Jeez, who cares if something is derivative, as long as it's derivative of success. Assuming commercial fiction, editors and their masters are...
If your characters are alive as real people in your imagination as you write, you'll hear them speak, and you can just write the dialogue down....
I've often experienced this. If I start daydreaming (mindwriting) a story, at some point my subconscious pokes its periscope above the waters and...
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