The creative process is different for everyone. How I think of things is not how you will at all. The following example is some of the things I see in word association.

To show what I mean I’ll use a random word generator to get three random words to start with, and try to build ideas from those words.

I got match, celery, look. Pretty darn random.

To take the words in order:

Match could mean an identical thing, a romantic joining, or a matchstick.

Celery is a lot more narrow. It’s not really slang for anything, and is a vegetable. You might be able to say a noise might sound like celery being crunched.

Look has a number of possibilities. It could mean trying to see something, investigate for subtle nuances, alertly attentive, a particular emotion conveyed non-verbally, or a signature appearance.

It’s how you see the story falling together.  As an example, and in the form so far, here are three story ideas from three random words.

A fashion designer comes up with a signature look that includes a celery colored dress, a color so unique that the fashion world scrambles to try and match the color, but can’t as no one knows how the designer first made the color, or what ingredients are in the dye.  The story could revolve around how cut-throat the designing world is, that a simple color would create a series of attempts at copying, stealing, or extorting the color from the designer.

Another story that comes to mind could be one where a shipment of celery from some location is contaminated, leading investigators to look to match soil samples gathered from the celery with a geographic region, to determine the origin of the shipment. Once the location is found, they have to look for the cause of the contamination.  This might be a good mystery crisis something like the movie ‘outbreak’ was a few years ago.

A third story could be that a child who is told to get celery from the corner store. She’s never seen uncut celery, so she looks at a piece of celery, then goes to the corner store to match what she remembers, which could be a neat children’s book.

Those are a few ideas. There are as many as there are people who love to imagine.

If you’re curious, that’s my wall in the picture. To explain what you’re looking at is a story.

This one’s called ‘No Fury’ the pale yellow card is a background character who has a professional grudge with one of the main characters described on the neon orange card it’s directly above.

The purple cards are significant background characters whose actions impact the main protagonists and the world.

That white quote over the headphones is from Groucho Marx, and reminds me it’s my choice that determines how I face the day.

The big 8-1/2 x 11 piece of paper are tasks assigned by the publisher at Paper Angel Press, reminding me of critical dates, and suggestions on how to help promote my book and, in a sense, my career as a writer.

I know a lot of you might think a writer’s job is done after writing. WRONG. It’s only beginning. Self-promotion of your book is the real beginning of your career. I have a lot of problems doing that critical part. No excuses, I’m terrified of self-promotion, of being the one in the spotlight.

I know this lack of promotion will slow me down, and also cause difficulties for the publisher, because promoting a book is very much a team effort. Publishers will work with you on this, but, they can only do so much. Like the cards, they can only do what their position allows. You, as a writer, need to help when and where you can. The more you can view a book as a team promotion, the more success you are likely to have.

I don’t know how someone else gets ideas for stories. I’ll guess that something triggers an idea that ‘something’ is a good story. In my case, there is a trigger. It’s not always the same. As an example, I may read an article about Fuel cells, and that becomes a cascade of linked ideas, such as a fuel cell made of paper ( don’t laugh it’s actually been done) which grows to what about making a paper airplane with whose kind o fuel cells, which goes to why not a regular plane, or a dirigible which uses humidity in the air to power the paper fuel cells in the skin of the craft. Which then goes to what’s the pilot and crew like, what is the world like that has this blend of technology?

Another way an idea seems to form, again in my case, is a story by another author. How would I write that story? What would I change, would the direction of that story actually work in my story. A lot of stories are built upon things we have read, or seen, or even heard being discussed. As another example. The current political furor in the US over Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton. That could easily be turned into a monstrous conspiracy theory about the status quo being pushed to the wall by a non-traditional candidate, and one that represents all the vile truths about the established political system. Or, to reverse it, a vile candidate who’s only strength is a cult of personality reminiscent of a pattern in recent history, versus, a flawed but well-meaning member of the establishment who is trying to effect change from within the existing system.

