It’s FIFTEEN covers on a page and I lose myself to a preview less than an square inch, story-thinking.

Other times, it’s a title or a line here or there in the description that just sparks my imagination and I want to run with it. Like, last week, I saw a title with a blanked out cover: Life Uploaded: A Novel[image error]. I immediately began to think about consciousness being uploaded to the internet and subsequent experiences. I realized the book was by a teen vlogger and was left diappointed that I couldn’t read what I thought it was based on the evocative title alone…but also inspired to write it instead.

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My favourite are the times I read a title wrong. Like when I saw this book.

It’s a classic German short story collection…and I read it as “Ghosts, and Other Girlfriends” and promptly started to frame a supernatural romance story that also dabbled in critical queer theory.

Have you ever gone to bookstores to get your ideas? Did you end up with more ideas or just more books to read and an emptier wallet?

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