Inspiration

[BellaLestrange87]

We all get inspiration for stories from everywhere. Some people get inspiration from songs, some from a random sentence or phrase someone said, and some from randomly standing in the shower. Others search out writing prompts, enter challenges, or have people request fics from them.

 

Where have you received inspiration for your stories?

[scooterbug8515]

I think most of my inspiration comes from music and real life.  There are moments in real life that just fit perfectly and spark ideas from a fantastic name to an odd situation, not to mention using real life adds realism to the story, but on the whole music helps inspire a mood for me and will spark ideas and feeling for my characters in so many ways.

[Mistress]

Road signs. Travel. Being on top of a mountain. Books. Movies. Music. Taking my dogs on a hike. Discussing my characters with other writerly friends. Inspiration comes from everywhere and usually I have to stop a conversation mid-sentence to write something down.

[hedwig1751]

Hmm real life mostly, and just random things I see that give me ideas. My betas give me loads of great ideas too, but if I say specifically to myself that I have to think of an idea for a new chapter, nothing pops up, which is really helpful .

[lovegood27]

I get inspiration from reading other people's fics, I think it really helps sometimes to just read through a couple of short stories or something if you're a bit stuck for ideas. Obviously, you don't copy what you're reading, but for me it gets me in the mood for writing.

 

Also songs, and real life, which had already been said. Songs have meaningful lyrics in them which can be the bases of an entire story, and I know there are plenty of moments in my stories which have been based off RL

[Professor McGonagall]

Action films. Downton Abbey.

 

I remember when I was younger that after I watched an action movie (Pirates of the Caribbean, Fast and Furious, Harry Potter) that I'd do nothing for the next day or two but quote the movie, invent small story lines that eventually had me circling around my mortal enemy (not my real mortal enemy-stairs; a fictional one), and swagger about like one of the main characters. Besides the endless planning that I seem to get myself into, I always try to picture the characters fighting: what their style is, their signature spell, and if they don't fight, what they do instead. It's insanely useful.

 

As for Downton Abbey, it mostly stems from the Dowager Countess as a character as well as the mesh between historical and fictional that I think influences me a lot.

[FlamingQuilltips]

I guess my inspiration is mostly my own imagination. I day dream a lot, and love making up scenarios in my head about RL. I kinda shoot off from there. Other times I get inspired from reading other fiction, books, movies. But majority of my inspiration is from inside my own head where I like to analyze a character so much and give them such strong background that fics just unravel from there.

[Vilja]

For me the inspiration would be random. Like an idea comes out of nowhere, and I follow it. So when I write I can spend entire days just writing, but sometimes I don't write a line for several months (years even). And that's totally fine for me, I can't help myself to get inspiration from anywhere.

 

Maybe from reading other people's writing would be the most true. But usually  when I get inspiration from a book, then think about it, and it takes me to places that are far far away from the original piece. What I would most often do, is to include a hint to something I've read as a 'tribute' to that writer.

[PinsandKneazles]

I guess my inspiration is mostly my own imagination. I day dream a lot, and love making up scenarios in my head about RL. I kinda shoot off from there. Other times I get inspired from reading other fiction, books, movies. But majority of my inspiration is from inside my own head

 

OMG this is so me too!

 

I'm also sometimes inspired by random little day-to-day happenings as well

[GotNoJamsss]

Lately, a lot of my stories have been started from challenge prompts. I FREAKING LOVE CHALLENGES  and may have a problem entering every single one I see. 
Other than that a lot of inspiration comes from music and the stories presented in their lyrics or books and concepts presented in them.

Somebody That I Used to Know was originally written based off the song 'All Too Well' by Taylor Swift and 'When We Were Young' by Adele. I loved the concept of seeing a relationship at it's end and retracing it's beginnings; investigating that feeling of longing and nostalgia. 

Quick Bright Things was written based off the quote from Shakespeare, "Bright as lightning in the collied night; so quick bright things come to confusion." This idea of a relationship that is meant to be short and romantic and then over, but of the people in it are like - wait - no. I don't want this to be a quick bright thing. 

We All Have our Reasons was written based off the prompt from @aurevoir

 giving us the line "The version of me you created in your mind is not my responsibility." Immediately when reading this I thought it'd be a cool twist to have the author say this to the reader and I tried to think of characters that would talk this way and quickly got to Regulus Black. His story is so shrouded in mystery and his hero status so complex that it just made sense. The story evolved from there - why does he have multiple versions of himself? What propels his change of heart to turn against Voldemort?