Plot Bunnies

[R.]

In the same way that dust bunnies collect under the bed, plot bunnies accumulate unbidden into my brain then escape at embarrassing moments.

I have been trying to do the day job this week, which has involved concentrating hard on some complex software.

So what happens? My mind is full of images of this young woman, dressed in brown, making her way across central Asia to find a building which is part monastery, part fort. There she is determined to offer herself as a sacrifice in exchange for the freedom of a great spiritual leader.

Why? Who the seven bells is she? How did she get into my brain when I wasn't looking? All I know is that if I don't tell her story she'll be very cross with me.

So am I alone? Or does anyone else suddenly find they have been struck down with a story that they simply must tell?

[Heidi]

I can completely sympathize. During my last launch for an urban fantasy Horror, I was way behind schedule and trying to get layout and the tour scheduled and planned, so I had absolutely NO TIME to write. Then along comes Isabelle, demanding that I tell her ROMANCE! I DON'T WRITE ROMANCE! But she's pretty insistent, and so I am working on her story on the side becuase I've already promised my fans 4 other stories in three different series.

If I don't give Isabelle her time at least every couple of weeks, she gets super pouty and annoying though. This is why I don't do romance...

[L.C.]

I can definitely relate to this. I'll be in class and a subject that interests or concerns me might come up and then I think "What if I write a book about this?" I have already started way too many projects now that my trilogy is done with and I'm trying to figure out which one I should focus on. All these characters are trying to lay claim on my attention but I can't let them! I'm in college, I need to be studying!

[Dan]

This is why I always have a notebook (or two) on me, no matter what. Hell, I even have a waterproof notepad (Aquanotes) that I take in the shower with me. You just never knew when inspiration's going to strike!

[Chris]

I do this, but by the time they reach the page they're nothing like my original idea was, so I can use them all over again.

[Jane]

The ones that mess me up worst are the ones that wake me up at four o'clock in the morning

[Isaac]

Dan wrote: "This is why I always have a notebook (or two) on me, no matter what. Hell, I even have a waterproof notepad (Aquanotes) that I take in the shower with me. You just never knew when inspiration's goi..."

I should invest in one of those! My plot bunnies always come out in the shower and more than once I've had to hop out to scribble something down on a piece of paper.

[Dan]

Isaac wrote: "Dan wrote: "This is why I always have a notebook (or two) on me, no matter what. Hell, I even have a waterproof notepad (Aquanotes) that I take in the shower with me. You just never knew when inspi..."

They're really great! A friend of mine bought them for me for my birthday a couple of years ago after she and I discussed the perils of shower-linked creative bursts. I used them up pretty quickly.

[Abby]

R. wrote: "In the same way that dust bunnies collect under the bed, plot bunnies accumulate unbidden into my brain then escape at embarrassing moments.

I have been trying to do the day job this week, which h..."

How funny, and that sounds like a plot to me! Is the guy working on the software psychic? Did someone send it to his computer? And does the woman know someone is on to her plot?

I like the term dust bunnies. And yes, I have quite a few, too!

[Dwayne, Head of Lettuce]

Happens all the time. I don't write any new ideas down. I already have many projects going so any brand new ideas can certainly wait. If I forget about it months later, it was probably not a great idea anyway. But, if I am still thinking of it months later and it's developing with characters fleshing out, plot lines forming, and especially if it's merging with some other simmering idea, I will write a quick rough draft and let that simmer a while.

[Melissa]

Jane wrote: "The ones that mess me up worst are the ones that wake me up at four o'clock in the morning"

I have a somewhat similar problem. I'm all ready for bed, about to go to sleep, when my brain decides that now is a good time to start working on that new story idea. I'm generally a night owl, but my plot bunnies, it seems, are insomniacs :P.

[Christina]

Dan wrote: "This is why I always have a notebook (or two) on me, no matter what. Hell, I even have a waterproof notepad (Aquanotes) that I take in the shower with me. You just never knew when inspiration's goi..."

They started following me on Twitter few years ago and I was like, OMG! That's brilliant! But then I realized the reason my best inspiration happens in the car or shower is *because* I'm without the tools to properly capture my "brilliance."

[Christina]

Back when I was writing the final book in my first series, I kept getting this idea about a YA book based on all the YA tropes and it wouldn't go away. It didn't matter that I was on the verge of find using a series, something I'd never done before, this book wanted out. I don't think I've written anything quite as fast since.

[Anna]

My plot bunnies are made to sit in an orderly queue.

I listen to those who find queuing hard to bear and I scribble down what they say and stick it in a file.

But I haven't had one quite like you, R.

[R.]

