Well, this is a first…I completely forgot to post the SWAGr post for August 2018! But here it is, better late than never. Post your goals for this month and let us know how you got on with last month’s goals.
(P.S. If you were interested in Jerry Jenkins’s Your Novel Blueprint course, but couldn’t face the one-time payment, good news: today only, they’re offering a payment plan, which is MUCH more affordable. Check it out here. I promise I’ll shut up about it after today, but I’d hate for you to miss out if the one-time payment was the only thing holding you back.)
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.Continue reading “SWAGr for August 2018”
This month I’m giving you prompts that work in different ways to support your long-form fiction/novel writing. Today’s prompt digs deep into your protagonist’s past.
Write the story of the childhood event that scarred your character
Tips
If you haven’t already, get hold of a copy of Lisa Cron’s Story Genius and read all about character misbeliefs. Re-read it, if you own a copy!
Every character has to have a flaw. Maybe you decided that yours was commitment-phobic, or that she was overly-honest, or that she couldn’t hold down a job. There are lots of ways that could be fun in a novel, but a deeper question is: Why?
What happened to your main character at an earlier point in their life, that caused them to begin acting this way?
Once you know that, the subtle ways she reacts will change. She won’t just be commitment-phobic, she’ll get unreasonably angry when anyone promises to take her on vacation, because when she was nine her dad promised to take her on vacation but instead blew the money taking his new girlfriend to Vegas, and your main character never had a real relationship with him again after that.
In Story Genius Lisa Cron asserts that harmful adult behaviors originate in behaviors that were actually protective, at some point. So, by not trusting her Dad again, your main character protected herself from getting hurt by him. But that pattern of behavior stopped serving her at some point (probably right around the time your novel starts) and she has to learn to overcome it. Knowing what caused her to begin acting that way is extremely useful.
Digging into your character’s past gives you news ways to show their flaws in your novel.
Writing a longer work like a novel can get a bit overwhelming. Today I encourage you to use short stories to explore areas of your novel’s world that you might not have dug deeply into. This can help unblock the writing process and get you back to a place where you’re enjoying your writing.
Over the past few weeks I’ve been encouraging you to write stories for special occasions to make sure you are writing year round, but also as a way to attract the attention of editors.
And that is started to make me feel a bit uncomfortable.
StoryADay has always been about the early stage of the process…the creative work, not the publishing and selling part. Sometimes friends ask me why I don’t publish anthologies or run competitions here at StoryADay.
It’s not by accident.
I passionately believe that you don’t do our best work when we’re thinking about who might buy a story or what a judge might think.
We do our best work when we are writing for the love of it, or for ourselves, or for one person we think will enjoy this story.
(That’s not to say that we shouldn’t pursue publication or that there is anything wrong with wanting that. It just pays to focus on the work first.)
So this week I’m encouraging you to set aside all thoughts of editors and publication credits and write for the love of writing and for the love of someone special.
The Prompt
Write A Birthday Story for Someone You Love
Tips
This doesn’t have to be a story about the person you’re writing for. Just imagine amusing or moving or entertaining them, as you write.
You don’t have to ever show it to them.
Try to imagine how touched they would be, if you did show it to them, to know that you wrote this story for them.
Pour your affection for them into this little story. Love it. Be nice to it. Treat it as something precious and delightful, like your friendship, not like a foe to be vanquished.
Get to the end of the story within 24 hours if you can, to keep its spirit pure.
Consider making this an annual habit. Put it on your calendar for their next birthday, too.
Go!
If you try this exercise I would LOVE it if you would come back and leave a comment. How did the writing go? Did the process feel different from other stories you’ve written? How did you feel about the story itself?
Today’s post is part of series of posts encouraging you to write stories for minor holidays.
Writing and submitting a story for Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day or Christmas, means you’re up against a lot of competition in an editor’s inbox. Everyone writes for those holidays. But editors still love a timely, topical story. Why not take advantage of the myriad of minor holidays, to give your story an edge?
“Minor holidays”, in my mind, can also mean one-off anniversaries. I’m not saying there won’t be competition for these ones, but if you write your story far enough in advance you could ride the crest of the wave.
The Prompt
Write a story for one of 2019’s big anniversaries: the 500th anniversary of Leonardo Da Vinci’s death; the 200th anniversary of Queen Victoria’s birth; the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings; the 50th anniversary of the first manned moon landing.Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Big Anniversaries”
I keep a spreadsheet of short stories I’ve read. I make a note of titles, authors, where I found the story and a short comment about the story, to make these posts easier.
My notes, on reading this story, simply say: “Wow”.
