From Ideas to Stories 1/2

There are some great ideas out there. I'm sure we've all had dozens (or at least several) that we've though 'wow, that would make a great story'. When I first started writing, I would create a new file for each idea, keep it in mind and add new thoughts around that idea when something came to me. Needless to say, I was building up dozens of 'stories'... which, as any experienced writer soon learns, aren't really stories. They're just a collection of disparate ideas.

So, once I realized I could never possibly write all the 'stories' that I was developing, the next step came to me: I would start combining like-seeming ideas into a common story (yes, this thought was undoubtedly only original to me, I'm sure almost every serious author goes through this stage, most probably more quickly than me). At this stage things really start to get exciting as you juxtapose ideas you hadn't considered bring together before. The setting really begins to gain some depth, and interesting story twists start peeking out of the corners and introducing themselves.

It's at this stage that the amatuer writer strongly needs to revisit their characters. For some people (not me) character development comes naturally. An honest assessment of my own work suggests that I can make interesting characters, but for some reason, they are never the main character. He (and it's invariably a 'he') is flat and boring, surrounded by really interesting people.

So, once the world and general story ideas are developed, I go back and have a strong reworking of my main character and his relationship to other characters. Generally, I find all the characters have been too pleasant to each other and I need to build in some conflict and tension between at least some of them.

So, currently, that's how I progress through my story developement process. This particular process won't work for everybody, as some people are stronger at certain areas than others, but I have a feeling it is a good place to start for amateur sci-fi writers--a group who tend to be strong on world building and weak on characterization (perhaps not so different from most amateur writers?).