Young Writers Society

Dusk on the Horizon written by @Stringbean and myself originated as an RP that became its own world very, very quickly. Now, we've decided to entirely revise that RP and compile it into a single book and then do the same with the RPs that acted as prequels and sequels.

I'm currently drafting a story inspired by SuperNatural. It's called The Monster Whisperer, and it's about a high schooler who hunts down monsters while keeping them hidden from people. She is reincarnated from a long line of monster hunters, and she becomes an apprentice to an old woman who's brother died on the job.

So...I have a lot of novels going on...well only about three actively being written right now but about six ideas and since this is about the ideas...I'll talk about all of them....because why not?

Life: Take 2 - A Subtitle That I Haven't Decided On

So this is my least developed idea, its not got any plot outlined yet, a world that has to be properly built and characters...lol I haven't even decided how many characters are going to be in this.

This however starts came as a result of a thought I had related to the Heroes of Olympus stories. So the story of Hazel Levesque as someone that got a second chance at life got me thinking of something along those lines.

And so this concept was born. Essentially the idea is that those that die at a young age, never got to prove if they would affect the world for good or bad, and appear to be people on the path of doing something good get a second chance at life, provided they can first prove their worth and do a certain number of tasks according to an ancient rule. And so the plan is to have a book per task and have it be kind of like The Famous Five or something where each book has its own separate story. The only connection will be that all that time they'll be working towards getting that second chance.

And my idea for the first is not very developed but this book is set to feature, time travelers, a band of pirates and tons of storms. All inspired by...well the Storybook Section...all this talk of pirates at the same time as I'm looking for how to get the series underway and I decided on that.

And the title, well that was initially meant to be The Shadowhunters because that's who they'll be, ghosties tracking other ghosties and hunting shadows so to speak. But I learnt that the name was taken so I had to change. It became known as The Second Chance 'cause that's what it was and even then it was already the title of some movie.

So, drawing from the fact that as someone who's also trying to be a youtuber and so is studying up on all sorts of editing tricks and filming tricks, I though why not call it Life, but like the second take, because the first one didn't work out. And so I'm yet to fully decide between, Life: Take 2 and Life: The Second Take but we'll see.

Superhero High School: A Subtitle I Haven't Decide On

This one is the next culprit, I've had the idea long enough to know the cast, the world and everything but they need a story...aka I'm missing a proper villain. The ideas I've had so far don't carry enough with them to make a functional plot out of.

And this idea came to through this movie called Sky High...which was basically this, a superhero high school. I just thought that was an awesome concept that they like barely bothered to explore in the movie so this is set to be sort of my take on how a superhero high school would go. A few experiments are set to happen in this one, including perhaps my first attempt at a original LGBTQ themed story so we'll see what ends up happening.

As you can see its an extremely title that just spells out what this is.

Once Upon a Time in the Cretaceous: An Unfortunate Accident

And this one, in that final stage of development. A decently fleshed out plot with a proper chapter outline, sketches for the types of characters I want and a proper set of arcs. This one is missing a world, well two or three settings need detail, and of course actual named characters. So far I just have their personalities and roles summed up.

So this started out with a fanfic basically. There was this amazing Harry Potter fanfic with a sort of slow burn hate to love you storyline and I wanted to do one of those. And so I needed a situation for that...and I thought of this ridiculous idea of like when workplaces have like staff trips and the kids all meet and its maximum awkward tensions. And of course I was reading Dan Brown's Angels and Demons at the time. So it became a science lab, complete with a big ol' particle accelerator conducting experiments.

And then while reading Time Riders where they accidently get zapped back into the time of the dinosaurs I decide that yaa...that's what's going to happen. A particle accelerator accident sends these kids back in time and then its just fighting dinosaurs, surviving and falling in love.

Meanwhile the parents in the present try to get them back while fighting other forces...but that's all behind a series of plot twists so yaa...you guys will know eventually.

The title for this one comes from the period of dinosaur history they'll be getting zapped back to.

Survival: The Escape

This one...well this one, if things to go to plan in NaNo, this will be the second ever book I complete, and this time I might actually be happy with the story. We'll see, the world has been built to the last detail, characters are ready to go, plot is planned out completely, it just needs to be written.

