Old Ideas New Again

Okay so how many of you have done it? How many of you have tried at one point or another to take that old idea you had, maybe you even wrote a couple of chapters, and tried to brush it off and see if it still had some life.

I do this occasionally but not often with great success. One book I know I did this with was Suspect Lover. I pulled it apart, put it back together and thought it really worked. But when it finally came out it wasn’t reviewed all that well - why? Reviewers said it was disjointed. Hmmmm? Could it be the pulling apart and putting back together wasn’t so transparent to the reader?

And let’s face it. The main reason those old ideas didn’t work was because they weren’t that good. And here I’m using “good” to mean “sellable”. We have lots of great ideas. But we’re professional writers or aspiring professional writers so it isn’t enough to have a great idea – you need to be able to sell it.

I wrote a freakin’ A great book. It’s funny, suspenseful, heartbreaking and uplifting. It’s a great sports movie in book form. At least in my opinion. But it’s about a woman golfer. Yep. A woman golfer so amazing she qualifies for the Masters. A lot of agents who read it said basically the same thing. Love it. Can’t sell it.

Tweaking and reworking to come up with something new sounds good, but if at its heart its flawed (like an idea about a female golfer) then you could be spinning your wheels and wasting time.

I hear this a lot with new authors. They write that first book and it’s such a huge thing for them that they will do everything to hold on to it. Changing it and altering it trying to please the next person in line – which I think in some ways can ruin your story because you’re moving away from what this was in your head.

It’s a story about a female golfer, but maybe if I instead make her an actress it will work. It won’t. Who this character is, is built on all of the experiences I created for her. Plugging out the essence of her and switching it with something else I think would make for a lesser character and a lesser story.

On the flipside, I am considering going back to two characters who I loved and giving them a new plot. I originally intended them for a romantic suspense but never really loved the suspense element. It was a bit too hokey. But I realize maybe I can just focus on who these two people are and what their issues are as a couple. Granted – I still need to give them a plot to move the story but it makes me realize something interesting.

I can’t go back and make Reilly Carr (my favorite heroine name) anything else then what she is, but I can’t take these two people and who they are at their core and just send them on a different adventure. At least I hope.