This is still ongoing. The story is slowly morphing all the time, and may end up as a romance between her and the person she came to save. This of course means that their meeting must come early, and the journey must be a flashback.

Also more of it is about sex now. Oh dear...

[R.]

Anna Faversham wrote: "My plot bunnies are made to sit in an orderly queue.

I listen to those who find queuing hard to bear and I scribble down what they say and stick it in a file.

But I haven't had one quite like you..."

That's the way mine happen. Years ago I was walking through Ocean Park in Hong Kong. When I looked into the sturgeon tank for a moment I saw a blonde woman wearing pyjamas, with her hands tied. By the time I got to the sea lions I had a complete novel plot, which I typed out from memory as that year's Nano.

[Christina]

So I'm in the middle of writing a trilogy and went out for a walk earlier so I could clear my mind and maybe get some inspiration...

Yeah... Inspiration... I got tons of it...

For a whole different book. -_-

[Lyra]

Christina wrote: "So I'm in the middle of writing a trilogy and went out for a walk earlier so I could clear my mind and maybe get some inspiration...

Yeah... Inspiration... I got tons of it...

For a whole differe..."

The Muse works in mysterious ways.

(My phone wanted that to be murderous ways... Which can be true as well. Lol)


I too got an idea for a brand new story today! It must be in the air!

[Dan]

Christina wrote: "So I'm in the middle of writing a trilogy and went out for a walk earlier so I could clear my mind and maybe get some inspiration...

Yeah... Inspiration... I got tons of it...

For a whole differe..."

I am in the same boat right now. I released the first novel in the three-book arc I've been working on in February, and when I was about six chapters into earnest writing on the sequel, my brain went "Wait, buddy. Do this first..." and now I've nearly completed a second, full-length novel, but it isn't the sequel. It's a prequel.

Brains are jerks is I guess what I'm getting at.

[Janet]

You know some times I feel schizo. When I drive my characters start arguing in the back seat, and I'm by my self. Its weird because the characters are in two different novels I wrote 3 years ago.

Being an author can be dangerous!

[Christina]

The muse works in mysterious/murderous ways.

Brains are jerks.

Being an author is dangerous.


These all need to be on motivational posters.

[R.]

Janet wrote: "You know some times I feel schizo. When I drive my characters start arguing in the back seat, and I'm by my self. Its weird because the characters are in two different novels I wrote 3 years ago.

..."

I suffer from the regiment of monstrous women. Over the years I've created a lot of female lead characters for whom feistiness can run to firearms, and in extreme cases nuclear weapons. The trouble is what happens when they get together. There's Jane herself (two spaceships written off in half an hour), Naomi (carries potassium cyanide in her pocket), Jojo (use someone else's gun, then they get executed for the murder) and Regina (if you can't stop a spaceship any other way then ram it with the shuttle.)

Get that lot holding a union meeting in your brain and there is trouble.

[Jane]

I have currently one WIP with betas. Eight stories waiting for my next collection. And - drum roll - thirteen started, half-finished, partway done books. Is it any wonder I'm a basket case. Every time I turn the tablet on I have all these voices shouting me, me, me. And then I woke up this morning with a Whole novella in my head.

*beats head against wall*

[Wanda]

Yes, I do! I should really start writing them down so that I have some coherence to them. Glad to know I'm not alone in this. When I try to explain to my friends and family that I start writing and the characters take me where they want to go, they look at me like I'm a little disturbed. LOL

[Briana]

I get plot bunnies all the time! I'm very forgetful, so I try to write them down as soon as they come to me. Once they're written down, I completely forget all about them and go back to whatever my current WIP is. I really should flip through my notebook and see if there are any gems in there! :P

[Morton]

To deal with this I made a plot bunny warren. I find that's the only way to keep some semblance of control over them while they wait for attention.

I have a lovely character waiting very patiently for his turn to show me his world.

Janet, sympathies to you. I have characters who sit on the sofa behind me.

[J.N.]

I let them run wild in hopes they will gain strength and develop into a future tale worth writing.

It's the lengthy simmering that gives it flavor.

[Jane]

That boinging noise you can hear is my plot bunnies jumping up and down on my bed. Just to keep me from getting my beauty sleep. And they are promiscuous. How else do you explain all their flipping babies....

[Denae]

Yes . . . and no. New characters visit, and they tell me about their worlds, but none of them are ever doing anything interesting enough for me to abandon my WIP. Settings? Yes. Characters? Yes. Plots? Not really. I struggle with plots. Maybe that's why I do retellings.

