Write A Drabble Today

Don’t expect this to be a super-quick exercise…

Today you’re going to write a were a story in 100 words. This also known as a Drabble.

The Prompt

Write a story in 100 words

  • With a story this short, you have about 25 words to open the story and about 10 words at the end to wrap things up. The rest of the words hold the meat of the story.
  • Often it’s easier to write the story a little longer and cut it down.
  • Being concise doesn’t mean leaving out detail. You just have to make sure (probably on a rewrite) that every word is doing double duty. If you’re describing something make sure it reflects the mood of the character as well, for example.
  • Don’t expect this to be a super-quick exercise. A hundred words is not many and it can be difficult to shoehorn a story into such a small space. You are going to need to build in time to revise it.
  • The good news is that writing a 100 word story and revising it still takes less time than writing a 3,000 word story.
  • If you need some inspiration check out the site 100 Word Story. Read a few to get the idea of what can be done with so few words.

Go!

Post a comment to let us know how you’re getting on, share your story, share tips or ask for help!

Guest Writing Prompt from Jerry B. Jenkins

Today’s guest prompt is from the legendary Jerry B. Jenkins, co-author of the Left Behind series and many, many other best sellers, and host of the fabulously generous writing resource: JerryJenkins.com. I’ve been poking around inside his new Writers’ Guild (a memership site for writers). It’s well worth a look, and I’ll be posting a review of it later in the summer.

Updated: As a bonus, Jerry’s asked me to share this article with you:How To Become An Author

The Prompt

You head the credit union at a company that requires employees to explain needs for loans. One pleads privately for confidentiality, and you talk the the board into his loan, based on their trust in you. You go to your grave without revealing his secret, which is…

Jerry Jenkins, author pictureJerry B. Jenkins has written 187 books with sales of more than 70 million copies. He’s had 21 New York Times bestsellers, including the Left Behind series. He now shares his writing knowledge with aspiring authors at JerryJenkins.com.

Fourth Grade Spelling List

This is a ridiculous and fun little exercise. Try it!

Here’s another prompt that’s going to make it difficult for you to try to write a brilliant story. We’re focusing this week on productivity, quantity not quality. And here’s the secret, when you’re not too worried about the quality, you quite often find that your writing is better than you expected.

The Prompt

Write a story containing all of these words from a fourth grade spelling list.

  • Blame
  • State
  • Frame
  • Holiday
  • Relay
  • Waist
  • Pail
  • Gain
  • Raise
  • Mayor
  • Airplane
  • Remain

Continue reading “Fourth Grade Spelling List”

Write A Story In 30 Minutes

This prompt is a great one for the first day because this is a day when you’re probably the most excited about the challenge and your ambitions are high and you’re quite likely to try and do too much.

The Prompt

Write a story in 30 minutes

I would rather you try to do too little and succeed and try to do too much and fai. Hence the limit on timing.

Tips

  • Set a timer. I know you probably have a phone clutched in your hand right now. Tell it to set a timer for 30 minutes. Don’t start it yet.
  • Every story starts with character. Think of your favorite type of character from somebody else’s fiction. Do you like Jack Reacher? He’s heroic he’s almost impossible to beat in a fight. And yet Lee Child manages to make him an interesting character. Is this the kind of character you like? If not what do you like? Write down qualities of characters that you love to read about, now.
  • Once you have a character, think about something that this character would never ever do.
  • Think of a way to back this character into a corner where they must do the thing they would never do.
  • For example all Harry Potter wants to do is find a place to belong, a place to call home. He finds it at Hogwarts. The last thing he would ever do is risk getting kicked out of Hogwarts. But what does he do in every book? He risks getting kicked out of Hogwarts. He does it to save his friends, to further the course of right, and ultimately to save his world.On a smaller scale in All The Light You Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, the main character is a young blind girl who relies utterly on her doting father. The last thing she would want is to be separated from her father and have to cope with life on her own. But along comes World War II and the Nazis and guess what she has to do? It’s not a big adventure novel there are some explosions (not in a Bruce Willis kind of way), but the tension is very real because were worried about this poor vulnerable girl and what she’s going to do in her circumstances. Pick something for your character that will push them beyond their comfort zone.
  • Think about this for a little while. It might be best if you think about this while you go off and do whatever it is you have to do today, and then come back to writing later.
  • think about how late you can start the story. You don’t have to write background, telling us who the character is, what her daily life is all about. That’s for movies. This is a short story. We don’t have the space for that. Short story writers can start closer to the middle of the action — we can start in medias res, the middle of the action. Later, we show the reader the stakes, through conversation or actions. They don’t need to know everything in the opening paragraph.
  • OK, you have a few ideas? Great! Start your timer.
  • How to write a story in 30 minutes Write for no more than 10 minutes on the opening of the story. At the 10 minute mark make sure that you’re moving into the main action of the story: the complications, making things worse for your protagonist, making things funnier/more harrowing/more interesting. At the 25 minute mark, start wrapping up: even if the story isn’t completely finished, even if you have to write [something cool happens here], draw a line under the middle part of your story and get the resolution. Wrap it up by the time you hit the 30 minute mark. First draft: done!
  • This is difficult, and you’re not going to end up with a fabulous polished story. (You might, but you shouldn’t expect to.) However writing to the end of the story gives you a first draft that you can go back and clean up later. The experience of going from beginning to end in 30 minutes proves to you that you can do this. Congratulations! You have a complete story. Now start thinking about what you might write about tomorrow!

