A Life in Words

Where Do Ideas Come From?

~ ChanAtkins ~ Leave a comment

I think one of the questions you get asked the most as a writer is; where do you get your ideas from? I always feel a little bit sad when I get asked this, because in my mind I kind of expect everyone to have a head full of ideas and this question reminds me that is not always the case. And then I feel a little bit sorry for the person asking because I don’t know what it feels like not to have millions of ideas and characters running around inside my head.

But where do ideas come from? It really is a good question if you think about it. Our minds are amazing! Pick up any book in your house or think about a recent read that had a real impact on you…it can boggle your brain to wonder how the author came up with it! Here are some of the ways writers get new ideas…

Image by Colin Behrens from Pixabay
  1. Out of nowhere… Sometimes ideas just come out of nowhere. You can’t trace them back to anything you saw, or heard or felt, or anything that inspired you. They just jump into your brain and they are there, taking up space. With me this is usually because the character invades my mind, sets up camp and then starts chatting. Before long they’ve suggested a back story and a possible plot.
  2. Musical inspiration... Writers will sometimes find an idea growing after listening to music. It could be that the song reminds them of a certain time and place and brings back memories that inspire a storyline. Or it could be the lyrics of the song itself that entice the writer to create a story. While driving, I once heard a song on the radio that instantly transported me back to a certain time in my life and by the time I reached my destination I had a short story in my head. I later evolved it into a novel which is in the first draft stage.
  3. TV/Film/book inspiration… Sometimes the young writers I work with worry that their story ideas are too similar to TV shows or films or books they’ve enjoyed. They’ve fallen in love with something and naturally want to emulate it in their own writing because it’s fun to do so. But they feel self-conscious, like they have stolen an idea or copied a character. I always tell them there is absolutely nothing wrong with this and that a lot of ideas are inspired by things we have enjoyed culturally. The Boy With The Thorn In His Side series was originally inspired by me watching The Lost Boys at aged 12! My series has zero vampires in it but the scene when the mother realises her new boyfriend is the head vampire, got me thinking about real life monsters that hide among us, and the story grew from there. Writers ‘magpie’ ideas, taking little bits from here and there to create something new and this is totally fine.
  4. Real life people/places/events… Often writers will feel inspired to write about real life people, places or events. This could be in terms of historical or political fiction, or it could be someone they have known or come across sparks off an idea in their head. Writers people watch a lot and they tend to soak up whatever is around them, so the chances are real life people and events do sneak into their writing, sometimes without them even realising it.
  5. Anxieties and fears… I think this happens to me a lot! Quite a few of my personal fears and anxieties have evolved into novels. I think this is my way of working through what upsets and worries me. I never realise it until later though! For example, another reason The Boy With The Thorn In His Side story came about was my fear at 12 years old that my recently divorced parents would meet new partners I would hate. The Mess Of Me grew out of my own body image issues. This Is Nowhere is essentially about a non-religious character trying to find meaning in life, which is something I was thinking about a lot at the time. The Tree Of Rebels and my current work-in-progress confront my fears around climate change and the destruction of wildlife. Elliot Pie’s Guide To Human Nature contains characters who sort of represent an internal fight I have with myself – one is open-minded, open-hearted and wants to see the best in people and view the future with hope, while the other hates people so much she basically becomes agoraphobic. I don’t think writers always realise it at the time, but I do think our personal fears weave their way into our work.
  6. Long walks… Or long showers! Either way, I find doing something relaxing that you don’t really need to think about for a long time, really allows the ideas to flow. I always get good ideas for stories or plotlines when I am walking my dogs alone. Any time I have had a block or got stuck, it has become unravelled on a walk. Ideas for endings have popped into my head out of nowhere while walking. Dialogue often starts to flow too, so I’ll write it down into my phone or record myself saying it so I don’t forget. If you are ever out of ideas, I would strongly recommend a long walk on your own!

So, that covers some of the places ideas come from and some of the things that spark off stories, but I am sure there must be more. What about you? Where do your ideas come from? Feel free to comment and share!

