[Writing Prompt] First Person Story

For the next few days we’re going to be concentrating on point of view. Sometimes it’s tempting to write all our stories in the same kind of voice. Not this week. I’m going to give you a real work out and take you through many different types of voice and story.

Ready? Let’s get started.

The Prompt

Write A Story Using The First Person Voice

Tips

  • The whole thing should be told in the “I” voice.
  • It should, for preference, be a story about something that happened/is happening to the person telling the story.
  • When writing in the first person you can never allow your narrative to stray inside another character’s head. The “I” character can speculate about what other people are thinking, but everything must come from their perspective.
  • If you fancy it, try writing the same story over the next few days, but each day from a different perspective.

Go!

[Writing Prompt] Location Location Location

In this age of Google Maps and Street view and everyone-documenting-everything, there is no reason not to set your story in a ‘foreign’ location and still get the details right.

The Prompt

Write a story in a place you’ve never actually been to.

Tips

  • Use a search engine to find out a few important facts about the place.
  • Use Google Street View to take a look at the place (if your story is taking place in a diner in North-East Philadelphia, hope on Google maps and find out exactly what your heroine sees as she’s looking out of the window, waiting to say that thing she wants to say).
  • Find a blog or informal tourist account of the location and gather some off-the-beaten-track details.
  • Don’t spend all day doing these things. Just find one or two really colorful details that will help ground your story in the location. Make your characters from somewhere else if you’re not confident of capturing local speech patterns.
  • If you don’t write realistic fiction, find somewhere to act as a model for your extra-terrestrial setting. Use a detail or two (like the architecture of the TRW ‘Space Park’ in Redondo Beach, California; used in a Star Trek episode in 1967; or England’s Home Counties as Tolkein’s Middle Earth).

[Writing Prompt] Front Page of Wikipedia

Quickly scan the “In The News” and “On This Day…” sections, or even the Featured Article. If something catches your eye, use it as the spark for today’s story.

The Prompt

Grab a story spark from the front page of Wikipedia

Tips

  • Don’t spend more than 5 minutes trying to find a story that sparks your interest
  • Don’t pick something that requires lots of specialist knowledge unless you a, work in the field or b, are comfortable blagging.
  • Try to concentrate on the characters and their reactions more than the facts. This might be inspired by an encyclopedia entry, but you shouldn’t sound like you’re writing one!

To see how some of last year’s participants used this prompt, check out the comments on this post.

Go!

[Writing Prompt] From Beyond The Grave

OK, this prompt is not as spooky as the title might lead you to believe.

Since we’ve started talking about ‘character’, let’s stay there for a while.

It can be hard to come up with a fascinating character for each new story. Yes, you can certainly use recurring characters, but what about when you get bored and need a change? You’ve raided your memories, you’ve looked at pictures for inspiration, but what to do on a day when you’re truly stuck?

The Prompt

Write A Story Based On An Obituary

Say what?!

Seriously, obituaries are like little potted character studies. Read them carefully and you’ll find stories there you never would have thought of: the little old lady in the nursing home who was actually a counter-espionage agent during WWII; the mother of four who loved to race go-karts; the business leader who quietly spent his retirement raising prize-winning orchids.

Characters, every one!

And if you feel strange ripping off someone else’s life story, try to see it as a celebration of their life instead. Change the names, change the details, but the story you write that was inspired by the obituary will remain a tribute to the unique human being you read about.

Where To Find Obituaries

  • Obituaries.com
  • Your local newspaper’s website

Tips

  • Reading about the great and good can be interesting, but paging down to the unsung, everyday people can be where you find the most unexpected and fruitful material.
  • Seize on that one detail about a person that makes them seem real to you.
  • What made them do the things they did?
  • What stories lie behind their passions?
  • What moment led them to that one fascinating detail in their obituary. Wind back the clock and show us the moment when it all started.
  • Try not to read more than five profiles before choosing one to write about. You could easily lose your whole day looking for the perfect character (or simply reading about people’s lives). Pick the first person who has a detail that makes you go “huh!”

[Writing Prompt] Character Is Important, in Fiction Writing

As I pointed out yesterday, story can be all about character.

Sometimes the idea of plot can trip us up (“How do I make it interesting? What should I make *happen*?”). But the truth is, write an interesting character, give them some need, put an obstacle in their way, and you need never worry about ‘plot’.

The Prompt

Think of a fascinating character from your life (past or present). Think about what they wanted on a particular day. Write that story.

Tips

  • Short stories are about a moment in time, when something changes in a character’s life. What one thing tips the balance for your character today?
  • The change doesn’t need to be life-shattering. Sometimes small changes in perspective have a huge impact on the rest of someone’s life.
  • For examples of what I’m talking about think of episodic TV. Not every episode deals with the overall arc of the season. Sometimes it’s just a fun story about a day in the life of one of the characters. Maybe Data is trying to learn to sneeze and discovers some truths about life as an android. Perhaps someone goes on a really bad date and discovers that what he really needs right now is to stop dating for a while and hang out with friends.

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[Writing Prompt] A Picture’s Worth A Thousand Words

…but sometimes so are a thousand words!

The Prompt

Go to the Flickr Explore page and pick the first photo that catches your eye.

Stare at it for five minutes or so and write a story inspired by it.

Tips

  • Pick the most visually arresting picture, the one that interests you immediately.
  • It might not be obvious what the story is going to be.
  • This will probably make the story better.
  • Don’t waste any time writing backstory. Think hard then start when something is happening or about to.
  • Remember that stories are all about character. What does your character want? What is getting in her way?

Remember to post in The Victory Dance when you’ve finished your story today. You’ll get congratulations and inspire everyone else to finish their stories.

(You don’t have to post your story anywhere, just let us know you have written today)