In Fiction Writing, There is No Such Thing As a "Good Idea"

Fiction authors occasionally find themselves buttonholed at a cocktail party by a novice or a non-writer who has “this idea for a great story.” The person then spends several minutes describing it (essentially, a plot summary with spoilers), and then wraps up with: “So, what do you think? Will it work?”

The first thing to understand is that when novice writers (especially wanna-be writers) ask authors for advice about a “great idea,” they’re not necessarily looking for honest feedback about how to make a given piece more compelling and publishable. That’s because they’re not showing actual product. They’re describing it. An author can’t evaluate writing that she has never read. She can only talk about theoreticals, and that’s useless if no product exists.

Usually, the novice is looking for encouragement and endorsement, which (they hope) will look something like this:

1. The author is bowled over by the novice’s clever story idea, and is secretly envious that she didn’t think of it.

2. The author immediately promises to do whatever it takes to connect the novice with the right people, such as an agent, publisher, and movie producer.

3. The author offers to collaborate so that this genius story idea becomes a reality as quickly as possible, and everyone becomes a lot richer.

   
   

I have never had any of the above three reactions. I have connected writers of all experience levels to editors and graphic designers, and I’ve given advice about indy publishing and the about the writing process in general. Having said that, I always encourage novices to record their ideas, and attempt to bring them to life. Everybody has a good story to tell. At the very least, their friends and relatives will find their life stories interesting.

But let me explore the cocktail-party fantasy in more depth. There are valuable lessons here for writers who struggle with assessing the quality of ideas as it relates to the quality of their final product. They are sometimes caught off-guard when buttonholed by the novice writer.

Story Ideas Are So Cheap, They’re Actually Free

Story ideas are everywhere: the news, best-seller lists, box-office hits, television, and trends on social media. Not only have fiction authors seen the same stories everyone else has (along with many obscure ones nobody knows about), those same authors have probably read far more fiction than most people, so they know all about the hundreds of combinations of plots, characterizations, and surprise endings that have been done before.

The story idea that the novice thought up on his own (which he thinks is unique) probably isn’t. There is a hundred-year-old sub-discipline in literary theory and in film theory that says all stories can be reduced to a limited number of basic plots (Christopher Booker, Joseph Campbell), that there are a limited number of character types (Vladimir Propp), and that successful commercial stories break down into identifiable, discreet units called “beats” (Blake Snyder). I’m not going to discuss whether all this, in fact, correct. I’m simply pointing out that whether a story idea is truly unique is up for debate. Ultimately, “unique” it doesn’t matter, because the audience only cares whether the final product captivates them, entertains them. They don’t care that they’ve seen a spaceship movie before, or three different romance movies between a city slicker and a country rube. They only care that the one they’re watching now is good.

So far, I’ve been talking about the consumption side of stories. On the production side, creative people generally find it easy to come up with ideas. I have stacks of files that go back decades, with numerous ideas for stories and essays. Talk to any creative person, and they’ll tell you the same. They have more ideas than they can shake a stick at.

This brings me to the next stage of production: turning an idea into a product. Creative people spend countless hours struggling to bring ideas to life, into a product that others can consume. The creation process is multi-directional, which means that the creative act itself is shaped by the idea, but it also shapes the idea. That interaction generates even more ideas that may or may not be incorporated into the final work. That is why when non-creatives ask “Where do you get your ideas from?” it’s implied that the idea comes fully formed, like Athena sprung from the head of Zeus, and all the author has to do is take down dictation. (Artificial intelligence reinforces this illusion, but it remains an illusion.)

To bring a story to life is like mapping out an unfamiliar city that is shrouded in thick fog. You got a glimpse of something for a moment. That’s the idea fragment. Now you must hunt that fragment down, to find out what it is, what surrounds it, what the history is, what the whole city looks like. The process is one of continual discovery, continual refining. On some days, the fog lifts a little and the writing is easier. On other days, the fog is even more dense, and you’re feeling your way along as you go, not sure if what you’re doing is any good.

Execution is Where the True Skill Resides

In the material world of bridges, buildings, computer software, and restaurants, there are such things as good ideas and bad ideas. A good idea solves a real-world problem (your car got you to the restaurant without any problems, you ate a delicious meal). A bad idea does not solve real-world problems (the software update causes computer glitches, the new perfume caused a rash).

In the immersive world of story, there is no such thing as “a good idea for a story.” There is only the execution of an idea that either becomes a good story once it is executed, or it doesn’t. Even then, the opinion of what constitutes a “good” story will vary from reader to reader. Some readers are going to love it. Some will hate it. Others will be indifferent. This is essential for a novice writer to understand. A single author’s judgement about your work is not an accurate prediction of how others will react.

Even book marketers and publishers who’ve been in the business a long time cannot reliably spot the bestsellers, regardless of whether the idea is well-executed. If they could, they’d never publish a book that under-performs.

“A person saves the village from the monster.” That idea has been done, in some variation, hundreds of times. The bad execution of that idea is going to be boring, the characters will be predictable, the pacing will be off, the writing will be cliched. The good execution is going to have interesting characters, unexpected developments, novel twists on a familiar theme, writing that moves.

Experienced writers don’t ask others (not even other writers) “What do you think of my story idea?” because they know it’s impossible to tell from a summary whether an idea is actually good. Heck, it’s hard to tell whether a movie is good from the trailer.

Just because a person is captivated by her own story idea doesn’t mean others are going to be. Captivation depends on how compelling the final product is. Captivation happens in the actual immersive experience of the product. Simply skimming a plot summary or a description online isn’t the same as being there. And (to repeat) what makes being there a great experience is the execution of the idea behind the product, not necessarily the idea itself.

I’m not going to talk here about what makes the execution of a story idea good or bad. That’s a subject that can span several books, because there are a lot of variables and techniques that rely on developing certain skills. Suffice it to say that, in my fiction, my aim is to grab you by your lapels and bring you into another world, and keep you there until the end. Yes, you are free to leave at any time. But I aim to make you so enticed by the world I’ve created that you don’t want to leave. Or, if you do leave (maybe to take a shower or talk on the phone), you come back. I aim to hypnotize you, to haunt you, to make that story as real to you as the room you’re sitting in now. Whether I succeed depends on what you, the reader, bring to the experience. I cannot predict exactly how you’ll react to what I’ve written.

When an author decides to spend her precious writing time and mental energy on a particular story, it’s because the idea, the vision, for that story is so compelling (or so nagging) that she simply must bring it to life. She, uniquely, is the one who must do that, nobody else can. The vision is hers. She glimpsed the thing in the fog, and she is in its thrall. It is her job to bring it out of her mind’s eye, out of the fog, into a form that others can experience so that they are in its thrall as well. Only she can compare the final product to her vision and determine whether the rendering is successful. That’s why hiring someone to ghost write a work of fiction makes no sense. Fiction is all about the vision, all about the experience itself as it is filtered through the creator’s eyes, and brought to life on a page or in an audio narration or on the screen. Non-fiction, in contrast, is about the information content and the utility of that information on the reader. It’s why ghostwriting works for non-fiction, but not for fiction (in my opinion).

So, if you’re an author, and you get buttonholed at a cocktail party by a novice who wants to tell you all about “a great story idea” and whether you think it will work, smile, be encouraging, and then send them the link to this essay so that they understand the difference between an idea and the execution of that idea, and why it’s impossible to tell whether an idea is good without seeing the final product.