I Have an Idea for a Fictional Story… Now What?

I never set out to write a novel.

In fact, when I first started writing what would eventually become Bloodlines: Cove Point Manor, I wasn't thinking about becoming an author, publishing a book, or even writing a novel.

I was simply telling a story to my cousin.

It was Christmas Eve, 2017, and I was visiting some very close family friends whom I hadn't seen for several years. We had grown up together and were so close that we referred to one another as "cousins." Our parents had been friends for decades, too, but over the years we'd lost touch, particularly after several of the adults in our extended group had passed away.

By then, I had already been researching my own family history for about fifteen years.

During our conversation, I mentioned that I'd been building a very detailed family tree. They asked the obvious question:

"Did you find anything interesting hiding in there?"

I laughed and told them, "You wouldn't believe me if I told you!"

They wanted to know.

So I told them.

I'd discovered all sorts of famous and wealthy people hiding in my father's side of the family tree. That was surprising enough because my father was about as blue-collar and down-to-earth as a person could be, and he came from a very poor family.

One of the people I'd found was Frank W. Woolworth, founder of the Woolworth Five and Dime stores. I'd done quite a bit of research into the Woolworth family and their extraordinary summer home, Winfield Hall. The family had accumulated tremendous wealth, but their story also contained tragedy—mental health problems, possible suicide, early deaths and more than a little bad luck. They had come from very little financially, and within only a couple of generations, much of that fortune had disappeared.

My cousin listened to all of this and then said something that changed everything.

"Wow, maybe one day you'll find out that you are heir to a mansion and a fortune!"

Her twin sister added that if that happened, two people we knew—our family "frenemies"—would probably suddenly reappear, acting as though I was the greatest person in the world while secretly trying to figure out how to get their hands on some of the money.

We laughed.

Then my cousin said:

"You should make that a story. It'd be hilarious!"

And that was it.

The seed had been planted.

The Story Already Had Some Real-Life Roots

Once the idea was in my head, I started thinking about how it could actually happen.

At the time, I was also heavily involved in DNA genealogy. I'd taken DNA tests and had been in contact with quite a number of DNA matches. Some were wonderful people, and together we could easily trace our relationship back to a common ancestor.

Others were...well, let's just say they were memorable.

One DNA match once explained my supposed paternal ancestry to me and had traced our family line all the way back to Adam and Eve. That's when I decided he might be just a little off kilter and moved on.

I'd also had another unusual experience involving an estate search. A firm in the United Kingdom had contacted my maternal uncle because they believed my maternal grandmother might have been the sister of a woman who had recently died in the UK. The firm was trying to locate relatives because the estate had apparently gone to the British government while they searched for heirs.

It turned out they had the wrong person.

The woman who had died was someone my grandmother had known. She had been a patient in a long-term care facility along with my grandmother's actual sister, and apparently had simply referred to my grandmother as her sister.

All of these experiences gave me something important: I knew that the seemingly impossible could sometimes be surprisingly plausible.

I had experience with DNA testing, distant relatives, unexpected family connections, tracing genealogical records and even the way professional firms could track down heirs who had no idea an estate existed.

My ancestry research had also uncovered plenty of examples of family members hiding things, lying about things or taking secrets to their graves—only for DNA and genealogy research to reveal the truth decades later.

So I started putting the pieces together.

Could someone really discover that they were the heir to a previously unknown family estate?

Absolutely.

Could there be family members who suddenly appeared once money was involved?

Of course.

Could there be secrets that had remained hidden for generations?

History had already shown me that was entirely possible.

Now I just needed a story.

And Then There Were the Characters

There is a little bit of me in Alex Tinsdill.

There is a little bit of me in most of my characters, actually.

But that doesn't mean my characters are me.

They can also contain characteristics of people I know or have known, qualities I admire, or even characteristics I wish I had myself.

Alex's appreciation for vintage cars, for example, is something I took directly from my own personality, but a lot of his personal isn't. His methodical nature, intelligence, down-to-earth personality and adventurous side are characteristics that I respect.

Even his name has a story.

Alexander is a name that runs through my mother's family, while Tinsdill was my maternal grandmother's mother's maiden name. Put the two together and Alex Tinsdill was born.

Names can actually be one of the harder parts of creating a character.

Sometimes I use the names of people I like or dislike, people I know or have known, or people whose names I want to remember. Sometimes it's a small way of paying homage to someone by giving their name a place in one of my novels. When I do that, I ask permission.

Other times, I simply find a name that seems to fit the personality of the character I'm creating.

But here's the interesting part:

The character I start with isn't necessarily the character I end up with.

Letting Characters Become Who They Are

Most of my characters start with an idea of who I think they will be.

Then they grow.

Sometimes they grow into someone quite different.

That development doesn't necessarily happen within a single novel, either. With recurring characters, it can happen over several books.

Alex, for example, changes considerably throughout the Bloodlines series. By the end of Cove Point Manor, he's become comfortable with his newfound wealth, but he also decides to use a significant portion of it to try to make the world a better place by founding and building his own DNA research laboratory.

Maggie changes too. She discovers supernatural abilities and, rather than living in fear of them, learns to embrace them and coexist with the spirit world.

Not every character develops in a positive direction.

Brenda is a good example. By the end of Cove Point Manor, her downward spiral is well underway, and it continues through the subsequent novels.

Connie doesn't undergo a dramatic transformation, but she does begin to believe in herself more and becomes less controlled by her domineering mother.

And even though Connie remains somewhere in that grey area between good and evil, that doesn't make her development any less important.

I think that is one of the things that can make fictional characters feel more like real people.

People change.

Sometimes they become better.

Sometimes they become worse.

Sometimes they simply become different.

And occasionally, even a deeply flawed character can show enough growth that the reader begins to see them differently—or perhaps even wonders whether redemption might eventually be possible.