In all of this, the idea is to extrapolate, to expand upon what the writer sees, hears, and feels. Kids do it all the time, so one could say a writer might be a child that never grew out of ‘what if’.

Collaboration is one of the most fun ways for me to write. I like the sharing of ideas, and story. It’s a good way to make characters unique, as your writing partners each have a unique style and voice to bring to the project.

The down side is if there’s a delay, you’re either stuck waiting, or stuck feeling like you’ve let your partner down.

I’ve tried two styles of collaborative writing, and each has pluses and minuses.

The first style is where you trade writing chapters. This works well for plot and storyline, as doing a complete chapter, including shared characters, allows you complete control of the scene and action. The downside is losing the identity of the individual characters, as while you can share the character, writing styles are still different.

Writing for individual characters preserves the uniqueness of each one, but in this instance, there is a lot of waiting back and forth as each section has to be passed back and forth to finish it. The story could become choppy and harder to follow for readers.

The troubles aren’t insurmountable, but the thing you need most is the focus and communication between you and your writing partners. Simply being consistent and communicative helps immeasurably with whichever way you decide to share the writing.

In short, I recommend giving collaboration a go. It’s a really fun way to write and a great way to share your imaginiation.

“We”, Summer and Winter said in unison, “want to ask if you’re ready to make a choice.” They looked at him steadily. Wally returned their calm gaze.

“You asked me that before. My answer’s the same now as it was then. No. I’m not going to choose a side.” Pain flared suddenly in his chest. The searing pain cut off as both Summer and Winter stepped to him, and lay a hand on his shoulders. He could feel the pain roll out of him to them. Their faces showed no change, no reaction as they took the last of the pain from him, then stepped back two paces.

“How’d you do that?” Wally asked them. “Why’d you do that?” The two looked at each other, then back to Wally. The shrug each gave was identical to the other. “We like you. You are unusual for a changling. You don’t try to bully with your power, nor do you let yourself be ostracized because of your difference. We’ve not met someone like you. It intrigues us.”

Wally shook his head. It was flattering in a way, having a gorgeous set of twins interested in him. He wished it was more that they were interested in him, and not his ability. “That’s nice and all, but I’m not going to change my mind about choosing.”

The two looked at him, and he thought he saw a change. They seemed, sad, for a moment. It was there, then gone. “Then you’ll die, Wallace Allen. Your body is changing every time you use your power. The fae part strengthens, and looks for a place. The human part strengthens through your actions. It too, looks for a place to belong. The two are not meant to strengthen together. The strain is starting to hurt you. The more you push to be in the middle, the more the ends will pull at you.”

“So, what? I’m going to rip in half? I’m going to die? Big deal. I’m not going to join Winter or Summer. I won’t be at the mercy of crazies like Maeve, or caught without a choice like you two.” He caught himself, and ducked his head sheepishly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” he trailed off as the two smiled sadly.

“We made our choice so we could balance each other.”

Winter smiled, then patted her sister on the shoulder. “I became Winter, cold capricious, calculating.”

Summer piped up. “I became Summer. Hot-blooded, passionate, and scheming.”

They both looked at Wally. “We look out for each other, and our court. We were sent by the Mothers to give you a choice. To be Fae, or to be human. It wasn’t simply just to force you. You have much power, and much determination. If you were to choose, the place you chose would have great respect within the Fae. Summer, Winter, or the Wyld.”

A calculating look came into their eyes. “We wonder” they said in unison, “what your parents would feel if they knew you are choosing to die.” At the last word, they simply vanished. The leaves resumed their dance in the air. Wind rustled the trees. Wally was left to wonder about his parents as Marian walked up to the house, holding up her cellphone as she snapped pictures for a possible article.

O’Malley shrugged his shoulders, and Roger smiled thinly. “Barbeque. Zombie flambe’.”

“Ewww.” Marian looked around. “Anyone hurt?”

“No” answered O’Malley. “Roger fried them before anything got out of hand.”

