Growing Ideas For Magazine Articles

Author: Kathryn Lay

Whether you begin with an idea or begin with a market you want to submit to, it’s a safe bet that you should understand something about the publications you want to write for before you submit your queries, articles, essays, and stories.

As a writing instructor, contest judge, and workshop teacher, I’ve always told my students to study recent and back issues of magazines they would like to write for—the types of columns, articles, stories, advertising, sidebars, photographs or artwork, etc. This is often emphasized to writers, but an area that I haven’t seen mentioned when talking about studying magazines is the idea of studying a potential market by reading the Letters to the Editor.

Not only can you gain insight into the wants and needs of the magazine’s readers, but you will find a wealth of idea suggestions.

Recently, I went through the Letters to Editor section of five magazines and came up with nine ideas for articles, queries, and short stories.

Examples:

In a children’s magazine, children wrote in with questions. One asked about study tips for making good grades. Although this publication wouldn’t actually publish that type of article, as a homeschool Mom and wife of a teacher, I knew I could come up with some clever ideas for a “list article” of study tips for a parenting or teaching publication.

Another kid wrote about how they didn’t have any friends at recess to play with and wondered how they could make friends during recess time. I was able to work out a short story plot as well as an article for kids and another for parents on this subject.
In an adult religious publication, a reader wrote in telling how two preschool sisters had dubbed her as “grandma” and how she and her husband created Easter baskets for them and their family to encourage them. This became an idea for finding the ministry opportunities around you.
In a large history magazine, a letter to the editor discussed how President Washington sat for many artists during his Presidency and complained about the time consumption involved in these “bothersome demands.” I began wondering about artists who had painted presidents. In the same publication, a reader told about a time while in the service during WWII; some of the members of his boot camp were moved into a tent city at a local zoo and about the mixture of military and animal noises day and night. This led to an idea for a children’s story.
A letter in a Woman’s Magazine discussing her weight loss from a diet printed in the magazine also talked about how her battle with thyroid disease led to weight gain that made the disease even more difficult and how losing the weight helped her illness. I began thinking about how people diet to decrease the effects of specific diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and so on.
And in an old issue of a now defunct publication, a reader talked about how she left a six-figure job that was hurting her heath and happiness. She began exploring other fields by volunteering, working part-time, and taking college courses. She talked about how making radical changes made her stronger and willing to tackle even more risks that gave her joy. This led to a short story idea and a variety of ideas for nonfiction pieces for women, family, religious, and children’s publications.

Another way of finding new ideas is by sitting down with a stack of magazines and writing down the title and theme or plot of every article, essay, and short story. Then go back and look at each one, wondering how you can approach the subject differently or use a nonfiction idea for fiction or take an element in a fiction piece and explore the nonfiction idea behind it.

Then take all your ideas and put them onto 3 x 5 cards and place them into an “idea box.” You can later refer to the idea box for new ideas. On those cards include names of people you know or know of. Include the professions, skills, interests, and hobbies of these “experts.”

The caving hobby of the father of one of my daughter’s childhood friends became an idea for a children’s short story that led me to break into a large publication I’d been longing to write for, thanks to the information from this man and his hobby.

Other stories have grown from learning of an interesting job or hobby from a friend of a friend, or reading about local people in the paper.

So, now that you are loaded with new ideas, how do you begin?

When I’ve had an “idea day” or session, I’ve taken another hour of my day and sorted the ideas into age groups since I write for both children and adults. Then, within those areas I can sort the ideas into nonfiction and fiction. Once that’s done, I begin working on query letters while the ideas are fresh and get them out into the mail or e-mail.

Essays, stories, or nonfiction pieces that can be sent out whole (as opposed to a query) are gone over until I find the one that really interests me.

I rarely find that I turn every initial idea into a query or publishable piece of writing, but if those idea sessions yield a half-dozen or dozen useable ideas, the studying time has been well-worth the break from actual writing. And when those ideas are exhausted, it’ll be time for another study through magazines, experts, and old ideas.