What to Write?

This question is not asking what it probably seems to be asking.

When I was studying for my MFA, one professor asked the class to write essays on this very topic. I don’t remember my essay. But I do remember the gist of an essay written by a young woman who said that if her writing touches just one person, then she would be a successful writer.

Young and ambitious, I commented that if my writing touches only one person then I would be a horrible failure. And that is true. For me. But obviously not for this other writer.
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Recently, I see writers stating on social media something similar…that they write “for passion, not profit.” And being a bit older, I understand their point of view. But I just don’t see passion and profit as being mutually exclusive. Why not write for both passion and profit?

I have been produced on stage and in film, have contributed to numerous projects, been published in magazines, newspapers, and have published a couple books.

Yet I still don’t feel successful. Why? Because my dreams are frighteningly huge. I don’t want to touch just one person, or a few. I want the world to laugh with me, cry with me, feel affected by my stories the same way they affect me. I want my name in the credits. I want to walk the red carpet. I want financial success. There is so much I need to do and my time on this planet is waning. As a popular meme asks: Why aren’t we all chasing after our dreams like we’re going to die tomorrow?

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​That doesn’t mean I haven’t celebrated my wins. And those wins all serve their purpose in my dreams.
The question I am asking here has an answer that has everything to do with your goal.

When starting out, many writers craft a story that is interesting to them and hope that the world will also find it interesting. Sometimes this works. Most of the times, however…it doesn’t. Consider two movies about unwanted pregnancies that seem to have been written as personal interest pieces--Juno and The Obvious Child. Juno hit it out of the park, whereas The Obvious Child did not.

Although I liked only one, both films are winners in my book because they were produced and released. Those are huge hurdles.

Now, maybe you don’t care to write a film. Maybe Hollyweird isn’t part of your dream. And that’s great! But the approach I take to writing a novel is through the lens of writing a screenplay because my dream includes both…even as a kid I wanted to write a book that was so freakishly successful it would be turned into a film.

The first book I remember reading that was written through such a lens was the original Jurassic Park, by Michael Crichton. It was the first book I had ever picked up on a Friday and barely put down until I wrapped up the read on Sunday night. I was as fascinated with the story as I was with its approach. So much so, that I wrote Chrichton to ask him why he had approached the book the way he did. (He even wrote back!) For my goals, writing the novel first as a screenplay makes sense.

And I would argue that if you are interested in writing only novels, this approach also works because it will strengthen your “throughline,” onto which all your subplots and extras can be drafted. If you end up over-writing, it will be clear where the cuts to be made have been written. If your core story falls flat, it is much easier to strengthen and tweak it within the bare bones the screenplay will provide, and you can be more easily certain that all the extras you add to the novel actually serve that core story.

Now, whatever story you write (in whatever format) should interest you. You should be passionate and inspired. But let’s choose a concept to write that is marketable. Why? We want to set ourselves up for success—be it in a film or a novel. Let’s choose a writing project people will likely want to see or read. We, of course, can’t predict what a publisher or studio might want to see, but we can craft a story with certain decisions in mind that will make a story interesting to them.

To do that, we’re not even going to think (yet) about characters and roles, subplots, settings, and all the other fun elements that go into crafting a story. We’re going to create a generic concept that could be written in any number of ways. Consider Bad Elf and The Krampus. The basic concept is this: A Goth elf at the North Pole steals the Naughty List to use as a map to find his Christmas-demon idol, Krampus, only to discover too late that he is on Krampus’ Naughty List. This concept can go in any number of directions:

• Does this involve Santa?
• Is it a Christmas story or a Halloween story?
• Is it a horror, comedy, or a rom-com?
• What’s the theme?
• Is this for adults or kids, or both?
• How does Santa’s Naughty List differ from Krampus’?
• Does this take place in the past, present, or future?
• Does it only take place at the North Pole?
• Etc.

The concept is just an idea, with ideas for characters but not the characters themselves.

So, if—like the earlier examples—what you are interested in writing is about unwanted pregnancy (and who isn’t?!) take away all the details of the story you might have been thinking about and narrow it down into its barest concept. See if it’s still interesting. What makes your concept unique? What haven’t we seen or read before?

If you’ve got a couple concepts in mind, great! If not, don’t despair! The next few posts will give you a few strategies for coming up with concepts. Before you set your heart on any one concept, let’s generate a few concepts. Quite a few. Maybe a hundred or so. (It’s not as hard as you might think. After all, Sharknado is a thing.)

I, of course, am aiming for success. And for myself, success means something specific. And huge. For you, it might just be to see a story through to completion. Or maybe to touch just one person. However you define success, shoot for it.

​That young woman in my class reached success at a very young age, for all these years later, her essay still touches me. I’m her one person. I still think about it as I continue working towards my own success.