A List of Forty-Nine Lies is a pretty intriguing title, and the story delivers immediately.
My name is not Levi. I am not afraid. The machines that hover in swarms over the streets cannot read the thoughts inside my head.
I am not running from them. I have nothing to hide.
This month I am still talking about writing for minor holidays and anniversaries. In this podcast I reveal the grand plan behind this: it’s a system for focusing on particularly stories, regularly.
I talk about the importance of systems (because apparently Ihave a problem with the word “routine”) and I recommend you check out Tim Grahl’s new book Running Down The Dream.
If you want a super-bundle that includes not only Tim’s book, but the new book by Stephen Pressfield too “The Artist’s Journey” (swoon!), you can find that here.
https://stada.me/grahl (not an affiliate link. I’m just a huge fan of both of these guys)
The bundle contains all ebook formats plus audio book files. Quite the steal!
Today’s post is part of series of posts encouraging you to write stories for minor holidays.
Writing and submitting a story for Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day or Christmas, means you’re up against a lot of competition in an editor’s inbox. Everyone writes for those holidays. But editors still love a timely, topical story. Why not take advantage of the myriad of minor holidays, to give your story an edge?
Cute and slightly terrifying story of two men competing for the same woman, but this time they have the power to go back and change the past.
(Compare this to Geoffrey A Landis’s story where nothing the time-traveler did in the past could affect the future in any way.)
Silverberg does a great job of creating signposts for readers that make the effects of time travel seem almost mundane (one character tastes cotton in his mouth when the past has been changed, another gets a persistent twitch under the left eye…).
As writers today, we wouldn’t have a character stop to explain why the gadget in their pocket was buzzing (We wouldn’t write, “My phone buzzed again. It did that every time a friend send what we called a ‘text message’ from a similar device, over the wireless cell network…” No, we’d just say, “My phone buzzed. Alan again.”)
Similarly, these characters simply mention the significance of the sensation the first time and then use it in the story to signal to the reader that someone’s been time-traveling again.
It was nice to read a story with potentially disastrous technology that wasn’t completely dystopian. It did seem a little shallow at times, though, because I’m so used to ‘realistic’ takes on doomsday technologies in current stories. Not sure how I feel about that, being an upbeat and optimistic person who likes a laugh, but felt a little cheated by this story.
How Stories Age
It’s funny how stories age. I guess we can’t worry too much about that. We just have to write the best stories we can, and keep writing them as we change and age. Some of our work will survive. Some will become embarrassing. And that’s OK.
As something of a side note, it’s interesting to go back and read older short stories and find things I wasn’t expecting.
For example, I’ve never worried too much about the sex (or gender) of the person who wrote a story or of the main character. I’ve never worried too much about older social attitudes that we have, thankfully, left behind, showing up in stories where we couldn’t expect the author to have a more modern outlook.
But in spite of not going around looking for these nits to pick, I am increasingly impatient with stories in which the women are cardboard cut outs. I don’t know if I should curse Alison Bechdel for bringing it to my attention, or simply shrug and accept that there’s so much good writing out there no that DOESN’T fail the Bechdel test, that it’s OK for me to be more picky.
I’m not willing to cut myself off from a world of literary history, just because the writers weren’t inclusive (or not-horribly-racist), but I can’t seem to help having a niggling, deep down dissatisfaction when a good writer excludes half the population or is clueless about basic human dignity.
Again, I’m glad these stories were written, and I won’t not read them because they aren’t inclusive. The writers were working with what they had. Some were better than others. But me? I’m certainly becoming less likely to read and praise them just because somebody tells me I should.
Do you worry about reader or posterity when you write? How do you feel about stores that have aged badly in one respect, while still having other features to recommend them? Join the discussion in the comments.
Today’s post is part of series of posts encouraging you to write stories for minor holidays.
Writing and submitting a story for Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day or Christmas, means you’re up against a lot of competition in an editor’s inbox. Everyone writes for those holidays. But editors still love a timely, topical story. Why not take advantage of the myriad of minor holidays, to give your story an edge?
The Prompt
Write a story for National Handwriting Day on January 23
This is one of the best time travel stories I’ve ever read, and I’m a huge fan of the sub-genre.
Although this story was first published in 1988, I haven’t seen anyone else treat time travel and it’s consequences like this. In fact I’m amazed no ones turned this into a script [1. Assuming they haven’t] (it’d be perfect for Black Mirror). Continue reading “[Reading Room] Ripples In The Dirac Sea by Geoffrey A. Landis”
Every month we gather here to discuss what we’ve achieved and commit to making more progress in our creative lives in the coming month. We call it our Serious Writer’s Accountability Group or SWAGr, for short! (We’re serious, not sombre!)
