In recent weeks, I've devised a way to use games of Spider Solitaire to generate characters and plots: clever, yes? Using that system has inspired my brain to come up with more ideas on its own, too, which I can only count as a good thing. :-)

I had two plans: one was to work on a novel I've been thinking about, "The Flower Bride," this coming November when I sign up for NaNoWriMo again, and the other was to ask the Spider Generator to give me the basics of a paranormal romance. Ah, but the best laid plans, right?

Through one of my Yahoo groups I got word of a short-story contest, the deadline for which is 1 December and the genre for which is horror, occult, sci-fi, sci-fantasy -- that sort of thing. It's supposed to be 10-12,000 words or so.

Well, I asked the Spider Generator for something along those lines, and it gave me the bare bones of a story I decided to call "The Decanter." Only then, as I was starting to make notes, "The Decanter" turned into a novel. I like it well enough that I'm probably going to work on ~it~ come November, which leaves me to find some other motivation to draft "The Flower Bride."

And what about the short-story contest? I was muddling over that as I drifted off to sleep last night, and came up with an idea for a story -- really a story this time, not a novel -- that I'll call "Do You Want Frogs with That." And I like it a lot too. No matter the contest results, I'll enjoy writing it and taking it to my writing group, where I think my colleagues will get a kick out of it too.

"Do You Want Frogs with That?" didn't come directly from the Spider Generator, but it was sort of an off-shoot; and I do have five or six other stories (not counting "The Decanter") that have come directly from my new system. It's been a fairly productive couple of months for me, and I just hope I can write fast enough to keep up with myself!

Hope y'all's ideas are workin' for you too. Enjoy the rest of the summer, and blesséd be!





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