[Christina]

I'm guessing plot bunnies act much like regular bunnies because my brain is exploding with bits of plot this spring. Too bad I live in an area where summer is just around the corner and I suffer from a well known condition called summer brain. The bunnies will have to sit still until fall.

[Chris]

Having just finished a project, I can now sit back and let the bunnies fight in a battle royale to decide the next one. May the best bunny win!

Of course, I may slip my favorite bunnies a chainsaw so they can take out the weaker ones.

[J.N.]

Ooohh... battle bunnies!

"In the end, there can be only one."
(Yes, yes, the famous quote from "Highlander"...)

[Felix]

I never came across the term before but it is very descriptive and intriguing. Recently came across one I wrote before the age of computers whilst working in India. Will it ever see the light of day?

[Anna]

I have a wip with betas and so the queue is getting a bit unruly and another one has joined it.

One is telling me that he (yes this one is definitely a he) is perfectly formed and ready to roll. (I think he's a hare, with thumping great feet.)

Another is telling me that, commercially, I should know it makes sense to run with that one first.

Another is saying, come on, come on, you know this one has to be written.

Sigh.

[B.A.]

Plot bunnies. I love it. Mine keep multiplying like the bunnies in my yard. The one that is most persistent in getting my attention is the one I work on next. Did a novel in a couple of weeks due to the bunny saying do it now or forever lose me in the rest of them.

Like other, I have multiple works started and on hold until I can get a book or two out and the second for the one I just published. Dang it rabbits...go and sit down and behave!

[Felix]

Isn't there a blog somewhere which allows those who are swamped by the bunnies to come together with those suffering writers' block?

[Anna]

Giving a bunny away might be as bad as abandoning a baby; mine have appealing eyes, waiting to be born.

Happy to help with writers' blocks in other ways though.

[Leanne]

I'm lucky because I'm registered partially sighted I no longer have a full time job so if ideas come to me about what to put in my novels I van jot them down on one of the many notebooks I have sorted around the house.
The most important notebooks are the ones next to the bed for when I wake up with inspiration and can't sleep until I have written it down

[Anna]

Ah Leanne, if only I could read my notes when I sit down to write!

[Mike]

I have certainly had this happen, the idea of an obituary writer who took to murder when people failed to die at their 'appointed time' wouldn't let go until I wrote it out.

[M.]

I have notebooks full of loose ideas, a few of which have become something substantial, but most of which have just sat around, for years in some cases. I don't really have any problems with loose ideas distracting me from my current project, though. My problem is that they are all over the place; I really need to organize them into one location, and then remember to browse through them every once in a while.

[Micah]

My wife keeps lots of notebooks around because if she doesn't write stuff down she's afraid she'll forget it. Me? If I forget something then fine. That's one more story I don't have to add to the Works In Progress file. And anyway, so what if a few ideas get forgotten? More will just appear later on. So I don't worry about it and just try to get on with the other (more than a) dozen books I've got going. My bigger problem is that at least 4 of the plot bunnies that I have started writing all turned out to be big ideas, each worth a year or more of dedicated writing. Trying to write all those along with working full time just makes me depressed.

[W.]

I have this waking dream of flinging myself off a draw bridge to float over a great gray river to escape the badies

[Phillip]

I wonder how many of the WIPs discussed here are fully realized and how many still wait in a queue for a chance at creation?

I always right ideas down on scrap paper, then transfer them to a computer file. Some ideas are simple and will be there for years. Others are destined to be written soon. I definitely know my next WIP.

It makes me wonder if any of you have had ideas, perhaps even significantly developed, that still haven't had a single word earnestly typed in your preferred format? They lay forgotten in an old spiral bound notebook.

[Ian]

All my plots, etc have got realized, although n ot necessarily exactly as initially conceived. There tend to be "modifications" along the way.

On the other hand, i also compose music, and while I have quite a biut of completed stuff, I also have a file of scraps of tunes and things awaiting action. Not sure why I do this.

[Dwayne, Head of Lettuce]

I will never, ever be able to get all my plot bunnies worked into full blown rabbits. And I'm okay with that. Some ideas just aren't good enough to be fully realized.

At the time this was posted, my current work in progress was kind of an abandoned project I'd started years ago and couldn't make it work. I dusted it off and started over from scratch a couple of years ago. I think it's going well.

Meanwhile, when I feel like writing and have only a short time, I have about six other things I'm dinking with. Not all of them will be complete, I'm sure. There is one I'm liking, though... kind of a thriller about a pastor who becomes obsessed with a young woman.

[B.A.]

Mine are on my computer, but I have these idea bunnies that just won't quit, so I have a looooong list of ideas. The book I'm editing was one that kept bugging me so I wrote the darn book so I would leave me alone.