Fluffy Toddler Bunny
260 PostsKarma: +32/-1
First, I consider the general shape of the story. That might be too abstract to write down, but is it going to have a genre or crossover genres? Does it have more heart, like rooted in a personal experience or belief that has got to come out? Or is it all spectacle and what if this cool thing happened?
Secondly, I try to get a sense of where it's thin or has gaps. One, I know the plot and playing characters of, but isn't rich enough in worldbuilding. Another has great characters and I'm inspired when it comes to the setting but it has no denouements to the plot. Another has a full plot but not enough character development--but can't combine with the other one that has no denouement, drat it.
With worldbuilding, I can decide to decide on (for example) a decade in history and research the daily life of specific professionals or those in a social/economic class at that time. Or, if it's not contemporary/realistic fiction, I can wonder about how much it resembled the world I know: physical laws, astronomical setup, social issues, laws...but I try to bring it back to the daily life of a character who would be considered ordinary in this world, and doesn't necessarily have a name or any part in the story, it's just a sort of a "tourist thoughtform" test for how well the worldbuilding holds up.
With characters, I try to spark it off from a character dynamic that I'm familiar with and then make it more original by putting whatever fits in what I know and like from my own personality or people that I know.
I really look up to Joss Whedon when it comes to group dynamics. Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly showed a really tight-knit group with different personalities and interweaving dynamics when they played off each other, and I watched one episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and could pick up on similar types that he likes. That doesn't mean that I'll think, "Ooh, I have to have a sweet nerdy waify girl because Whedon always had a sweet nerdy waify girl or two", it was more the group dynamics that influenced me, like when the group got "new blood" later on a series--what did I miss? Why? What did I like? Why?
So, Whedon is a big influence, and Terry Pratchett for a much wider gamut of characterization and character dynamics. I can also draw on character types from the Commedia Dell'Arte, or make it like a family structure (whether the characters really are related or not) nuclear family with nurturing or commanding parents/providers/guardians, insecure dependents or happy dependents; or an extended family, or a mixed family.
With plots...It's a joke among the fans of this author that I like, Scott Westerfeld, that when he gets stuck on the plot, he just makes something explode. Anything. Any kind of explosion. Just make boom and we're fine. I think I mentioned somewhere else that I (figuratively) have a muse named Awkward. The same element that creates comic timing, I've found, can create enough conflict to get a plot rolling. So, I wonder, "What would be really hilariously awkward to add right now?"
Jill Bearup, a YouTube reviewer, also made the observation that with the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire, the next book in the series changes the stakes, unlike common storytelling advice which has it that we must raise the stakes in order for it to be interesting. There's no template that I've found for the kinds of stakes (yet) that I can like put on a chart and spin around like a Wheel of Fortune at a casino, but either raising the stakes or re-examining who has stake in what happening how...is, I've found, good brainstorming practice for plots.
But all that said: Don't think too much about it. I mean, I believe that a storytelling will always be thinking a lot about all of the above, but not necessarily consciously. So, I might have written a lot of words on it but the process can simply be letting the subconscious do its thing and analyze it later.