One of my first story ideas was sparked by a piece of children's artwork. The young daughter of my then-boyfriend had drawn a picture of a witch stirring a cauldron which said, "poor witch" in child's scrawl across the top. I asked her what it meant, and she said, "she's a witch, but she's poor." It stuck with me for hours until I finally scribbled:

The witch was poor. All she had in her little witch house was an enchanted broomstick, a little black cauldron in the fireplace, a chair with rips and tears and stuffing falling out, and a little witch's bed. She kept a neat little garden in her little backyard where she grew vegetables to eat, and her black cat, Mystic, and all his friends feasted on mice and birds.

And thus was "Poor Witch"  [E] born, which was my first successful NaNo in 2008, and which has since turned into an multi-novel series (thanks to many years worth of What If Prep exercises) set in a very well-developed fictional world (which has grown more complex over many a Prep.) But it took a What If series of questions to figure out who this witch was and why we cared about her story. All I knew was that a poor witch was intriguing. Why was she poor? What happened there? Had she always been poor? What If she used to be famously wealthy, but by a series of unfortunate events, had been orphaned? Why couldn't she just use magic to conjure up some wealth? What if she'd been orphaned so young that she didn't really fully understand her magic? What if magic had other purposes and couldn't be used to generate personal wealth?

If only I had the focus perseverance discipline time to actually finish and edit those novels.

And that's not even half of my incomplete projects! If you can't tell, Prepping is my favorite part of Noveling, and brainstorming is my favorite part of Prepping.

Cheers,
Michelle