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.Continue reading “SWAGr for July 2018”
Minor holidays are a great opportunity for writers to show editors why they need to publish *this* story *now*.
Forget about the over-subscribed holidays of Valentine’s and Christmas. Instead, write about some oddball holidays.
All StoryADay’s prompts in June will be tailored to these odd little holidays and anniversaries. Listen to this episode to find out why you might want to write an Arbor Day or National Handwriting Day story.
Plus some opportunities to give and invest in your writing.
NOTES: Get Well Gabby Foundation is collecting NEW books to be distributed to children’s oncology wards. Send them to PO Box 555, Ocean View, DE 19970 or contact your local hospital to see if they need donations.
When I was 12 years old and living in Scotland, I had a friend whose parents were English. We walked home from the bus stop together every night, chattering away in colorful local accents and colloquialisms. But as soon as my friend reached her front door, she would call out, “Hallo, Mummy, I’m home!” in the most pukka English accent you could ever hope to hear.
She didn’t even know she was doing it.
Maybe it’s because I have my parents staying with me at the moment, but I’ve been thinking about the ways our characters change, depending on who we’re with. My McCarroll tendencies come out while they’re visiting. I become more laid-back (or as my husband calls it ‘late’), and more spontaneous (or ‘disorganized and indecisive’). Even my accent gets more Scottish (see last week’s podcast).
I’m sure my parents are equally bemused by my ‘sudden’ need to know what everyone’s plans are for the day, since nobody in our family ever really had plans until the last minute (see? Spontaneous!).
So today I want you to explore that, with your character.
The Prompt
Write a story that shows you character in three different scenes, interacting with people who bring out different sides of their character.
Tips
Families are great for this. How we act around our parents and/or siblings is almost certainly different from how we act around our best friends. How we act with our spouse is probably different again.
How we act with a truly terrible lover who is all wrong for us, is a whole other category of behavior, especially when contrasted with interactions with people who really love us.
Stress is another great way to reveal a different side of a character. Some people are great under pressure. Some get angry. Some whine. Some cower. Some people turn into unexpected leaders in a crisis, while others who you’d expect to lead, become indecisive or cowardly.
Think about using cultural differences. For example, think about my friend who was Scottish on the street and English in the house. Think about how Barack Obama’s rhetorical style slipped along a spectrum from Harvard Intellectual to Southern Baptist Preacher depending on the crowd he was talking to (not that those two things are mutually exclusive, of course!). Think about how a hideously prejudiced old man can be genuinely sweet and generous to his own grandchild.
It’s tough to read Matheson’s stories now because his are the quintessential Twilight Zone type story (they were turned into several of the best TZ episodes) and have been ripped off, parodied and lovingly copied so many times that they feel cliched.
But concentrating on that takes away from the exquisite, concise, clear writing, characterization and big ideas of the original material. He really is a tremendously good writer.
His stories contain big ideas, thoughtfully dealt with in crisp prose that I could read until the end of time.
The Death Ship
This story was adapted into an early Twilight Zone episode. It comes from the early days of space exploration, when ideas were big and facts in short supply. Some of the assumptions in the story are suspect by today’s scientific standards, but that was never what these early sci-fi stories were about. (You know, unless they were written by Arthur C. Clarke, who also had a hand in inventing Radar, so he’s a bit of a special case.)
In this story three men in a space ship survey new planets, looking for new homes for the humans from the chronically overcrowded Earth. When they go down to investigate a particular planet, things start to get weird.
From that point on, the story is a purely about human nature and drama, with the space-faring backdrop becoming fairly unimportant.
That’s one of the things I find irresistible about science fiction. The writers hook you with the setting, with the gadgets and the ‘what ifs’, but then all the best stories end up being about the human condition.
They do what art is supposed to do: make life look a little bit strange, so that we can reassess our own position towards it. No matter which side of the political shouting match you’re on, it seems like that’s something our civilization could us at the moment, don’t you think?
What setting or story type could you use to reel in a reader who needs to see part of their own life with fresh eyes?
This month at StoryADay we’re all about revisions.
This episode takes a look at how to revise your short stories without becoming overwhelmed, and invites you to think about submitting a story to StoryADay’s showcase: Storyfest, coming up on June 23-24.
One of the only ways to get better as a writer is to learn to revise our stories. This month, at StoryADay we’re focusing on revision. Keep reading for a free lesson on how to achieve the right revision mindset, and for news about this year’s StoryFest!
The Prompt
Take a story you have written before and rework it, today
Do not correct your grammar and typos first! Instead, look at the structure of the story. Does it make sense? Is anything missing? Is there any conflict in your story?
