How to Have FUN With Your Story | Guest Post by Bethany Meyer

Hi, I'm Bethany! I’m the author of two, soon to be three books, and the trilogy I’m currently working on is probably the biggest blast I’ve had writing in a while. I have never laughed so hard with characters or shaken my head so often over their antics. I mean, come on, putting a whole river in a bag? You’re kidding!

So let’s talk about having fun with stories because I definitely want to have this much fun again.

We’re supposed to enjoy writing, right? We like it, so we keep at it. But struggles happen, they just do. I know that even with this trilogy, I’ve had(and probably still will have)plenty of times when the writing became stressful and not enjoyable. So how do we get to having fun in the first place, and if we lose it, how do we get it back?

The answers to both are the same, and the bottom line is this: aim to please yourself with the story.

Write it for yourself. From the very beginning, set out to create something you genuinely enjoy. When I brainstormed for Robbing Centaurs and Other Bad Ideas, I had a single goal in mind: write a book I would want to read. Of course, everything I write is something that I want to read(and a good thing too since they always need many rounds of edits and readthroughs), but with this one, I wanted only to create a crazy story that I would be eager to write and read. If other people enjoyed it, fantastic! But they weren’t the audience I had in mind.

That leads me to my next point: Don’t take the story too seriously.

Do that and you’re bound to end up in a rut. Let yourself write silly ideas, even draft whole scenes that you never plan to incorporate into the main story. I like to write lists of ideas including even the crazy ones that would never work, and spoiler alert– sometimes those ideas are worth something after all. The opening chapters of Robbing Centaurs would never have involved fireworks if it weren’t for these lists. I wrote the idea with the fireworks as an overly extravagant one I could never use, and what do you know, it made it into the final draft.

It’s also important to hunt down ideas that make you excited. Look around for ideas that make you want to write. For example, for years now I’ve loved the idea of winged rabbits. Bunnies with wings make for such a striking image, and can you imagine flocks of them crossing the sky? Compile your story from ideas that make you excited and Frankenstein them in there any way you can. Maybe your winged rabbits are even an important part of the plot! You’ll never know until you explore the possibilities.

And don’t be shy about humor, either! Make yourself laugh. Write in lots of jokes, or even just make memes and jokes about the story itself. I’m part-time a meme account, but you don’t have to do all that. You can do as little as to find an incorrect quotes generator and put your characters names into it. It does all the work for you, and the quotes are good both for your own personal enjoyment or to share with your followers!

Long story short, don’t think about it too much. Aim to entertain yourself and produce something you’ll enjoy. In the end you’ll get a world of fun out of it, and as an added bonus you might even find other people who enjoy it too.

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About me!

I’m Bethany Meyer, and my writer career began in the typical fashion, as a kid writing fantasy stories. Fantasy never lost its sparkle, so I never stopped. In my spare time, I like to make memes(that I usually post on my Instagram) or painting while I watch anime on the TV. I like to stay busy :) My trilogy’s second book, World Saving and Other Disasters, releases at the end of the year!

Here are my links so we can stay in touch:

Instagram: @scribbledfiction

Twitter: @ScribbldFiction

Website: https://mebethanydanni.wixsite.com/bethanymeyer-1

Buy Robbing Centaurs and Other Bad Ideas! https://rb.gy/ge9l0t