I have to be honest — I don’t get the whole zombie zeitgeist. I’d have thought — no, wait, did think — five years ago that we had reached the peak, that zombies were a fad and their day was done.
Millions of viewers of The Walking Dead would beg to differ.
Despite my firm belief that zombies were past their sell-by date, there’s a zombie concept I’ve held in my mind for the last few years. I’d occasionally tell someone about it a convention, an elevator pitch of the hook, and they’d be excited, they’d want to read the story.
Slight problem. I didn’t have a story to go with the concept. It was a fun concept, but I could never figure out what to do with the concept. Occasionally I’d pull out my notepad and try writing something about it on the train, but nothing ever clicked. Even the old adage that stories are about characters, not concepts, didn’t help.
Something clicked recently, because I’ve worked out how to tell the story.
I plotted it out last night, pen and paper in hand. Two pages, front and back. I had trouble with it at first, and I wondered if I could see it through to completion more than once. However, when I finally put down the pen, I could affirmatively say that I had an outline for a short story.
It is not perfect. I am going to let it sit for a day of two, though I have already begun to compile a list of things I want to change or background that did not fit the outline.
I am going to write it. By the weekend I’ll have broken ground.
Not being that familiar with the genre, this story may be atypical. At the same time, it is very much the kind of story I would write. There just happens to be a zombie apocalypse going on. 🙂
I don’t even have a title for it yet.
That’s the story. Stay tuned!