Then look at your main character. Are they consistent? Do they develop over the story?
Read through this guest post from DIYMFA.com’s Gabriela Pereira, about how to approach this layered method of revision. Pick one layer to work on first. Don’t get overwhelmed.
If this very structural method of revision doesn’t work for you, still bear in mind the general principle that the big story questions come first, spelling corrections come last!
Now is the time to think about your audience. Who will want to read your story? (Hint: don’t say ‘everybody’.) If you’re writing romance, you’re probably writing for women ages 25-39. Are your settings, situations, characters and language appropriate to that audience? If you’re writing an adventure story for 13 year old boys, is your protagonist slightly older than them and does he have strongly defined personality traits and friends with complimentary traits? Is the situation he faces exciting and just slightly outside his capabilities (but not too much? If you’re writing for flash fiction fans, is your story a little Rubik’s cube of a thing, but much, much prettier?
What length should a story like this be? Check out Duotrope.com for listings of publications seeking stories (they list story lengths and sub-genres). It’s all very well to write something unique, but it’s much harder to get published if nobody can fit you into a sub-genre. And since we’re talking about revision, this month, I’m encouraging you to think about audience and market more than I do when we’re just working on creativity!
STORYFEST IS COMING, June 23-24, 2018
If you took part in StoryADay May this year, our annual story showcase is scheduled for the weekend of June 23-24. (See previous versions of StoryFest here)
To take part, make sure you’re on the mailing list (sign up below) and watch your inbox for information about how to submit your favorite story and recommend one by another StoryADay writer. (No, there’s no ‘judging’ or selection process, you simply nominate one of the stories you wrote during StoryADay May this year.)
We’ll meet every week to write a story. Feel free to share in the comments, or just tell us what you wrote about (if you’re saving your story for publication).
The Prompt
Write about an artist (not a writer) struggling with a personal and a professional challenge on the same day
Tips
Use the lessons you’ve learned in your writing, but transfer them to another art form (e.g. a pianist is struggling to practice; a digital animator is on deadline and the power goes out…)
Allow their professional and personal struggles to inform each other (Do they struggle with putting their own needs last, in their personal life? How does this impact their work? Is their work a refuge from their personal life? How does this affect their relationships? Is the powercut threatening the safety of their loved ones, as well as their deadline?)
StoryADay May is over and now we get to celebrate.
This episode talks about upcoming themes at the StoryADay blog, the Serious Writers’ Accountability Group and the upcoming StoryFest showcase of all our hard work
Every month we gather here to discuss what we’ve achieved and commit to making more progress in our creative lives in the coming month. We call it our Serious Writer’s Accountability Group or SWAGr, for short! (We’re serious, not sombre!)
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.Continue reading “SWAGr – Accountability for June 2018”
Today I’m sharing the final Superstar post with everyone, because I think everyone needs to take a moment to celebrate!!
Audio only
Transcript
I hope that you have found this illuminating, frustrating, exhilarating…
I know there were days when you weren’t thrilled with what you write and that there were days when you surprised yourself or made yourself really happy.
More than that, YOU know that you have 31 days under your belt, of writing whether you felt like it or not.
(Even if you didn’t write every day, I’m willing to be there were days this month when you wrote when you didn’t want to and you finished a story even when you thought it wasn’t worth it and that act of finishing showed you that you can do this.)
You’ve pushed yourself and I want you to take some time today to make some notes about what you’ve learned, about your rhythms of writing; about how things work for you.
I can give you advice, and Stephen King can give you advice, and none of it really matters. It’s great to put yourself in a community of people talking about things that matter to you, and you can learn from other people’s examples, for sure, but the only way to discover how you write, is to write.
At the end of this 31 days, you’ll have learned something about your rhythm, your practice of writing.
The Prompt
Write a story about a creative person who has just completed, or is in the throes of completing a massive creative effort.
(And yes, this can be autobiographical).
Youc ould tak us thorugh the manic process of trying to finish up the work. You can show us their post-event hysteria/collapse. You can have them reflecting on the effort.
Pay attention to the physicality of it.
Go anywhere you want with this.
It doesn’t have to be serious. It can be self-indulgent (you’ve earned it!)
Looking Backwards And Looking Forwards
I hope this has been a great experience for you.
Write your story today and then take a moment to blog or journal or tweet or whatever you do to celebrate and share.
Take some time to really revel in the fact that you have devoted these 31 days, regardless of how much you were able to turn up, or how often you were able to write, or how good your stories were, you devoted this month to paying attention to your inner writer.
