I've been scribbling away the last couple of days on a new short story, inspired by recent news events here in the West Midlands. There's been a sudden rash of schools targeted by arsonists - more even than usual - and I was vaguely scratching my head and wondering why. Then a little imp in my head piped up with a wonderful theory and I just had to turn it into a story. I'm not going to give the whole thing away but I will just say 'never trust the headmaster'.
I don't often write stories based on news events; too often they've been and gone before I've managed to think my way through an associated plot. For crime stories, though, a trawl through the newspapers can be invaluable. There are so many people doing so many strange and dark things that it's a positive well (sink-hole?) of inspiration.
2 comments:
I agree completely. For my first radio play, I had an idea which I held for ages. It needed something extra to fill it out but I had no idea what. Then I read a short news item which gave me the material to change the main character and shift the balance of baddies and goodies so that it suddenly made sense.
Good luck with the story.
Thanks Bill. It's going to need some serious work because the end sort of tails off, but at least I got the idea committed to paper before the next nine-day wonder (or one and a half day wonder) came along and chased it off the news schedules... ;)
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