Unlimited Imagination

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It’s In The Bag

/ J. Paul Cooper / 1 Comment

It’s a very simple, but effective premise; your character finds something he wasn’t expecting to find, and is faced with a moral dilemma. The 2007 movie, No Country For Old Men, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy, and A Simple Plan (1998) adapted from the novel by Scott B. Smith are both based on this simple concept. In both cases the main character finds a bag full of cash. These are excellent examples of beginning with the question “What if?” and then thinking about the worst possible outcomes. You’re basically giving yourself the freedom to be paranoid.

Starting with this one idea, finding something unexpected in a bag, has immense potential. What if the coach of a professional soccer team is organising the team’s equipment before a game and finds a severed head in one of the equipment bags? Who put it there? How did that bag get mixed with the team’s equipment? Was it there to send a message to someone on the soccer team, who owes serious money to a very aggressive loan shark and/or the mafia?

Is your novel or short story a Western? A bag full of cash could fall off a wagon, or stagecoach. Are you writing a science fiction screenplay? An extra crate could be found in the hold of a deep space cargo vessel, containing an unusual device. What happens when a member of the crew tries to activate it, and is successful? Does she find herself in another galaxy or dimension?

To ratchet up the tension, you can have your character do the right thing and still end up in a life threatening situation. He finds a large cache of cocaine and calls the police. Unfortunately for your character, a crooked cop takes the cocaine, but doesn’t drive it to the station or record that he’s taken custody of the illegal drugs. A short time later, members of a drug cartel, who owned the warehouse where the drugs were found, arrive in the city. Now, the corrupt police officer needs to kill your character, before the cartel members talk to him.

As you can see, the possibilities are endless. The next time you’re not sure where to go with a story, try asking these questions: What could my character find, that would complicate her life? What could my character find, that might get him killed? What could one of my characters find, that would send the story in an unexpected direction?

Keep writing, there’s still time to tell great stories in 2022!

Copyright © 2022 by J. Paul Cooper

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Take a Trip to….

/ J. Paul Cooper / Leave a comment

Have you ever watched a video, as a Travel Guide describes all the major tourist destinations of a city? Do you remember the sickeningly sweet, cheerful voice? That isn’t helpful if you’re writing a novel, it’s much better to get the feel of a city, not the packaged version. Travelling overseas, no matter which end of the globe you’re starting from, is expensive. Although it’s much better to actually be there, you can be your own Travel Agent and arrange a virtual trip using Youtube.

Begin by choosing your destination, using “Flight To” or “Flying To.” With so many people taking videos during their vacations and business trips, you can decide which airport you want to start from and which airport you want to land at. You can watch a video recorded by someone sitting in Economy, or a video from First Class that includes a segment about the airport lounge and the luxurious amenities enjoyed throughout the flight. During the arrival, you can watch the aircraft land from a passenger’s perspective or the pilot’s point-of-view.

Now that you’ve arrived at your destination, how would you like to see the country? You can take a trip by car, bus or motorcycle. If you type, “Driving in….” you can find videos recorded during daylight hours, or at night, over quiet mountain roads, or through city traffic. Cars and buses don’t interest you? Not a problem, just type “Train ride,” or “Subway routes” with the name of the city or country, and you’re on your way.

While virtual trips will never replace a real experience, it is an option that wasn’t available to previous generations of writers. Watching a video recorded by a camera mounted on a vehicle’s dashboard or mirror, is about as close as you can get to sitting in the passenger seat, without spending a fortune to get there.

If you’ve been dreaming of a story set in a distant land, I hope this post will encourage you to write that tale, so we can all enjoy it. It’s your voice, your passion. Write.

Copyright © 2021 by J. Paul Cooper

Feline Infinity

/ J. Paul Cooper / Leave a comment

2017-09-04 15.07.38

Your cat curls up for a nap. As he drifts off to sleep, his mind races across galaxies, through the time-space continuum. His intelligence, far superior to that of a mere human, unravels the mysteries of the universe as he is immersed in the infinite wisdom of the quantum field.

As he returns to the mortal plane of existence, he walks into the kitchen,  prepared to explain the origins of the universe.  Being much smarter than us, cats can speak an unlimited number of human languages, but prefer to communicate with one another using the much more complex dialect our limited comprehension interprets as “meow.”

Your cat is about to explain how the concepts of the Big Bang and Intelligent design are actually compatible, when he hears, “Does kitty want a treat?”  or “What are you meowing about? Does your litter box need to be cleaned?” Although cats are very intelligent, they are easily distracted. Your cat forgets what he was about to tell you and is more than pleased that you’re opening a bag of his favourite treats or going downstairs to clean his litter box.

All across the face of the Earth, scientists are missing the opportunity to finally understand the mysteries of the universe, because they’re too busy opening cat food cans and scooping litter boxes.

Copyright © 2017 by J. Paul Cooper