You have these materials now, you can come back at any time and dive back into these prompts, the meditations, the forum. You’ve met these people who have gone through this experience with you and you’ve made some connections. I hope you will stay in touch with each other. Having a cohort of people to help each other out is an amazing thing. These people who know and like you will be your biggest boosters, so stay in touch. Take advantage of the fact that you have this group of people how have shared this experience with you.
(And if you weren’t part of the Superstars group this time around, keep watching your inbox for the next opportunity. I’ll be running this again in September and next May, at the very least.)
Make your plans for the rest of the year. As you’re writing your celebratory blog/journal entry and going through the worksheet about what you’ve learned this month, think about your plans are for the rest of the year, the rest of the next five years…
Think about how you can put into practice. everything you’ve learned in this month to honor your urge to write to be creative, to write. If you need to be part of a group of people who commit to writing regularly, then you’re going to need to find a group. It might be the SWAGr group–come along on the first of the month, and make sure you’re on the SWAGr notifications list by signing up at the bottom of this page. Maybe you need a real-life group fo people who meet in a cafe on Saturday mornings and does a write-in. Find one. Look on Meetup.com. Start one!
Whatever you need, figure it out, commit to doing it.
Set yourself some goal. Make most of them attainable, but think about having one big, scary, outrageous goal. Think about the steps you can take to get yourself closer to realizing that goal, or at least working towards it.
Thank you for coming along on this journey. I learn a lot from you, and from producing these materials, so I really appreciate you being here. I love getting to know you and building this tribe of people who are on each other’s side as we strive to be writers everyday, not ‘someday’.
Write your story today. Journal about your experiences this month. Watch your inbox for more information from me in the months ahead, and most of all…
Keep writing!!
And don’t forget to sign up to receive reminders about the Serious Writers’ Accountability Group (SWAGr) below!
What are your plans for the months ahead? What would you like to see here at StoryADay to help you reach your goals? Leave a comment (or a link to your blog post) below.
Welcome back to the penultimate day of your month of extreme short story writing.
After setting you free yesterday, I’m putting a few more limits on you again today.
The Prompt
Take a story that you wrote earlier this month, and tell it from a different point of view
The point of this prompt is to show you that sometimes a story benefits from being told in a different way. Noir stories work in first person because that’s what we’re used to. Something set in a Victorian era works well in Third Person Omniscient because that’s how Dickens wrote–it’s what we’re used to.
Use this prompt as an excuse to play with a story and make it richer, through voice.
Here we are, the final three days of this extreme month of writing.
It’s so impressive that you’re still here, that you’re still writing, that you’re still coming back to this.
I know you have stories you want to tell, that the world needs to hear.
Your experiences, your outlook, your way of expressing yourself, are unique in the history of the world and I’m so glad you’ve come this far, and you’re still writing.
And I know you’re going to continue to write, because you’ve come this far.
Today I’m giving you a prompt that might seem a little lazy from me, but there’s a reason.
The Prompt
Write the story that you’ve been hungering to write.
I’ve been very proscriptive this month, telling you what you write, and you’ve been writing for four weeks. You’ve got stories in your head that are nipping at your brain, whispering “tell me!”, so today I’m setting you free.
Tell one of those stories.
Leave a comment to let us know what you wrote today
This is the kind of writing prompt that puts so many limits on your story that you can’t worry about making the story good. Sometimes you end up with a good story, but the silliness of the prompt removes all pretension and blocks.
The Prompt
Your story must include these words; ink, previously, work, breeze, seven, run, delicious, example, spontaneous, barb.
Start a story that begins with the ending, then immediately jumps back in time.
e.g. “It all started 12 hours ago.”
Think of this as the way someone might shoot a heist movie: a character is being led out in handcuffs and a voiceover says, “It all started 12 weeks ago.”
(In a short story you probably need to keep the scale in hours as this means you don’t have too many scenes.)
Don’t worry too much about getting this perfect. Feel free to be cheesy. Just have fun. Leave a comment to let us know how you got on!
This week I share some of the prompts from week 4 of StoryADay May 2018, talk about creativity and limits, and encourage you to dive into the community at StoryADay.
Also, I talk about drug discovery and wheelbarrows…
LINKS
Serious Writers’ Accountability Group (SWAGr): https://stada.me/swagr
Today’s prompt lets you practice your dialogue and thinking about communicating your characters’ motivations to the reader.
The Prompt
One character is trying to sell something to another character. .
This could be metaphorical: they are trying to sell them an idea.
It could be literal: they’re trying to sell them a car.
Leave a comment letting us know how it went (and what you decided to sell!)
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