And the idea for this comes from well the fact that my friend loves the idea of like dystopias and just horrifying worlds where all goes wrong. And I though I should do one of those, where its Earth after an apocalypse. And it was literally title After the Apocalypse and the idea was that a few kids would fall in love...cough...save the human race from some alien captors.

At first I couldn't really figure out a way five kids could save an entire race without it being ridiculous and shelved for a long time, then as the other stories and my world developed around it, a viable plot sprang out, a possible inciting incident came up and then the plot happened.

And so the title changed to reflect what the plot is, its them trying to survive in a Earth that is no longer theirs and this first book is all about how they escape captivity.

The Sorcerers of Hisderat

This is the current main project you could say, everything is ready for it and 17k odd words have already been written. With a expected final count of 100k, the NaNo 50k should see this go a long way towards being complete and hopefully finished off sometime in the end of December or beginning of January.

And this one is the craziest one. So basically me and my friend have been trying to write a collab story for a while but our extremely contrasting writing styles mean that our stories rarely if ever pass the planning stage. So one day he was just like dude, let's just write a random fight scene, post it on Reddit (this was before I found YWS...heck searching for a place for this story is how I found YWS...but that's a whole other story) and see if we can actually write something that makes sense together.

So the first thing was written, it was kind of like a roleplay, he made two characters, I made two characters and it was just this like 18+, f bombs, limbs flying mess of a scene. But it was a good one. We were both happy about it, and after editing for cohesiveness we decided to make it PG, then try to build something from it. It made it till three chapters with no plot or any structure whatsoever and then he got bored of like he always does.

But...I was having none of that, after pestering him to keep writing and coming up empty, I decided, I like these characters, I'm altering this one, making a plot, fleshing out them characters, and writing a story. And so I rewrote the first scene (it was third person omniscient mess that I recalibrated to third person limited) and then sort of put my flair on it (jokes and a very obvious will they/ won't they cheese fountain) and wrote a couple of chapters.

At first, it was not great, people on the sites I found just pointed out random grammar things and didn't help at all. I was considering throwing this in the trash and just forgetting writing completely to go full time with just YouTube. Then I found this site, people liked it, wrote some helpful reviews and I was like, okayy...lets just do this. A plot was finalized, arcs were made, twists were added and the story was born, a story of a very important briefcase and several other hidden plot points.

And the name was well chosen by the both of us when we needed a name to post it under and we just chose the sorcerers of [insert town name] format 'cause it was the simplest. I created the word Hisderat which expresses my feelings very well about this story and how it was made. So yaa that's an anagram of Read This, because that's all I wanted for the story, for someone to read it.

The Alpha Pack: The Dawn of the Dead

And this one,...oh boy...I could write a novel about how this novel was formed.

So...this story begins a good four, five years ago, this was a result of my first ever attempt at writing something. I was fresh off of the latest Percy Jackson novel and I wanted something amazing like that but a story where things happened the way I liked. And since I couldn't find such a thing I just decide, I'm just going to write it.

And so I did, an idea that formed by the name The Special Seven: The Palace of Death, basically a bunch of kids learn they are aliens that have superpowers, their parents get killed, they go on a quest to get their weapons back from an evil monster army that stole them and hid them in The Palace a Death, the place where a portal under the Bermuda Triangle leads to. And I did it, it took a couple of tries for me to be satisfied, but Harry Hardy was born that day (I always Harry Potter and I was just getting into Hardy Boys at that point) and so were several other key characters that still live on and I wrote a story. It took about an year and a half, and by the end of it, my writing ability had dramatically increased, making it a weird mess of horrifying garbage to a halfway decent ending.

Eventually I decide it was kinda crappy and the idea was scrapped, I needed to do better. So I revamped things, made them part of this bigger organization called the Earth Defence corporation and inspired by running into The very first Avengers film, my heroes became proper superheroes, and it became a superhero team up series, the first installment involved introducing these seven kids.

So the plot was upgraded and things happened and I revised it, writing yet another edition of it, but at the end of it I was still not happy with it and the characters were horrible.

Then I made a friend, several new friends, I sort of put this on the backburner, began organizing other things in school and formed a gang of sorts where we would sort of pretend like we were superheroes, giving ourselves crazy name, code names and we'd do all kinds of things around our school from throwing away garbage if we saw it on the floor to even running top secret mission where we would track down the classes of prominent bullies and prank the crap out of them.

