Young Writers Society

Does anyone think that reading minds is too cliche no matter how it's done? Im working on a story right now and I majorly need some help figuring out some new original special abilities that the characters could have.

Anyone?

I guess it just depends on what kind of story you want to tell.

Is it a superhero story or a story of someone who can just read minds? If It's the former, I wouldn't worry about it--just make sure that the character in question has other superpowers to balance everything out. In my opinion powers can't really be cliches simply because there are only so many to go around-unlike character and plot possibilities, which are endless. If it's the latter, I also wouldn't worry about it, so long as it's needed for the story. It it isn't, try to think of what power would best compliment and help move the story along.

Hope this helps!

Well its not really a superhero story. Its more of a story of the causality of having the ability of mind reading. (Its actually a very, very complex and strange story. Hard to explain.) Im just thinking something along the lines of an ability which kind of stands out. Or something which can stand in addition to the mind reading to make it as fresh as possible.

Thanks for the help anyways though!

First, there isn't anything original out there.

I think if you're trying to do a deconstruction of the power, just about anything you do will have something to it. Telepathy rarely gets deconstructed (from what I've seen) so you should be able to find something unique in there. Although I do remember one deconstruction was with Jean Grey from X-Men. When her telepathy came up, it caused her to be so overstimulated she lots control of her telekinesis and nearly destroyed a pretty large area (cause she could manipulate things on a molecular level).

So, if you take some twist on the downsides of it, I'd be interested in seeing what you come up with.

The method by which the mind reading is done what is really the main part of which makes it different. I really thought about a few things which would be necessary realistically to achieve this feat. And I think I came up with something original. I even thought of that idea like the Jean Grey example but even there what really other than the obvious could be a down side to ESP?

So Im not very secure in it so I wanted to get some advice.

Overstimulation can actually take a lot of different forms. There's a physical reaction (collapsing, tension from all the thoughts around, possibly becoming a puppet if somebody with the proper mind control powers was around), emotional reaction (which would be closer to empathy, but can also be irritability from sensing too much, or the emotional strain of knowing everybody's secrets/thoughts, the isolation if somebody knows the character is a mind reader and can't protect their mind, so they don't want to be around the mind-reading character, being more open to suggestion because you don't know if the thought is your own or somebody else's), or mental reaction (the brain can't keep track of all the thoughts and the character is not functional, the character gets splitting headaches, limited motor function/mental capacity/memory because most of the brain is going towards keeping track of all the thoughts).

You can also toss in empathy, which is sensing others' emotions. That power's negative side effects, however, has been done a lot because it tends to be considered rather useless in an actual fighting situation. But if you actually want to look at the negative side effects, it could be interesting. The side-effects are pretty much the same as telepathy, except instead of an overload of thoughts it's an overload of feelings.

And you can't beat looking at stuff your own way— analyzing something can provide lovely ways to deconstruct a power.

Good points. Maybe I could use some of those ideas for other stories but this one I think I have found my way on.....

Thanks everyone though for your advice. Its greatly appreciated.

I can't wait to unveil what I've got brewing......