What is it about Ed Cunard? He wrote an absolutely awesome piece on story ideas, and now I’m strangely compelled to offer my own pitiful list. Ed, why can’t you use your powers of suggestion to get me to do something that won’t embarrass me? You’re like my personal Bad Idea Bear.
Anyway, a disclaimer at the outset: these are not stories I would be interested in writing, but ones I’d be interested in reading. I like writing fiction, but I have no illusions about its quality. If you’ve actually seen comics with these stories before, please let me know (particularly if they’re any good). That said, here goes:
- Back-stabbing, bed-hopping, and backstage bitchery at a suburban community theatre production of Noël Coward’s Hay Fever. (Based on a number of true stories.)
- A gay couple, college professors in very different fields, reach a crisis point in their relationship when one (out and proud but a mediocre teacher) gets tenure and the other (closeted and ultra-competent) doesn’t.
- A defensive, withdrawn young woman comes into her own when she enrolls in a prestigious culinary school.
- Chaos ensues at a suburban high school when a caustic, anti-social slacker gets a perfect score on his SATs.
- A middling but dedicated vet-school student accepts an internship and is shocked to find that the rural animal shelter specializes in mythological creatures.
- A biography of Julia Morgan, architect of the San Simeon residence of William Randolph Hearst.
- A look at the adolescence and early adulthood of Lucrezia Borgia through the eyes of the woman herself from her perch as the Duchess of Ferrara.
- A corporate trainee for a national newspaper conglomerate is assigned to lead the transition at a weekly, small-town newspaper that’s been recently acquired. He meets resistance on every front, particularly from the young editor. Romantic complications ensue.
- A promising young sorcerer gets the worst assignment imaginable: mystic magistrate in a backwater town that makes Mayberry look cosmopolitan. Pointless feuds, angry young witches, and finicky familiars aren’t what he had in mind when he joined the magical hierarchy. Can middle management ever be magical?
- At the suggestion of his therapist, a gay man attends his high school reunion to get closure by confronting the bully who made his life miserable. Unfortunately, the bully is now well into recovery and plans to use the reunion as part of his “making amends” process. Worse still, closure is further derailed when they start falling for each other.
There. That’s more than enough, I think. Thanks for your indulgence.