Marian nodded then glanced back a Wally, who was leaning against the car. “I had to pick up Wally today. Cops said he’d fallen down, and when I got there, he said he’d had a pain in his chest. Like some weird burning sensation.”

Roger raised hies eyebrows, then peered at Wally Allen. “He doesn’t look hurt. Kids like him have all sorts of things pushing them one way or another.”

O’Malley, walked off the porch and over to Wally. “What’s this about chest pains?” he said quietly.

Wally reddened, then shrugged awkwardly, which made O’Malley frown and step closer to Wally. “Don’t think about toughing it out, Allen. Chest pain’s are a big deal. You don’t hide this, not from us. Now what happened.”

Wally gave the stocky sergeant a sour look but began talking. He explained about the attack that morning doing laundry, then the second one while he was running. As O’Malley listened, his face became more concerned. “Wally, I think we really need to find someone who can look you over right. I’ll get Doc Zylgy to give you a checkup, as much as he can. There’s just no telling at this point what’s going on, and you need to talk to us when this crap happens. Got me?”

Wally blew out a breath, then looked at the sergeant. “I hear you. If anything happens you’ll know.”

As Wally pushed away from the car, he watched O’Malley slow down to a bare crawl, then seemingly stop. A leaf hung in the breeze, suspended in mid-air. Wally looked at the leaf for a moment, then grabbed at his wrist. Is it happening again?! To his relief, and puzzlement, his heart pumped strongly, with no sense of a burning in his chest. As he looked back at the leaf, and then at Marian, caught mid-step, a feminine giggle sounded behind him. The surprise had him spinning in place even as he recognized the voice.

Summer was here. She stood about three steps away as he completed turning around. A half head shorter than he, her skin was tanned like she’d been lounging at a beach for weeks. Her sleeveless shirt clung to her, it’s golden color highlighting her skin. Her long hair hung over one shoulder, trailing to her waist in a riotous shade of blonde and gold. The blue jean shorts barely were long enough to cover her hips. As he stared at her, Winter stepped from behind summer, to stand next to her.

Winter’s pale skin was contrasted by the deep blue sleeveless tee shirt. She had piercings of silver rings in her lip, right ear, and left eyebrow. The White blue jeans and bare feet finished her razor-edged look. Winter and Summer had started out as identical twins, changelings. When they’d chosen, both had chose life with the fae, though each had chosen different sides. They were often used as recruiters or part-time emissaries for the courts, as despite the hostility the Winter and Summer courts had for each other, the twins sibling connection was stronger than the enmity.

“Wally, we’ve come to ask something important of you.” They spoke in unison, voices blending together in a natural harmony. Icy soprano and heated contralto. They’d been more or less his constant companions and major irritants for the last two years.

“Ask me what?”

Roger finished the circle, then bade O’Malley to step back to a corner. The stocky Irish cop nodded, and moved to the corner closest to the hall opening. As a precaution, he pulled his .44 magnum, flipped open the cylinder to check that all cartridges were loaded, then snapped it closed. He lowered it to his side, ready for use I something bad happened. As he’d seen before, bad things did happen often enough that he wanted to have his weapon to hand. Roger began chanting, holding the hairs he’d collected from the bedroom.

His trace spell began to take shape as his consciousness slowly dropped into a near sleep. He felt the tendrils of the spell trail out and surround the hairs, melding with them and sending a call to more of the same. He frowned as interference started unraveling the spell as it formed. His consciousness returned to full wakefulness, and he opened his eyes. The bodies had begun shifting. O’Malley brought the pistol up and fired a shot at the one nearest the circle. The bullet struck the side of the head, blowing brains, flesh, bone, and maggots all over the floor away from Roger and the circle. The maggots wriggled then crawled towards the body, which pushed itself to hands and knees, and continued a slow crawl towards the circle.

