Originality: Making a Story Yours

For this week’s blog, Kristin suggested I talk about originality, and, yes, I do recognize the irony in that statement. With any creative passion though, it does sometimes seem very hard to come up with your own idea: how many songs can you write with the same chords, how many words can you arrange into different patterns, how many times can you paint something and have it be new?

            First off, quit thinking like that because all you’re going to do is get overwhelmed in self-doubt and anxiety. Secondly, realize that you are bringing your own set of skills, experience, and creativity to the table and that, in and of itself, is going to give your idea its own unique fingerprint of creation. Yes, you do have to stay vigilant to not encroach on other’s ideas and themes, but if you’re really trying to create a new, unique piece of art then that should not be hard.

            So, how do we maintain uniqueness when it feels like everything else has already been done first?

1.     Tell the Story Only You Can Tell

            The first thing I like to think about in writing is what kind of stories I want to tell. What are the things you love? What kind of adventures do you want to go on? Do pirates float your boat (pun intended)? Do you love fantasy stories with talking animals or extensive mythical cultures? Do you like heist stories, mysteries, searches for long, lost treasure? Take the elements you love about things and combine them into a recipe for a story only you could write.

2.     Be Aware of Tropes and Story Associations

This is a big one, especially for new writers. Creativity stems from being exposed to other creative things, but you have to be able to recognize if something you’re creating draws from something else a little too much. People get sued over this all the time- their song uses a melody distinct to something else, their book is too similar to something that’s already been copyrighted, etc. It’s never okay to steal someone else’s work, either intentionally or unintentionally, so you have to make an effort to notice if something in your own work seems familiar.

            There is, of course though, the issue of tropes- or story elements that commonly reoccur in plot, theme, or character types- that sometimes make familiarity hard to be avoided. You’ve seen tropes all your life because they’re effective story elements: two characters have to kiss to avoid being caught by the bad guys, a treacherous rope bridge is the only way to cross the chasm the quest must go through, the humans encounter and have to coexist with aliens that are very different from themselves…there are a bazillion different ways a story can go that have been used before. This is why we see a constant call to utilize tropes but have them play out in some unexpected way as a refresher. Think about tropes you always like to see in stories, as well as ways you can flip them on their head, to create a unique scenario for your characters.

            Beyond using tropes, there is a much greater thing to keep in mind regarding story associations. By this I mean, one type of story is so popular that it is regarded as a quintessential example of that genre. Writers want to write the kinds of stories they love, plain and simple, but sometimes it can be very difficult to do that without drawing comparison to other established stories. For example, if you write a YA story about wizards, even if it’s completely different in every way, you’re still going to get compared to J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter. I think the same holds true for demigods, vampires, and dystopian battle arenas. See? I didn’t even have to name those books and you still knew what stories I’m referring to.

            Just because a story has a great association with something else, doesn’t mean you can’t write about it. If your heart is set on writing about wizards and you’ve got a great idea, that’s great! I’m just saying you might have to work extra hard to get away from those pre-existing literary ties. As a new writer, I feel like this is especially hard if you really love a particular type of story and want to emulate it. Believe me, sometimes you read a book that’s so good, it almost discourages you from writing because you feel like you’ll never be able to write something like that. But writing, or any creative talent, takes a lot of practice and I guarantee that the fantastic final book you’re reading took a lot of writing and re-writing to get to the end result.

3.     Learning to Read for Writing Technique

            Learning to read from a writer’s perspective is one of the most important skills I believe someone that’s interested in writing can develop. Yes, you can read and enjoy a book as an audience member, but reading to see how exactly the author is telling the story is a different matter entirely.

            Obviously, you should never set out to write like someone else but learn to pay attention to what a writer is doing stylistically to make the story so effective. How do they use description/emotion to tell the story in a way that makes you identify with it? What word choice do they use to hammer their point across in a decisive way? Figure out how the writing moves you as the reader and what things the author is doing to trigger that response in you.

            I know for me, I tend to love stories that have that over-the-top humor Rick Riordan tends to use, probably because his books were some of the first I really, really loved to read. Hilarious, yet action-packed adventures are a staple of Riordan’s technique in his series for younger readers and adults, and I believe this is also why I gravitated toward Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff’s Aurora Rising series as it also contains this boisterous humor in a high-stakes plot. I love Markus Zusak’s way of using personified description in The Book Thief and I Am the Messenger. Or Cornelia Funke’s world-building prose in Inkheart.

Look at your favorite books and authors and pay attention to how they do what they do. Think about what types of things you love to see in books or what types of styles work best for how you write. Read a lot and tell the stories you want to tell.

4.     The Characters and the World They Live In

Even if you have the greatest plot in the world, none of it will matter if you don’t have characters your readers will empathize and identify with. Much like tropes, characters types are something that tend to occur over and over again in specific genres. A few months ago, I wrote a blog about the “Sci-Fi straight man” (click here to teleport), the stoic answer to a more overtly funny counterpart in a comedic duo that appears continuously throughout sci-fi as a genre.

So again, think about the kinds of characters you love to see and, more specifically, what type of characters your story needs. If you’re writing an edgy dystopian novel, you probably don’t want a goofball as your main character as it wouldn’t really fit the vibe you’re going for. What characters are common to the type of story you’re telling? How can you make them different if a similar cast falls in each story? What are you trying to accomplish and who can you do that with? Do you need certain personalities, skillsets, etc., and how has the world around the characters shaped them to be the people this story has to be about? What experiences/superstitions/beliefs are common and how does this affect things?

5.     Theme/Purpose

Kristin also made the point that theme might play a lot into the kind of story you write. Your theme is the overall or smaller points you’re trying to get across by telling this story. As a new writer, theme might not be something you’ve considered a lot- I know I didn’t when I was starting out- but that’s okay. Particular themes or ideas might emerge as you dig deeper into the story, so it’s not something you have to know right off the bat.

Her point was that a lot of times if you’ve set your story up as a game, it’s usually a statement against some sort of authority, essentially pulling the strings on a character, or if you’ve got a hero, it might deal with society’s flaws. The theme might help to inform what sort of characters you need as well. If you want to tell a story about a character overcoming their fears, then you obviously need a character that’s afraid of something. If you have a villain that learns remorse, you need some kind of path to redemption.

It might be helpful if you’re not sure where to start to look at themes common to your genre. Sci-fi has a lot of themes regarding exploration, social acceptance, the moral and ethical lines of discovery and its uses, for example. Think about the kinds of things you specifically believe are important that you might want to relay through a story- the power of friendship, love, overcoming adversity- anything that’s important to you can be part of your theme if you find a way to relay that effectively.

6.     Putting it all together

If you’ve been reading along, essentially you’ll see a common thread with all these random thoughts on writing: draw from the things that you love and gain inspiration from and put those into a big mixed-up stew of things only you would put together. If you find yourself saying, “Oh, all my favorite stories have dragons, buried treasure, and best friends that eventually become enemies”, then that’s clearly where you start. It might be a wild combo, but that’s alright if you end up creating a story that’s unique to you. Learn what you love, what techniques suit your writing style best, and then run with it. It may take a while to figure it out, but you will get there if you find a way to make your idea work and you’re dedicated to telling a story you love. Keep in mind the norms of your genre and associations they might bring with them and find new paths forward.

Got any more tips or tricks on writing unique stories? Let us know!

Thanks for reading. Write on.

-Kamryn