Michael Connelly, creator of the Harry Bosch detective novels had his character in The Last Coyote, make this statement repeatedly, "Everybody counts or nobody counts. That's it. That is my rule." What a lovely premise. In a nut shell, the premise is the reason we write the short story, novel or screenplay.
The more defined the premise, the better the story. The premise should not be a treatise or a one page explanation, but a succinct statement. For my novel, The Regulators, the premise is, "No one escapes justice."
How you deal in the story with the premise is what makes you a writer. In The Regulators, the criminals believed that they successfully evaded justice until the Regulator pops up and shows the convicts the different purgatories that awaits them after their death. And purgatories are not fun.
One caveat, you cannot change your premise halfway through the novel. If you do, then the premise was wrong in the beginning and you now need to examine what you written up to this point.
The best way to develop or find a premise for a story, pick a subject that you are passionate about, ask what if, make a statement and then write the sentence.
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