Unearth Your Writing Ideas: Mastering the Drill-Down Technique
This works for both reading and writing fiction.
People tell you to “niche it down” when picking a business niche. Most fields, say medical products, need to be more specific. Medical devices get less ambiguous — medical devices for disabled people. You have a particular niche, but it’s still too broad for left-handed disabled people. Now, you have a niche that seems unique!
You can use the same thing for writing. You can “niche it down.” You can drill down through the conventions of a genre to create something new. At least it still sticks out from the others — without leaving it.
(Sticking to a genre’s conventions is okay. In articles like this one, I list the conventions of a genre because they’re what readers expect. You need to know these rules before you can drill them down; find a unique tact.)
Here’s an example of niching it down (drilling it down):
You want to write a mystery. That’s too broad as a genre
The mystery uses a detective. That still needs to be narrower.
Now, let’s consider a unique approach within a genre. Imagine a detective who solves crimes without ever leaving their armchair. Relying solely on their reading skills. Though not a…