At this point we started being allowed to write stories for our English exams so still having that writer spirit inside I turned our escapades into a series of essays, titling the universe after our gang which we called The Alpha Pack because well...one of my friends, now a former member, but one of the founders loved wolves and so he was like we'll be a pack and we'll call ourselves the Alphas 'cause we are the best. Yes guys this story has nothing to do with werewolves or vampires...dunno why so many people think its that

And so well then came by rekindling of the flame to write because after I wrote a few essays my English told me that...heyy...your essays with topics are kind of bad, but your stories are great and you can definitely be an author so keep on writing them.

And so I took my old draft, updated the characters by making one for each of my friends, added a few more all based on people that positively influenced me in life and made things happen, thought of like a big team up between humans and several other planets and my world expanded into worlds.

The Alpha Pack was born. Then as I ran through a chapter or two and figured out a plan, my friendships changed, some amazing ones staying and other fakes ones leaving, the characters evolved, our real life things evolved and I finally came up with a storyline after nearly two years of planning and worldbuilding to make a very ambitious 22 part series that would span more than a couple million words.

And the first step of that journey is Alpha Pack: The Dawn of the Dead. Its inspired by an essay I wrote titled Operation Sentient Dust, which was based on this obscure movie about a mummy coming to life (Not The Mummy...that is definitely not an obscure film, this one is a found footage style weird thing). And this whole thing was based on us dealing with this one double agent that joined our gang and helped out a gang of bullies. So taking that real life drama and mummies and then eventually space and a massive world to play with the story as it was released to YWS was formed. Harry, my original character, the superhero alias I picked in our little gang, kind of became me, and with him leading the charge, Avengers Infinity War happening, things fell into place.

But...with 17 group members and 17 protagonists and many others, I had doubts about whether people could understand this. So I wrote some chapters and threw it at YWS. After getting some great feedback and visiting stories where a large number of characters were used effectively, I have now restructured it all, and this plot I am finally satisfied with, the characters and their arcs too. And now that I have a very stable and unshakable set of friends, some great people who influenced me (yes there be characters inspired by various YWS members in here) and final set was created. And I wrote the prologue for it, jam packed with twists that will pay off 22 books later.

And now that its freshly plotted, I hope to make a decent dent in that 250k target by attempting to hit 25k this NaNo for an estimated finish by April - December 2021 depending on how fast I end up writing.


And that was me writing way too much about my stories...if you read this far...you are awesome and thank you for listening to me ramble.

My first ever novel started with me imagining me and my friends becoming Dragon riders whenever I got bored with class. (I was obsessed with How to Train Your Dragon at the time (Still am))
Anyway, at the time, it was just me playing out action scenes in my head, but eventually, I formed a plot idea, and changed out the characters to better match the world. I wrote it down in my notebook during free time. I completed it two years later.
Another story started when I watched a video about time travel, and learned about the idea of a multiverse. I sat on the concept of three multiverses colliding for awhile, before starting it during Last Man Standing.
My current project, which I've been calling Unreal, came to me as most ideas do, well using the bathroom.
Well, sorta, I had been playing with the idea of creating a character who could break the fourth wall for awhile, but I wasn't sure how to go about it. I had two ideas at the time (Which I still might do) where either Characters from novels that I made up get stranded in 'the real world' or vise versa. However, Unreal is a bit different, with characters who are trapped in their own world, know it isn't real, and aren't happy about it.
And yeah, that's how all my main novel ideas came to me.

I definitely posted in this thread with my previous novel ideas, but I don't think I've done it with my current one just yet. My latest novel, Ghosted, was inspired by a fanfiction I had been toying around with for at least a year. I was really frustrated with an author killing off some of his characters, so I decided to write a fanfiction where they got a second chance on another world. That world and its magic system was the basis for my latest novel. I also really got a kick out of writing one of the characters in that fic, so the protagonist of my novel was loosely based off of the alternate universe version of that character. Another side character was a blend of two of the characters that popped up in the fic, so I really owe my current story's progress to the original author.

My current project Chasing Shadows started with an idea for a character dynamic I've always wanted to write (or at least for the past eight years or so), inspired by my own experiences as an older sister from a large, close-knit family and by my favorite childhood fantasy stories.

