Daily Prompt – May 15: Amusement Parks

I’m spending the day at an amusement park with the kiddies.

I love watching all the different people and types, from the loud, dramatic teens, to the young parents, the kid-free couples, the grandparents, the happy ones, the cranky ones…it’s great fodder .

Write a story set at an Amusement park

It’s a setting ripe for drama, mystery, horror, poetry, action, joy and sorrow.

Go!

Daily Prompt – May 14: Skylab

Write a story using space or sci-fi elements

On this day in 1973, the US launched the orbital space station Skylab.

Write A Story With  Space/Science Fiction Elements

Even if you’re not a big fan of science fiction, this doesn’t have to be a difficult assignment. Sci-Fi isn’t all about techno-babble or rockets.

Two of my favourite episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation are:

1, Captain Picard is left on a planet, by a malevolent force, with the captain of a ship from a culture that communicates so strangely not even Star Trek’s wonderful translators can handle it. They are in peril and must work together. Gradually Picard figures out that the alien captain’s language is based on metaphors, but he doesn’t share the same culture so how can he find metaphors with which to communicate? It’s basically a stranded-on-an-island, must-work-together-to-escape-peril story, all about linguistics. In space.

2, Someone from Starfleet wants to take the sentient andriod Data back to HQ and take him apart to figure out how he works, for the greater good of the service (a fleet of Datas? We’d be unstoppable, Great!). Picard demands a tribunal at which he attempts to prove that Data is an individual not merely a piece of equipment. A wrinkle? Picard’s second in command and Data’s buddy, Riker, must act as prosector, and try to prove that his friend is merely a machine. This one is called “Measure of a Man” and is a long, fascinating philosophical argument about what it means to be human. Set on a spaceship.

Another example: the movie Moon, which came out last year. It is a psychological thriller set on the moon. It uses a sci-fi setting  to create an isolation you couldn’t realistically create in a story set on our planet these days. And it uses some sci-fi tricks to mess with the hero’s mind and throw obstacles in his path, and none of it is extraneous.

What kind of story could you write, that uses as space or futuristic setting? A mystery? A romance? A morality play?

Daily Prompt – May 11: Irving Berlin

Write a song inspired a song.

Another birth anniversary from the Golden Age of US popular culture: Irving Berlin.

Born Israel Baline in New York in 1888, Berlin was a prolific songwriter, penning some of the most well-known songs ever, from White Christmas to Blue Skies and God Bless America.

While a lot of his songs lyrics were saccharine-sweet, being written for shows, they were all clever and often deceptively simple. My favourite Irving Berlin songs are the ones where he lets a tinge of sadness or regret into them (What’ll I Do? is an example of a both a seemingly simple lyric and real, poignant emotion).

With A Song In Your Heart

(OK, that was Rogers and Hart, but let’s not pick nits)

Write a story inspired by a song. I’m going to suggest this verse (that’s the bit they usually don’t tack onto popular recordings of standards) from the Irving Berlin song Remember:

One little kiss,

A moment of bliss,

Then hours of deep regret.

One little smile,

And after a while,

A longing to forget.

One little heratache

Left as a token,

One little plaything,

Carelessly broken.

But you can pick another lyric if you want to.

Week 2 – How’s It Going?

Well, this has been an interesting journey so far.

In a week and a bit I have gone from …

Well, this has been an interesting journey so far.

In a week and a bit I have gone from

  • Being super-excited and a little nervous, to
  • Awkwardly writing the first short story I’d written in ages, to
  • Figuring out how to get into the meat of the story faster, to
  • Feeling like I was never going to be able to launch myself into a new story every day, to
  • Realizing story ideas were everywhere and that all I needed was one interesting sentence or question or moment in reality for a story to flow from it, to
  • Struggling with real life, carving out time to write, to
  • Noticing that I am really happy and productive in other areas of my life when I do write, to
  • Noticing that I am a bit of a witch if circumstances conspire to keep me from my writing, to
  • Coming to terms with the fact that even in a challenge like this, there might have to be the occasional day off, to
  • Looking forward to getting back to writing again after a day off.

I have written every day except Mother’s Day on Sunday, when I spent my writing time doing site maintenance and lining up writing prompts for the coming week (Note to self: if I do this again, I’ll get a month’s worth of prompts ready before Day 1. I also wish I had more blog posts in my back pocket, rather than blog ideas. I was waiting to see what people’s challenges were, so I could blog about that, but in reality, where did I think I was going to find the time? Even this post is robbing Peter to pay Paul).

I am really enjoying reading everyone else’s comments both on the Twitter feed and at the site.

I love reading everyone’s comments on other people’s stories and making them myself. It forces me to read things critically and pick up tips for my own writing. I find that difficult to do in a vacuum.Freckles

So, in short, I’m loving doing the challenge and I’m loving the community aspect of it. Big thanks to everyone who is turning up and trying.