How to Figure Out What Your Book Will Be About

You show up and write crap until you stumble upon something.

If you read my last Book Bound piece, then you know I was writing a book until I realized I didn’t actually want to write that story. Considering I read lots of horror books, I thought that was the genre I was supposed to write in.

I was — and this is rarely so — wrong. (Okay, fine, it’s not rare.) While I’d love to write a scary story someday, this isn’t the time. I thought about some of my favorite books, themes, and characters, and eventually, I came to the conclusion that I wanted to write a YA novel.

You can’t plot if you don’t have an idea

If I’m honest, a part of me always knew my first novel would be YA, but I was resisting it. I thought writing YA wasn’t legit, but once again, I was wrong. YA books are fucking brilliant, but that’s a whole other topic.

However, I still didn’t know what genre to write. I wrote a lot of fanfics when I started writing, and they revolved around two things: crime and romance. So, I tried my hand in both of those genres. Over and over again.

Nothing was working out. I tried taking plotting courses, but nothing helps because I still had no fucking clue what I was going to write…