What to write about

I really had no idea what to start writing about.  I wasn't even sure at first if I should write a fantasy novel.  I started perusing the internet searching for story ideas and then I found idea generators.  There's all sorts of generators-for characters, plots, weapons, sci-fi technology.  The list goes on and on.

I was looking for an idea that really grabbed my attention.  Soon I noticed the ones that got my attention were all fantasy related and that just reaffirmed my thinking that I should go with fantasy.  I stumbled across a story line suggestion about a dragon that had a cursed bracelet that was driving him insane and suddenly my imagination went wild.  Yes!  That's the one!  A flood of scenes and characters and ideas went pouring through my brain.  Still, what did I do with all these ideas?

I wanted to know how to organize my story, how to collect and focus my ideas and how to keep from getting stuck.  You see, I've written many books before this.  The problem always was that around page 50 or so I got bored.  The characters didn't seem to have anyplace to go and didn't know what to do.  What was the point?

I've since found out that my style of writing lumps me into the group of authors called "pantsers."  People who write by the seat of their pants.  I didn't want to be a pantser though-it never worked for me. I know it works for others, but not me.  So again I turned to google for my salvation.  I looked up plot development and writing a fantasy novel, hoping and praying to the gods of google that they would send me an answer.  And lo and behold they did!  The snowflake method.

The snowflake method is a step by step method of getting your story organized.  I'm tired right now so I'm not going to get into it too much, but in the next post I'll tell you all about it.