Brain Storming

Ultimately, my goal is to publish my work on Kindle Direct Publishing. 

I was reading bits of advice about doing so, you know: love what you write, write what you actually read, and stick to generas that sell- if you want to make money. But, the most interesting piece of advice I read was: publish several works at once, that way if your readers like what you write, they can find more of your work in the amazon store. 

I love the idea of putting multiple works out at once. I've recently finished the third book in the Off Campus Series: The Score, by Elle Kennedy  (more about what that did to my writing in my next blog post). I like when books take place in the same world, and mostly, I loved that I got to see my book crush Garett throughout the series, even though his story was finished in book one. 

So, I said- it's time to develop my world. I've changed the college a bit. Pembrook is now closer to the Chesapeake Bay. I'm still stuck on what this will do with Carah, whose main reason for going away to college was to get far far away from her small town. Maybe Stone Way will be in the Virginia section of the bay, while Pembrook is in Maryland. I'll have to work on that. 

Now to the actual Brain Storming I did last night:

Characters in Love 
One of the things I decided to do last night was to come up with a list of ideas. I described my setting. I listed every romantic situation I could think of that could take place in this setting:

Student with Student 

Local with Student 

Local with Local 

Teacher with Teacher 

Student with Teacher

I immediately rule out teacher with teacher. As a high school teacher, I can't think of a more uncomfortable scenario. I know that these stories create a lot of tension, but I can't even bring myself to read them. 

Qualities:
Moving on. After I listed my possible characters, I thought about qualities men and women find attractive in each other. I came up with a few:

Confiance

Wealth

Enjoys Adventure 

Fun Loving 

Smart

Kind

Respectful 

And then I figured, this is the easiest thing to think about, what I really need is to come up with hobbies for my characters! 

Interests:
So I scoured the web for hobbies that my characters may find interesting. I started with a few of my own and my fiancé's:

Gardening

Brewing Beer

Reading

Writing

Coloring

Then found a few more from the internet:

BMX 

Boxing 

Wind surfing

Dance 

Music 

I was able to get a pretty good idea of some things my characters can get into. I'm leaning more toward sports, because I think it's a great all encompassing activity that everyone can relate to- even if you relate because you hate sports. 

Tension:

Finally I had to think about reasons there would be some tension in the relationship. This one was the most difficult, because I think it takes over the whole plot. I mean, I read romance to see a couple get together. If they got together in chapter one, what's the point. It could have just been a tweet. 

Here's what I came up with for tension:

Doesn’t have free time

Doesn’t want to give up single life 

Has a girlfriend/boyfriend 

Comes from money, is poor 

Doesn’t like themselves, so why would someone else like them

Fake Relationship

After coming up with these lists, I feel like I have a better idea of where to go. When I was in college, my creative writing professor said that my writing reminded him of bath tub stories. A story that's nice, but there was no action. For as long as I can remember, my biggest struggle has been creating an interesting plot.

After I brainstormed my setting, characters, and tension, I decided to create a plot chart that chronicles my next story. I'm okay if it doesn't end up exactly the way that I think it will, but I've never had more direction when starting a story!

See anything missing from the lists above?

Do you brainstorm a different way?

Let me know!