Roger felt the pull at his spell, and focused his senses. The pull of energy was to the moving corpse. Out of the edges of his perception, he could see the other bodies begin to slowly animate. As they began moving the pull on his circle increased. Growling a curse, Roger fed more power to the circle and watched the closest body begin to move faster towards him. O’Malley’s second shot tore into the body’s shoulder, propelling it onto its side, where it thrashed three-limbed and tried to right itself. Is it using my spell to power itself? Thought became action as Roger dropped the circle. The bodies furthest away dropped to the floor, inanimate. Only the closest continued moving. “Screw this,” Roger snarled, then called up a fire spell. The one armed body tried to reach for Roger, then disappeared in an oily burst of heat as the spell consumed it totally.

He stepped over to the next body, and burned it, then repeated with each body. “What was that? It didn’t act like any zombie I’d seen before”, O’Malley commented as Roger methodically burned the last body. Roger looked down at his employer and friend. “They’re not. It was something else. When I powered the spell, the bodies started moving. I think it was those maggots that were doing the work.”

“The maggots?”, O’Malley asked him. Roger nodded. He went over to one of the few that were still mobile. “Watch, I’m going to focus a little power at this one.” O’Malley watched as the maggot suddenly accelerated, crawling deliberately at Roger, growing to the size of a fat grub in mere moments. He glanced at Roger, who gasped, and stepped back. O’Malley took that as a cue, and stomped the growing maggot flat under his shoe.

“They feed on magic. I could feel it pulling at me. I was overconfident.”

O’Malley nodded. “You figured it out. That means you’ll know what to do next time we see them.”

“That’s true. I just hope we don’t need any magic soon. I need to rest.”

“Gentlemen, if you’re finished in there, you have visitors out here.” Lieutenant Kruger stepped into the doorway, then gasped, and covered her nose with one hand. “What did you do to the bodies? Burn them?”

Roger smiled mirthlessly. “Yes, they were infested.”

Lt. Kruger frowned, then glanced at O’Malley. “Your other ‘consultants’ arrived.” She fixed O’Malley with a irritated green-eyed gaze. “How about not destroying more evidence until after we’ve gotten some images to reference?”

O’Malley nodded. “Sure, so long as the evidence doesn’t try to jump anyone.”

Roger walked out onto the front porch of the house. He saw Marian, and Wally exit the vehicle. Marian smiled as she approached, which turned into a grimace as she got close enough to smell them. “Gods what have you two been doing? You smell like burned meat.”

Marian Kolchak gripped the wheel of her car, and gritted her teeth. It was bad enough that her editor Updyke reassigned her to ‘social events’ from the ‘Crime beat’, he’d added insult to it by assigning the new guy to that position. How is it that he just walks in and gets the Crime beat when I’ve been working there for two years and have given Up-tight the scoop on so many important stories? She looked over to the passenger seat, and her uncle Carl’s old straw fedora resting there. What would he do? Uncle Carl would have stolen copies of the files Up-tight gave him, and gone and done the job. Marian thought about it for a moment, then shook her head. I hate being honest.

As she turned off the side street and back to a main thoroughfare, her cell-phone began to chime. The car swerved as she dug in her bag, pulling the blue cased phone out. A quick glance at the screen showed it was Wally. She tapped the phone with her hand as she straightened the car out. “Wally, I’m driving. What’s…”

“Excuse me ma’am,”, an unfamiliar voice cut over her own. “Could you come to the corner of Beedle and Hawthorn? I’ve a young man who insisted I call you instead of an ambulance.”

“I’ll be right there,” Marian replied then dropped the phone. She signaled a left turn and turned north. Ten minutes later she rolled up behind a black-and-white police cruiser. One officer at the wheel, while another was standing by Wally. Marian could see he was unnaturally pale. She got out of the car, and walked over to the young man. The officer took a step towards her. “Marian Kolchak?” he asked politely but authoritatively. She nodded in response, then kneeled down next to Wally.

“Dumb question, but what happened?” Wally took a deep breath painfully then shook his head. Marian looked back up at the officer, who was standing at a polite distance. He was a lean, angular man who easily topped six feet. His jaw was long, giving him a hatchet-faced appearance. His eyes were dark enough to be almost black, and the tips of his pointed ears barely peeked through the wavy black hair that feel beneath the officer’s hat. Elf? On the force? How many of the fae are really there?

