Here are some notes on a great panel at Life the Universe and Everything SF/F symposium. The topic is on Brainstorming.

– Sources of ideas in the fourth grade got stuck in the school system from that came a story where characters encountered in book: Lord Borden
– One author got ideas by playing role-playing games with his girlfriend.
– Do an object like a muddy boot and write a story about that boot.
– Another author got an idea for a book from using a spellchecker, which later became part of the title, the book.
– When plotting doesn’t accept is the first idea because that will be using what everyone else selects as well. Keep coming up with additional ideas. It’s the later ideas that have a better chance of being original.
– Go into other people’s dreams.
– Get ideas from people’s art paintings (. Melva )
– Sometimes brainstorming with someone else can help you have a more interesting story line because they make him him with an idea that you did not expect was a complete surprise.
– We society turns into astronauts. This is inspired by the author’s husband check in with the family that he visits. Try to get an idea of who has food supply. And a sister thought that he was spying on her.
– If you want to see if a certain action of a character will work in the scene role-play it.
– Right appeal about people you don’t agree with, and then write the scene from their perspective.
– 99% of people believe that they are good people. There’s a story of a mobster was surrounded by police and he was involved with the shoot out. He had killed the police officers in the past. Before he died he wrote a letter to his mother, saying that his soul was pure and that he would not hurt soul. So from his perspective, he was good man.

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