5 Ways Writing Improves My Mental Health

~ ChanAtkins ~ 2 Comments

If I look back, I can see that it was reading that started my love affair with writing. Quite simply, I was a young bookworm who devoured books, one after the another, and that love of reading soon evolved into a love of writing. I’d read books and feel so inspired, I’d want to write my own. It was a magical feeling realising that I held this power inside of me. The ability to create characters and devise worlds and storylines, all of my own creation! It was exhilarating and addictive and I’ve never lost that excitement. But over the years, writing has helped me in other ways and I’m a strong believer that writing can be of great help to anyone struggling with their mental health. Due to some personal circumstances, mental health is one of the biggest issues in our family at the moment and if there was any way I could impress upon those struggling, how much writing has helped me to survive, these are the points I’d raise.

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay
  1. Writing Is A Release – They say that if reading is breathing in, then writing is breathing out and I truly believe this is so. But it doesn’t just apply to reading. Our entire lives we are breathing in, absorbing, observing, soaking up and reacting to what is around us. And it’s hard. It can feel overwhelming, like we can’t breathe and our bodies don’t know how to respond. Writing is a release. You breathe out again, you let go. You take everything you have absorbed, everything that has battered and affected you, and you breathe it back out again in your own words. Every time I write I feel like that – like my thoughts, feelings, fears and hopes are released slowly and calmly onto the page. I couldn’t bear the thought of having it all locked up inside forever.
  2. Writing Is Private – Until we choose it not to be, writing is intensely private. When I was a kid I started writing a diary and I kept it going for decades. I still have those old notebooks now and if I choose to, I can go back and revisit all the different stages of my life. But they are private. Not for anyone else. I recorded my frustrations, my insecurities, my failures, losses and anxieties on those pages throughout my life. Writing them down helped me release them and deal with them, but so did the private aspect of the process. Knowing those words were just for me gave me the freedom to write them down. It’s the same with writing stories and poems and even blog posts. I have a host of unpublished blog posts. Thoughts and feelings I needed to let out but have not yet felt the need to publish. I have a notebook full of random thoughts and poems that may never see the light of day! And when I write a novel, for the first few drafts at least, it is just for me. It is private and there is something both liberating and protective about that, like I am shielding myself from the world and creating a private, calm space just for me.
  3. Writing Helps Us Work Out How We Feel – Sounds strange, but it really does. Sometimes in life, how we feel is black and white and very simple. We feel happy or sad and we know why. But there are times when it’s far more confusing and muddled. The teenage years for example are turbulent and full of mixed emotions and thoughts and feelings we can barely understand ourselves. The same applies to the perimenopausal stage of life for women. And as we navigate our way through our lives, we are sometimes unsure of how we feel about the things that happen to us or around us. Writing can really help us make sense of this. There have been times I’ve not truly understood how I feel about something until I start to write it down. This might be within a story a poem, a blog post or a diary entry. I might start writing about something else entirely but somehow the words lead me to where I need to be. So many of my books contain topics I was absorbed by at the time, and writing about them through made-up characters enabled me to figure out how I felt. When I’m distressed or feeling dark, I write poetry and although it is sometimes just a mess, it really does help me figure my own feelings out.
  4. You Are Never Lonely or Bored If You Write – I say this all the time. Because of writing I have never been bored or lonely in my life. How could I ever be either when I have a head so full of ideas and stories and characters begging me to tell them? If I have a quiet moment, or I’ve just gone to bed, its those people and stories that come back to me, filling my mind and keeping me company. Waiting at bus stops, travelling on trains, walking alone, waiting in cars to pick people up, none of those things are ever boring to me because my mind will transport me to the worlds I have created and I will just hang out there until it is time to snap back to reality! I think this has helped me immeasurably over the years. I feel genuinely worried for people that don’t have creative hobbies, whether its writing, drawing, sculpting, acting or creating music. If you have a creative hobby, you will never be bored or lonely and that can really help when your mental health is not so good.
  5. Writing Gives You A Voice – Writing can be private but it can also be the opposite. Writing can change the world and it has done, many, many times. Storytelling is part of the human condition, going right back to the beginning of our time here on Earth. We have lives, dreams, hopes, fears, beliefs and experiences and we have the right and the ability to voice them. Sometimes in life, when things are tough and you feel like you are floundering, it’s good to remember that you have a voice and writing enables you to be heard. Tell the world how you feel. Write about it. Tell your family and friends how you feel. Write about it. It doesn’t have to be personal – you can use fiction to tell the world your story.

Writing is hugely therapeutic to me and I will always recommend it to anyone struggling. What about you? How has the act of writing helped you through your life? Feel free to comment and share!

