Writing Ideas–Part II Page Turners

How do you know your story is worth telling? How do you evaluate whether or not your idea is a good one? Will it be a “page turner” or a “book closer?” Will readers stay up just to finish the book of your idea, or will they go to bed early? #pageturners #amwriting #writing ideas Share on X

In my first post on this topic, I talked about what I liked, what I looked for. I look for unusual things and people. I dig deep to look for the obscure, something that maybe needs to have light shone on it. I look to find the opposites in things, especially when I’m crafting a story. And I look for the extreme. I just read No Safe Haven, by Kimberley and Kayla R. Woodhouse. This is an extreme book. Kimberley and Kayla are a mother-daughter team, and they wrote a gripping suspense thriller in the extreme. A lot of Ronie Kendig’s military suspense books also hold the extreme. These books are page turners.

In my Craftsman class, our first lesson was how to get writing ideas and where to find them. We are a media-driven society, so use your media to help you find interesting and compelling ideas. One thing I love about FanFiction.net is that there are so many story permutations on the same theme that everyone tells a different angle. I first heard of FanFiction while watching JAG, several years after the show ended on network TV. FanFiction readers and writers came up with a bunch of ideas about sixth season cliff-hanger “Adrift.” If this had been a book, it would have been one of those page turners you can’t put down.

If you’ve never seen JAG, it’s about navy lawyers. The main character, Harmon Rabb, Jr. is a former Top Gun-type pilot turned lawyer for the Judge Advocate General’s office. At the end of the sixth season, the woman he’s secretly in love with for years is about to marry another man. Harm promises to be at the wedding, but decides to squeeze in his “quals” – his qualification flights to continue pilot certification. The cliffhanger has Harm crashed in the ocean in the middle of a severe tropical storm. That summer, numerous ideas about how “Adrift” would end abounded on FanFiction. None of them got it right. One, if I remember, was sort of close, but the creativity of the different scenarios was interesting to read, especially since I knew how it ended. He is finally found because Colonel Sarah “Mac” McKenzie does a sort of psychic exercise that helps people know where to look. She postpones her wedding until Harm is fully recovered from hypothermia. This is the nutshell version. The final scene of “Adrift” takes on a different twist. (spoiler) Mac is adrift in the rain without comfort from fiancé or best friend. The creativity from writers speculating how they would end that episode is the point.

What about you? How do you evaluate whether an idea is a good one or not? What's a page turner for you? #pageturners #amwriting #writingideas Share on X