Wally looked at her. “I was, uh,” he slowed as he looked over at the officer, “jogging, and my chest suddenly felt like it was on fire.” He coughed, then slowly started to rise. Marian slipped an arm under his left shoulder and helped him up.

“Jogging, and how long were you jogging before the pain happened?”

Wally shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. I think it was like five minutes”

Marain pursed her lips then sighed. “Okay, I’m driving you home. Then you are going to set up an appointment with the doc. If this is happening, it needs to be looked at.” She let Wally go, and he staggered slightly, then straightened and walked slowly to Marian’s car. The officer stayed at a discreet distance through it all, which was odd. Maybe they’re not comfortable around Wally being a half-breed.

She glanced over at the officer in the car. He was much shorter than his partner. His round face was barely above the top of the steering wheel as she looked at him. He seemed also more rounded all over than the tall officer. She didn’t see any pointed ears, so it could be the man was just a human. Marian pondered it for a moment, and then got in her car. Wally buckled his seat belt as the engine roared to life. She pulled around the car and gazed in the rear view mirror. The officer was intently tapping at something in the car. Wally turned to look back.

“I think he was running your plate”, Wally told her.

“What makes you think that?” Marian asked him.

“Because the only thing the officers have in the front seat like that’s a computer they use for running plates, or punching addresses. I got to do a ride-along for a senior class, and that’s what our cop said he used it for.”

“Oh joy. Why the hell would they want to do that, I wonder.”

Wally just shrugged, and turned back around. “Probably a habit to make sure you are who you said you were.”

“Maybe. I hope that’s all it is.”

“Now who’s paranoid?” Wally chuckled as Marian scowled at him.

“It’s not paranoia if they’re out to get me. Then it’s common sense.”

“Sure it is.”

Wally Allen, aka ‘Rapidfire’, streaked towards downtown Boston. His red suit with a white boxing glove on the front announced to the world who he was. It that didn’t, the red streak of his passing did. His mind wasn’t wholly on running at the moment. He’d gotten home from working as a security guard, and collapsed just after he made it inside his home. Wally fell, and threw up as his vision danced and swam so badly he didn’t know if he was on the floor.

The colors suddenly were glaring, painful to look at, closing his eyes did nothing as they simply grew brighter, spinning dizzily before him. His left arm cramped and ached, the pain radiating up and down the arm like a classic heart-attack sign. He lay gasping in pain for what seemed hours, then the sensations faded, like water soothing a sunburn. Five minutes later he was able to stand up. He checked his throat for anything irregular, but all he felt was a strong, steady beat.

The dizziness didn’t return while he started laundry, which had him believing it might be he’d pushed himself a little hard the last few days trying to patrol as Rapidfire in between semi-hourly sweeps of the facility he was assigned to guard. The division of actions had been tough to balance all week. Small things kept slowing him down. Mugging, attempted arson, drunks in traffic, drunks driving. It’s said the devil is in the details, and Wally was inclined to agree. He checked his watch as he moved the wet clothes to the coin-operated dryer. He put the dryer on medium, then fed in enough quarters to keep it cycling for two hours. That would give him time to make a quick trip downtown patrol and back.

It wasn’t that he saw responsibility, he did understand responsibility, he just saw the chance to be a hero like those on television irresistible. Wally always had a sense of recklessness, which got him into numerous scraps as a kid, but he never backed down, and he never let anyone bully another when he was in school. Looking like a nerd didn’t help, and begin as strong as a limp spaghetti helped even less, but Wally was always stepping in rather than watching. He didn’t know why, or really care. It was who he was.

Okay now where was that interview? Oh, yeah. He pulled a scrap of paper from his pocket, and read the address. North side, about four miles from here. I’ve got 10 minutes. No problem. Grinning at the chance to run, he bolted out the door, pausing just a moment to close it behind him, was gone in a flash.