Inspirations

by Adam Huddleston

“Where do you get your ideas?”

It’s a question asked to authors of all shapes and sizes, levels of fame, and years of experience. The answers are as varied as the individuals being queried. If I may take a moment to surmise, I believe that most of the answers amount to the same thing: observation of the world around us.

Several of my story ideas, from themes to opening lines, originated from something my kids or wife said. I take those little quips and extrapolate them into something bigger and better. For example, one of the many stories that are in development (a particularly nasty from of writer’s purgatory), concerns an android whose battery is dying. The inspiration arose when my young daughter was reminded that daddy’s phone battery was low. I took the simple statement and ran with it.

The same offspring recently began explaining to me that a tiny door resided under her bed. Said door opened to a magical world. Suffice it to say, I jumped on the opportunity to encourage her to write down everything she saw, smelled, heard, tasted, or felt. The way I see it, the earlier I can instill a sense of wonder and love of literature in a child, the better that baby’s life could be.

So, if you are a writer, I repeat my question.

“Where do you get your ideas?”