The Only Writing Advice You Ever Need

~ ChanAtkins ~ 4 Comments

Google the term ‘writing tips’ or ‘writing advice’ and you will soon find yourself drowning in things you should and should not do as a writer. Write every day. Write when you feel like it. Self-publish. Don’t self-publish. Know your audience. Write for yourself. Write what you know. Write what you like. Other writers will give you advice, and people who don’t write will give you advice. There are infinite amounts of websites and author services dedicated to giving you advice.

And of course, a lot of this advice is important and valuable. If you are new to writing, of course you should seek advice, ask for help, ask for feedback and be prepared to listen to those who have gone before you. The trouble is so much of the advice is contradictory, because what works for one writer will inevitably not work for another. The trick is forging your own, individual path through all that advice and all those tips.

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

Take what you need from the writing advice websites and articles, and ignore what you don’t. Because above all else, you have to remember that one size does not fit all. Some writers plan and plot to an excruciating degree before they ever start writing, and that’s okay. Some writers don’t plan or plot a thing, they just start writing and see what happens and that is also okay. Some writers get the concept first and have to create the characters to fit the idea, and some writers get the characters first and have to create the plot to fit them. Both are totally okay. Some writers write every day. Some writers only write when they feel like it. It doesn’t matter what type you are.

The only writing advice I personally think you ever really need is this.

Do what you want.

You can interpret that any way you like. Find your own path. Create your own journey. Do whatever makes you happy. Do whatever the hell you want.

Because above all else writing should make us happy and passionate. We should feel happy and excited and passionate about our writing. It should be, above all else, our happy place. The thing that makes us feel like ourselves. The thing that makes us feel free. And yes, further down the road, you might want to think about audiences, and readers, and markets and blurbs and selling…but before you ever get close to those things, you have to love what you write. You have to love to write. You have to be totally and utterly in love with the act of writing because quite simply, the act of writing is for you. It’s yours.

Its your escape. Your freedom. Your way of interpreting the world. Your way of figuring out how you feel and what you think. Your way of speaking up and being heard. Your way of leaving some kind of imprint on this world. Your way of being you. That’s how writing feels for me. And every time I try to please anyone else, it all gets messed up.

Writing is mine. And I do what I want.

I’ll leave you with this poem, one of many from Charles Bukowski that for me sums up how I feel about writing. Please note, this poem does not sum up how everyone feels about writing! Other writers may not relate to this at all, and that is okay! I just love this poem so much and I feel like Bukowski only ever did exactly what he wanted.

“So you want to be a writer


if it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.

unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.

if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don’t do it.

if you’re doing it for money or
fame,
don’t do it.

if you’re doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don’t do it.

if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don’t do it.

if it’s hard work just thinking about doing it,
don’t do it.

if you’re trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.

if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.

if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you’re not ready.

don’t be like so many writers,
don’t be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don’t be dull and boring and
pretentious, don’t be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don’t add to that.
don’t do it.

unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don’t do it.

unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don’t do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.”

Writer’s Block is Really Your Friend (and you should listen to it)

~ ChanAtkins ~ 3 Comments

Writer’s block is a horrible term I don’t even like to use. I think most writers hate the term and loathe the reality. We dread getting writer’s block but what does writer’s block even mean? How does it feel to be ‘blocked’ and what, if anything, is the ‘block’ trying to tell us?

I am very fortunate because writer’s block is not something I usually suffer from. I tend to have too many ideas, and too many projects on the go and my main problem is not enough time to do it all in! But recently the dreaded writer’s block struck and in fact I now realise it was with me for some time.

So, what is writer’s block? I think it can manifest itself in different ways. There is a block to ideas, when a writer quite simply can’t think of anything to write about. These writers tend to have big gaps between writing projects while they wait for the muse to show up again. There are blocks that happen mid-flow – one minute you are tapping away at the keyboard and then suddenly it all runs out. Your mind goes blank and you cannot conjure up the next words. There is also what I call plot blocks. Basically, you get stuck. You don’t know what to do next with the plot. Maybe you had it all planned out but now can’t figure out how to do it, or maybe you were winging it from the start and just ran out of steam. I’m not sure what type of block is the worst but I am more than familiar with the dread of sitting down and staring at a blank Word document.

