I’m procrastinating again. Actually, I’m stuck on a plot point and can’t think of a way to get my heroes out of the jam without falling back on a cliché. Or the ever popular “with a bound they were free!” solution. This has set me to thinking about clichés and what I’m trying to avoid writing, which then made me wonder why am I trying to avoid it...

10 Tips for writing a fantasy bestseller.

1. Leave no cliché unturned in your quest for literary greatness. A very influential acquisitions editor told me once if she saw another fantasy that starts with an unsuspecting goat-herder (fisherman, healer, whatever) coming home to find his village destroyed and then setting out on a quest to seek vengeance, she would have to kill herself. Pay no attention to this. The reason she was lamenting this particular plot device was because yet another very famous, internationally bestselling author had done it and made bucket-loads. Clichés sell.
2. Send your hero to magician school. I have two words for you: Harry Potter.
3. Vengeance is a dish best served… over and over again. Your hero must be scorned. Doesn’t really matter by whom, just so long as someone says something along the lines of “what’s that useless goat-herder doing here?” at some point in the book. Then, when your hero saves the day, all the nay-sayers will have to eat their words. Even if your hero isn’t out to avenge the destruction of his village, there must be a vengeance subplot. Fantasy without vengeance is like country music with your girlfriend dumping you.
4. Promotion opportunities must abound. Your hero should always be a poor man/woman/boy/girl raised to greatness. Who wants to read about someone who already has it all?
5. Destitution must loom. If you must have a hero who starts out rich and powerful, take it away from him, or threaten to. This will give him something to do for the rest of the book. You know, getting it back.
6. Orphans rule! Heroes can have parents, but orphans are better. This allows you to decide at a later date, when your story starts to run out of steam, that your hero is really the long-lost son/daughter of someone really convenient.
7. Parents – keep them simple.  If you must give your hero living, breathing parents (who are not going to later prove to be evil overlords or benign kings and queens searching the world for their long-lost sprog), make them fisher-folk, healers, blacksmiths or, if you’re a traditionalist, goat-herders. They must in no way have prepared their offspring for the quest they now confront, with the possible exception of good homely moral values.
8. Ignore technology. No matter how innovative your society, they must never progress to the point where the arch-villain can be removed by a sniper, a suicide-bomber or the hero pointing a shotgun in his general direction. If you do, you won’t have anything to do in books 2 through 11 of your trilogy.
9. Make sure your hero isn’t sterile or celibate. Eventually, you will run out of ways for your hero to save the world. By making sure he/she has children, you can milk your world for poo-loads more cash. Said sequel series doesn’t even have to be written well. Provided the first series did brilliantly, you can be driving your new brand Beemer long before the publishers (and your readers) realise the next series is a stinker. In fact, some readers are so loyal, they’ll not even notice.
10. Dragons rock! Talk to any editor at a writer’s festival or a con will tell you they are completely over dragon stories. These same editors will then approve dragons of the covers of every fantasy book in their backlist. Dragons sell. Everybody knows it, even if editors are sick of reading about them. Even when the story is simple, not terribly well-written, and a clear reworking of someone else’s story (see entry on clichés), dragons sell. Alternatively, be born into a family where your parents are publishers. That helps.

I’m done now. Back to work...

I suppose, if they can't get out of the jam, you could always push them in deeper *has mental image of Jenny pushing Arkady right under a pot of orange marmalade*

Combining your plot problem with your 10 tips, I'd say that the unknown-to-now overlord parents of the heroes must save the day, after riding in on dragons.

thanks for the tips jennifer

i have never written a book
but ive recently been thinking about it

i feel im capable of creating a new world/characters that will be fantastic, but i have no idea how to start..
but your tips are leading me in the right direction

thanks!