Over the years, the details of the characters and plot evolved and changed a bajillion times, but there are certain elements that tend to stay the same: A sibling duo (sometimes a trio) with magic powers ends up alone, underdogs up against a powerful enemy in a grimdark fantasy world, and have to protect eachother. Older sibling is serious and mature, younger sibling is optimistic and innocent. They're separated and complications arise that pit them against eachother as enemies, but they're eventually reunited and reconcile in the end. Or one might die and become the other one's drive, or one might become the well-intentioned villain.. all depending on what themes I'm going for in that particular version of the story.

Chasing Shadows is built off this old idea with some changes and new elements introduced that take inspiration from my favorite childhood books, movies, and shows. Many of the fantasy worldbuilding aspects are inspired by details from Brandon Sanderson's cosmere and the Studio Ghibli movies, while the themes of the character arcs are more often inspired by my own life experiences, my family members, and other people I've known.

So.. I basically started with the two main characters and everything else- worldbuilding, plot, themes, side characters- sort of grew out of the dynamic and character arcs I had planned for them.

Well, it usually comes from inspiration or just a flash of insight.

Usually, I just start daydreaming about characters and viola you have a novel idea.

The first horror novel I read was The Shining, which sparked my imagination and so far my book is at about 30 000 altogether. I slowly and unknowingly integrated aspects of the book together. A huge place on a hill versus a mountain. An abusive dad versus a dad who gets angry. A huge mansion versus a hotel. The house being set on fire versus a boiler exploding etc. I think you read and you look at writing styles and when a particular writing style fascinates try to write a short story in that style and slowly but surely turn it into a whole novel.

Movies are also a huge visual inspiration and even something like cobblestone on a horse stable can translate into the look of the cobblestone in the basement.

One of my novels I started because of an English assignment and just continued working on it.
My current one, it was actually inspired by doodles I made on my notes during chem. Some buildings, plants, keys.. it turned into a world I told my friends about and soon created a character for. From there I've been writing and plotting it out.

Honestly, my current novel has been through so many iterations it's not even really the same concept that I started with. Back when I was in high school I was a big fan of female-assassin/spy-driven stories (like, I adored Graceling and another book that for whatever reason I can't remember the title of but I read it like three times).

And I've been collecting inspiration for random characters and plot points over the years, kind of stripping them all down and cramming them together into the current crackpot plot that I currently have going on. My novel still needs serious revisions, though. Let's see if draft 4 can salvage it lol

My cousins and I had a bet. If I lost I'd have to write a short story on a writing prompt of their choice. Long story short...I lost.
The original prompt was that a man found a bunch of explosives buried in the grains of hot chocolate. Every hot chocolate container blew up and half the world was destroyed.
Crazy right? From there came a novel about biowarfare that has nothing to do with the original prompt but i gotta credit them for giving me the motivation to start

The one I'm currently working on, Burning Skies, started off as a novel called To Every Sky a Storm. It was about a thief, Fable, and a prince, Alastair, and basically the king was bad and Fable was fed up with it so he kidnapped Alastair in an attempt to make the king listen to his people. It didn't work because the people who ACTUALLY ran the country, the Council, Did Not Care about Alastair. But then I also tried to fit like, a whole second book into it? It was all political intrigue and stuff.
Anyway the plot was messy and the pacing was WAY off, but the actual writing itself holds up, I'd say! (I wrote 16000 words of that thing. How.)
So in an attempt to rework the whole thing, I changed Fable's name to Ilya ev Emieln and made him a lost prince of Chiesau Nova, and I was going to merge the two parts, aaaaaand then I gave up.
So recently I tried again! Basically, I liked the characters I had, but the plot left something to be desired in my eyes. So now Ilya is still a lost prince, but he's also an informant living in Alastair's country, and he ends up at this thing in Najahashi (I have a whole world ahahah) called the Fire Festival. The other three POV characters are Alastair, Rurik tan Nazta (king of Najahashi), and Lotus (who's the Marquess of somewhere else but I should probably stop talking about the countries before I utterly confuse everyone)

Oh yeah. The idea for the original definitely came from Six of Crows. I wanted to write a heist novel