Anatomy of an Idea

MEMENTO NORA (the novel) started out as a short story I wrote for Odyssey Magazine.  You can read “Memento Nora,” the short story here.  In nutshell, though, the story is about 14-year-old Nora James  going to her first Therapeutic Forgetting Clinic (TFC) to have a memory erased.

Where did the idea come from? My “formula” for this germ of a story was:

OBSESSION + CONSTRAINTS + RESEARCH + WHIM = THIS IDEA

1. OBSESSION.  I’ve always been fascinated with memory. I’m not sure why, but it was one of those things that grabbed my interest and led to me read about many, many aspects—from the guy who lost his short-term memory because of a railroad spike through his brain (he lived) to studies about aboriginal children having better eidetic memories. So, the topic was something that was already percolating in my brain when I saw the Odyssey theme list.
2. CONSTRAINTS.  I did write this story for a particular magazine. Odyssey is a tween/teen science magazine that features one short story per issue. Each issue is themed. Obviously, this particular issue was about memory. The guidelines gave a few story ideas, but none were about frozen-yogurt style shops that erase memory. Oh, the story word count had to be under 1000 words.  So the story had to be about memory, for a YA/MG audience, and short.
3. RESEARCH. So, I set off looking for something within the topic of memory that really grabbed me. It didn’t take long. I ran across an article or two about experimental Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) treatments. The scientists were investigating the use of a common blood pressure medication to lessen the grip of traumatic memories.
4. WHIM.  What if this treatment could be dispensed as easily as buying a frozen yogurt or a latte? It could be a franchise—like TCBY. (Hence the TFC name.)

At this point, I had the idea—but not the story.  That’s when I start asking myself the hard questions. What kind of society would have TFC’s on every corner? Why would people go? Why wouldn’t they? What would happen if they stopped going? Who would be the least likely hero/heroine?  And so on.

See? This is the hard part—taking your glimmer of an idea to an actual working story.