I'm Not a Plotter

There are writers who meticulously plan their stories before they write them.

I'm not one of them.

I'm a pantser. Completely.

I generally start with an idea of what I want to write, but sooner or later the characters and the story start telling me what's happening.

At that point, I'm basically there to watch the show and take notes.

That may sound crazy, but that's honestly how it works for me.

Each scene, each piece of dialogue and each development can play out in my head as the story unfolds. Sometimes it works beautifully.

Sometimes it doesn't.

And that's okay.

A lot of what I initially write can eventually be dropped. But when that happens, it is usually replaced by something bigger, better or more entertaining.

The first idea isn't sacred.

The story is.

The First Spark

Often, a story doesn't begin with a fully formed plot.

For me, it starts with what I can only describe as a whisper in my brain.

A flash.

An idea.

Something that suddenly appears and makes me wonder what could happen if I followed it.

If I'm sitting at my computer, I'll put it down electronically as quickly as I can.

More often, though, the idea arrives when I'm nowhere near a keyboard. Sometimes I'll make a note on my phone, but usually the idea stays with me until I can get somewhere that I can write it down.

I've always had a pretty good memory for many things, and story ideas seem to be particularly stubborn. Once one gets into my head, I don't tend to forget it.

It stays there until it has a chance to come out and show itself to the world.

And that's when the show begins.

The Story Has to Entertain Me First

There's another test I use, perhaps without even consciously thinking about it:

Does the story entertain me?

If I start writing and it feels like too much work, something isn't right.

If the flow isn't there, I'm not enjoying the journey.

If things become boring or so unbelievable that even I don't buy into them, I'll stop.

I save what I've written and come back to it later.

If I still feel the same way, I'll delete that section and replace it with something that comes more naturally—something that flows, fits the story and keeps me interested.

Sometimes the discarded story doesn't really disappear.

It may come back in another form.

One of the things I particularly enjoy creating is the flashback. A piece of a story that didn't work where I originally put it may suddenly work perfectly as something that happened in the past.

Some authors and critics may not like flashbacks.

That's okay.

If it adds something to the story I'm telling, it's going in. :)

I think the first person who needs to enjoy a fictional story is the person writing it.

Making the Extraordinary Feel Possible

My novels contain supernatural elements.

Spirits, strange happenings and things that can't necessarily be explained scientifically aren't everyone's cup of tea, and that's perfectly fine.

I'm writing fiction. I know that.

But even when I'm writing something extraordinary, I still like to leave the reader thinking:

"Yeah...that could happen."

There are authors who take supernatural fiction to an extreme. I certainly did that in Brenda's Revenge.

But I think the important thing is what surrounds the extraordinary.

There are enough recognizable people, relationships, emotions and situations in the story that the reader can relate to them. Then you can introduce something strange, frightening, outrageous—or sometimes all three—and the reader is willing to follow you.

To me, that's part of the fun.

The boring can exist alongside the outrageous.

The real world can exist alongside the unknown.

The trick is tying everything together in a way that doesn't push the reader away, but instead makes them want to know more.

I Didn't Know I Was Writing a Novel

Here's the funny part.

When I started writing Cove Point Manor, I didn't know I was writing a novel.

I wasn't trying to write one.

I was trying to write a story for my cousin, explaining how I imagined things might unfold if I suddenly inherited an estate, a lot of money and a family full of special frenemies who found out about it.

That's all it was supposed to be.

But the characters had other ideas.

Once they started talking, there was no putting the genie back in the bottle.

Eventually, I had to keep writing because I wanted to know what happened.

It really was that simple.

I became a reader of my own story.

I wanted to find out what happened next.

And if the person writing the story isn't interested in finding out what happens next, I'm not sure why the reader would be.

Finishing Wasn't Really the End

The first novel took me the better part of five months to write.

When I finally finished it, I was surprised that I'd actually managed to finish the story.

Then I thought I'd wrapped it up too quickly.

There was more to tell.

Cove Point Manor was definitely my first novel, which means there was also plenty of room for improvement.

But almost immediately, another question started nagging at me:

What happened to the characters next?

I don't like open-ended questions.

So I started working on Bloodlines: Of Noble Blood.

I used a similar formula, and that book came together fairly quickly. It wasn't quite as much fun to write as the first one, though.

Then came the third book.

Bloodlines: Brenda's Revenge flowed.

And flowed.

I had a lot of fun writing it.

But I was also becoming a better writer.

I wanted to improve the story, develop the existing characters, add more meaningful dialogue and introduce new characters. I also spent considerably more time making certain things realistic and plausible—not just for the eventual reader, but for myself.

The three books became more than three stories.

They became a record of my own development as a writer.

So, You Have an Idea. Now What?

I suppose that's where I come back to the question I started with.

What do you do if you have an idea for a fictional story?

My answer is probably much simpler than many people expect.

Write the story that speaks to you.

Write the one that you have fun creating.

There are countless tutorials, books, videos and courses about how to write and sell a story. There are people who will tell you there is a formula, a process or a secret to getting it right.

Maybe some of those things work.

But in the end, I still believe the author has to enjoy the experience.

If you enjoy creating the story, that enjoyment has a chance to find its way onto the page.

Will it be perfect?

Probably not.

Mine certainly weren't.

Will it become a bestseller?

Maybe. Maybe not.

But if you write a book that takes a reader away from their daily struggles and brings them somewhere else—somewhere they become immersed in the story and, for a while, forget about whatever is happening in their own lives—then you've already accomplished something worthwhile.

So don't rush it.

And don't spend so much time listening to conflicting advice that you never actually finish the thing you're trying to create.

Write your story.

Enjoy the journey.

And, most importantly, find out what happens next.

I did.