This is where you start. The small idea, the one sentence, whatever tickles your fancy; this is how it begins. Write it down, in a notebook, on Google Docs, on Microsoft Word, a sheet of loose leaf paper, just write it down. Otherwise you may end up forgetting it and you'll never get to write a potentially amazing idea.

Also, those of you who are trying to get an idea: don't. In my experience, trying to force an idea just pushes me further into a writer's block (for those of you who don't know what that is, or how to get over one, I'll address that in a later chapter). And as some of you know, writer's blocks are not pretty.

Once I get the idea down, I start something I call "ideashooting." This basically consists of me rapidly typing down ideas... and, most of the time, shooting them down. Like so:

OOOOH WHAT IF OTTO LIKE GETS JEALOUS AND
no that's
BUT WHAT
nO

Stuff like that where I can be weird and have no one judge me. It's fun, and I write as I go so I can keep up with my head. Now, I can type fast because I've been typing for years. I know some people aren't able to type at 10000 wpm (I certainly cannot) but try to catch your ideas as they come. It really helps me to better plan the story out and work out things like "what goes here?" and "what if this goes there?" plotwise. You can have many ideas for a story, but until you get them in place then that's all they are; ideas.

I'll try and update this book with one chapter every other Sunday. Until next time!
-Parker