The question on the tip of any writer’s tongue is where do the ideas come from?  For me that can be almost anywhere; I’ll illustrate this with seven examples from my own writing.

1.      When my grandmother died I inherited her postcard collection which contained cards from around 1908 to 1918. I was intrigued with the letters and notes on these, the language of the times, the way they were used as conversational notes and to arrange get togethers. Also noticeable was the transition from the happy colourful early cards to the more sombre cards of the First World War period. I decided to write a story told by postcards. The end result was a touching tale of an elderly woman in her last hours, sharing a youthful war time love story with her granddaughter, through the reading of her postcard albumn. This became ‘Postcards from Wumberidgee’ which was highly commended in the 2010 Positive Words Poetry and Short Story Competition.

2.      I was lying in bed one night trying to think of something dramatic to write about, which led me to think about great books. Somewhere along this train of thought the bible came to mind. Trying to think of something dramatic I could draw from the bible (and I am by no means an expert on that book), I somehow settled on stoning. Now I am thinking about a woman in danger of being stoned. Why is this happening? What brought her to this point (back story)? Will someone help her or will she be betrayed? What might she be capable of to save herself? This idea became ‘Not Dead Yet’ which won the 2008 Boroondara Literary Prize and was published in Award Winning Australian Writing 2009.

3.      ‘The Footsnake Story’, a humorous Aussie encounter with a tiger snake, highly commended in the Stringy Bark Short Story Competition of 2010 and published in The Umbrella’s Shade was loosely based on a childhood incident when a tiger snake went under the kids cubby hut.

4.      ‘Espresso’ published in Mosaic by Bridge House Publishing in 2010, is a sped up version of the courtship between my husband and I.

5.      ‘April’s Perfect Cuppa’, published in Positive Words Magazine in 2011 takes its theme from the simplicity of life demonstrated in my four-year-old granddaughter’s pretend tea party.

6.      In my time as a public accountant I often came across older ladies who had been widowed and had no understanding of how to conduct their finances. This started me thinking about what else would be different for these women whose life had always been defined by their family.  ‘After the Wake’ was second prize winner in the Flash 500 First Quarter Competition  2010.

7.      Lost for a story one afternoon, I was driving to the shopping centre, almost chanting a mental mantra, story, story, story. I passed a shopping trolley abandoned by the roadside, started thinking about trolleys out of place, neglected and damaged and ‘Trolleys International’ began to form. ‘Trolleys International’, a humorous tale told from the point of view of an abandoned trolley was commended in the Best of Times Short Story Competition #7.

Where do your story ideas come from?