Notes from the Nightstand

When I’m struggling with a plot issue, the solution always comes to me when I’m in the shower or half-asleep.  This is, as you can imagine, inopportune.  My husband gets tired of running to the bathroom so he can take a note about blowing up a car the “right” way while I’m rinsing conditioner out of my hair.  But until he relents on my plan to put a dry erase board by the shower door, he’s stuck.

As for the half-asleep, half-waking ideas, I keep a notebook and pen in my nightstand and scribble down some note to remind myself of my brilliance(ish) when I wake up.  Unfortunately, between my personal shorthand and penmanship that was forever ruined by a journalism career, these notes can come across as somewhat sinister.

For example, last night, I had an idea for a story I’m working on.  I need my male character to have a genuinely disturbing reason for avoiding his werewolf pack.  So I came up with a backstory and wrote, “SHE HAS TO DIE.”   It was enough of a hint that “6 a.m. Molly” would be able to interpret it.

I rolled over, found what looked to be a very threatening note in my serial killer scrawl, and then threw it away. That’s the sort of thing that disturbs my family.

But the system is hit or miss. A few weeks ago, I found an old note that said, “NO MORE NANA.’”  I didn’t even know what book this was for. Was I planning to kill off a grandmother character? Is one of my characters allergic to bananas?

And yes, it would make more sense to keep a voice recorder handy, but that would mean suddenly murmuring things like, “Kill the wife in flashback” or “Fifth chapter sex scene” in a dark room while my husband sleeps.   And that seems wrong somehow.

So, my fellow writers, when do your “plot fixes” come to you?  What tricks do you use to preserve your good ideas?  And to our readers, have you ever found a note you wrote yourself and had no clue what it meant?

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