TV SHOWS. And how they can inspire us writers. (Guest post)

Hi followers of Danielle’s blog! You probably don’t know who I am, so I’ll introduce myself. I’m Kaitlin, KT for short, and I’m a YA writer, too. I tend to write fantasy, but sometimes contemporary as well. I’m doing a guest post (obviously – oh, small fact, I use parantheses a lot) today!

I’m going to lead into my topic a little strangely – and I’m going to say how I met Danielle. Whilst on the lovely twitter, I noticed somebody I already followed (Jaime) tweeting about the TV show Merlin, and I, being a HUGE fan, tweeted with her and discovered Danielle. We quickly became Merlin buddies (among other awesome things we have in common).

And that leads me to the topic – TV SHOWS. And how they can inspire us writers.

Obviously as writers, and people, we have our ups and downs. We stand against the dreaded writer’s block and those moments where we can feel like giving up (I recently had one), but sometimes all it takes is a break and a little inspiration. And that can come from so many different things – books, music, a conversation with someone. A lot of the times for me, and one of my CPs, television helps us.

For me specifically, the show Merlin actually helps me A LOT, which is just another reason I love it. Hehe. My current WIP is a YA epic fantasy – which is pretty much what that show is in a nutshell. Young protagonists, magic, swords, medieval time period, yeah? Yeah. How it helps me is through its world, the visual it gives you. In television, you have a picture instead of description. And sometimes when you’re stuck, seeing something close to the world that you’re writing can help a ton. You can get the image you see and transfer it to help the setting in your book come alive. I can be completely stuck, wondering how something would play out in my book’s world, take a break and watch Merlin and suddenly feel that inspiration to write because I can see it again.

But sometimes it’s not even an entire episode that can be inspiration. Maybe just a preview can strike something within you. For instance, when I was watching TV one day, I caught a quick scene in a preview for a show I don’t even know – it was of a guy wrapping a blanket around a girl’s shoulders. And that’s a scene I have pictured in my head later in my book, and it immediately gave me this urge to write, like I wanted to get to that scene, wanted to know how my characters would react in that situation!

As for that CP of mine? She writes while watching TV shows a lot lately. And in her case, it’s a show that doesn’t even relate to her WIP. She’s able to write through the background noise because she loves the show and its characters, and it becomes a comfortable writing environment for her.

And with such a wide array of genres and TV shows these days, there has to be something out there that can relate to a lot of different writers’ WIPs. So, even if it may seem wrong to be a couch potato for a few days and veg out watching an awesome television show, it may be exactly the RIGHT thing to do! Because maybe you can find a little inspiration there :)

I obviously get it from a show with an epic castle and magic. I get it from a little scene of a blanket. It becomes a comfort, and it’s good to be comfortable when writing, isn’t it?

So, what kind of awesome TV shows do you guys watch? Do they inspire you, too?

-Kaitlin :)

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