: Re: Is it smart to reserve one's best ideas or to utilise them early in their writing career? At the very commencement of my writing "career" (I have virtually zero experience), I have an idea

@BetL639

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Use your best ideas! Ideas are there to be used. Write the best story that you can now, that will give you the best foundation to write more good things on.

There are many famous books where I read a throw-away detail and wished that had been its own book. But I enjoyed the book more for having those details in.

Sometimes the idea you're in love with is strong enough to drive a good book even if you're less experienced in other ways.

However, that said, there actually are quite a lot of other reasons why you might leave an idea until later. Sometimes you want to write an idea you love, but actually another idea is better suited to your current strengths. You may want to write a series, but practically, think you'll learn more from writing short stories first. Maybe those short stories naturally fit in the same universe, maybe they don't. Maybe you have an idea that needs a lot of research, and it's better to get started on an idea you can write right now.

So, write the idea which you think will make the best writing you can do right now, but it might not be the best idea out of all the ones you have.

And finally, don't focus too much on how good the idea is. What's good about the idea isn't just what's in the idea, it's usually much more about the other ideas it brings to life in you. To you, an idea sings with possibility, to someone else it lies limp. The best idea is one that serves effectively as a seed for you to grow a story around, but the core of the finished story often occurs to you later, so don't rely too much on the original idea being perfect.

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