how do you get your ideas?

i get asked this question a lot, even from my husband: how do you get all your ideas?

great question, dear:)

i ran across this amazing quote the other day and it has completely changed my attitude towards writing...for the better.

"if you don't have time to read, you don't have the time or tools to write." -stephen king

seriously? i couldn't (well, i didn't) have said it better myself. writing is a freeing task for my heart and brain and soul and all those other great things, but reading is where it begins.

one might ask: isn't reading like getting ideas and stealing them?

my answer is no, not exactly. it's the same as listening to music and writing it exactly as you just heard it. of course people copy, people plagiarize, people steal from drug stores (it happens--just not to me). but for real creative minds, i believe that it unlocks a side of your writer's brain that you didn't have open for business. you start thinking in a way you didn't before. you start looking at things in your regular life that you wouldn't have even noticed before.

i went to the library the other day and picked out 5 books for my new novel. they are more for research than for writing style, so i went back to my parents' house to see if any of the books i had in my old room would help me in my quest. (don't discount books you have already read! sometimes you don't know what you know---does that make sense?

so now, i'm ready to get my read on.

piece of advice--if you have a genre in mind that you want to write about, find some authors who write those kinds of books...start with them first!  (that narrows it down a little:) )

have a great day!

ashlyne huff revelette