Image by Steve Johnson from Pixabay

The block I’ve been suffering from was none of the above, not really. My current work in progress is a four book YA post-apocalyptic series. I had the idea a few years ago and it had to wait its turn. During that time I started a little notebook of themes, ideas and character bios. I always knew this one was going to be a challenge. I love the post-apocalyptic genre as you might already know from my post here: https://chantelleatkins.com/2021/07/02/post-apocalyptic-fascination/. From the start, I had this feeling that the series was a good idea but someone else would be able to do a better job with it than me. I don’t normally feel like that about my book ideas. I’m usually hugely protective and obsessed with them so I would never consider offering or suggesting the idea to someone else. But this one niggled from the start.

I started book one about a year ago but had to keep stopping to get other books finished and published. I was initially quite surprised with how well it went. The first chapters flew out of me effortlessly and were exactly what I wanted. I genuinely think the first few chapters of book one are excellent and I’m proud of them. It got harder after that. It became a slog!

And that’s the difference between these books and my others. Aside from my YA dystopian The Tree Of Rebels, all of my books follow a familiar pattern. I get the character first, they suggest the plot, back story, dilemma and so on. It builds in my head and everything flows from the characters until my head gets so noisy it feels like it will explode. By the time I get around to writing it it almost writes itself because I know it all so well. It’s not hard. It’s fun. It’s addictive and exciting. I normally cannot wait to sit down at my desk and tap away. Sure, I get stuck here and there and some parts are trickier than others, and first drafts are always a clumsy affair, but I still love it and believe in it.

With these books it has been hard work. I’ve forced myself to write a chapter a night most nights and with that work ethic I have managed to write the first two books and even get them to fourth draft stage. I am now nearing the end of the first draft of book three. I know what will happen in book four so it is all getting there. But it is so painful! When I say I force myself, I really do. I stare at the screen for ages. I nearly always get distracted by my phone, checking social media or emails or playing a game. Because it’s hard and I don’t like it being hard!

The trouble has been not understanding why it has been so hard and the other day I finally worked it out. As I mentioned earlier the only other book I had this trouble with was The Tree of Rebels. And there are similarities with this series – The Tree Of Rebels came from a concept first. I had the idea and then built the characters around it. The other similarity I only just realised was that I started writing that book and this series with an audience in mind. I knew The Tree Of Rebels would be a YA dystopian. It was great knowing that because then I’d know who to market it towards. Normally it’s a struggle to figure out what genre my books are! With this series, I knew it would be YA post-apocalyptic and with both The Tree Of Rebels and this series I wanted to aim them at 12-14 year olds. That’s the younger YA age bracket to my other books. I have some books aimed at adults and some aimed at 14 years and up. With The Tree Of Rebels I wanted to write a book my children could read at the time and with this current series I wanted to write a book the children who attend my writing clubs could maybe enjoy…

And that was the trouble! That was the block! When I realised it was like this light bulb eureka moment! Now I can’t believe it took me so long to figure it out!

Having the idea before the characters was a problem but the main problem was deciding who to aim it at before I even started writing. It’s like having someone watch over your shoulder the whole time and it totally changes the experience for me. I start thinking about what elements are expected in that genre and what things are suitable or appropriate for the age group. It ruins the process. I feel like I am writing a book to order, writing for someone else, and that just doesn’t work for me.

I realised that the age group was a real problem. There is a big difference between books aimed at ‘tweens’ and books aimed at older teenagers. I didn’t feel I could swear in this series and it’s just not as gritty or hard hitting as my other books. It’s just not me.

But all that is going to change. Once I figured out what was causing the writer’s block I made a decision. I’m now going to aim the series at the older YA audience and I am going to do what I normally do. Let rip, let them swear, go as dark and gritty and edgy as I like! I am going to write these books for me and no one else because that is the only way it works for me.

It’s amazing but since I realised all this, the chapters have started flowing again. It feels different. It feels exciting and a bit naughty! I have already wandered into darker territory. I am going to finish book three in this vein and carry on into book four. Of course, then I need to go back and rewrite everything I have done so far. I do think that was partly what prevented me from admitting what was wrong – knowing how much work I’d have to do to correct it! But I’m looking forward to it now. There will be more character development, some extra chapters and lots of rewriting in each book but I think it will all be worth it. And I will keep one thing in mind the entire time until these books are ready to publish – I am writing this series for ME. I am writing the books I want to read.

That should work!

And I suppose the moral of the story is always listen to writer’s block because it’s just trying to tell you something. For that reason, writer’s block is actually your friend. You just need to figure out what it’s telling you.

Do you ever suffer from writers’ block? If so, what kind? And what do you do to push through it?