 

Continue reading “Write A Story In 30 Minutes”

Guest Writing Prompt from Jonathan Maberry

JONATHAN MABERRY is a NY Times bestselling novelist, five-time Bram Stoker Award winner, and comic book writer.

Today we’re kicking off StoryADay May 2016 with a prompt from the fabulous Jonathan Maberry.  (If you have a chance to hear him speak at a writer’s conference/group/signing, go! You’ll be inspired to run home and write!)

The Prompt

When Terry began scrolling through her phone, none of the photos she found were hers.

Jonathan Maberry, Author pictureJONATHAN MABERRY is a NY Times bestselling novelist, five-time Bram Stoker Award winner, and comic book writer. He writes the Joe Ledger thrillers, the Rot & Ruin series, the Nightsiders series, the Dead of Night series, as well as standalone novels in multiple genres. His new and upcoming novels include KILL SWITCH, the 8th in his best-selling Joe Ledger thriller series; VAULT OF SHADOWS, a middle-grade sf/fantasy mash-up; and MARS ONE, a standalone teen space travel novel. He is the editor of many anthologies including THE X-FILES, SCARY OUT THERE, OUT OF TUNE, and V-WARS. His comic book works include, among others, CAPTAIN AMERICA, the Bram Stoker Award-winning BAD BLOOD, ROT & RUIN, V-WARS, the NY Times bests-selling MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN, and others. His books EXTINCTION MACHINE and V-WARS are in development for TV. A board game version of V-WARS was released in early 2016. He is the founder of the Writers Coffeehouse, and the co-founder of The Liars Club. Prior to becoming a full-time novelist, Jonathan spent twenty-five years as a magazine feature writer, martial arts instructor and playwright. He was a featured expert on the History Channel documentary, Zombies: A Living History and a regular expert on the TV series, True Monsters. He is one third of the very popular and mildly weird Three Guys With Beards pop-culture podcast. Jonathan lives in Del Mar, California with his wife, Sara Jo.

[Write On Wednesday] Dreadful Dialogue Tags

Conventional writing wisdom (these days) says that the mark of an amateur writer is to use colorful dialogue tags instead of a simple ‘she said’. Nevertheless, teachers continue to foist alternatives to ‘said’ on our children. Today’s assignment is designed to show you just how ridiculous that can become.

 Have fun!

And, if you’re near King of Prussia, PA, tonight, come out to the StoryADay Live! “Un-Dreadful Dialogue” workshop  hosted by the fabulous Main Line Writers’ Group!

Thumbnail of 100 words poster - alternatives to saidThe Prompt

Write a story featuring lots of dialogue. Every time you attribute speech to a person you must use one of the ‘alternatives to said’ from the sheet.
(Click to enlarge)

Tips

  • Make sure you rely entirely on the tags to convey the emotion, leaving the dialogue itself bland and without character.
  • Bonus points for making all your characters sound the same.
  • Be as ridiculous as you like.
  • This exercise works particularly well when your subject matter is serious or shocking.
  • This whole exercise is designed to show you how ridiculous dialogue tags can wreck a serious story.
  • (Remember, “he said” and “she said” become invisible when you use them well. These tags never will.)
  • Make sure every single utterance has a tag, whether or not you need one. (e.g. in the case of two people speaking, you can often get away with no tags at all, especially if the conversation is short and the voices are distinct.)
  • Read it (and weep).

 

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Steal A Title

A Month of Writing Prompts 2016Big News! This prompts for this year’s StoryADay May challenge are now available for pre-order as a Kindle ebook! (More formats forthcoming)
If you’re the type of person who likes to plan ahead, go ahead and pre-order your copy today. It’ll land in your Amazon account on Saturday, April 23, (automatically downloading onto your Kindle or Kindle app on your phone) giving you a week to ponder the prompts before the challenge begins.

Stuffed with all-new prompts—including material from my StoryADay Live workshops on story structure and conflict—and headed up by a section that shares road-tested tips for surviving a month of short story writing!

And now, on to this week’s prompt.

The Prompt

Steal a title from a novel or song

Tips

  • You can tell the story of the song, in short story form
  • You can write a completely different story, taking the title and coming up with something fresh.
  • Don’t simply retell the story of someone else’s novel (that’s theft!)

 

[Write On Wednesday] 100 Word Story With Grandparents

Today I’m challenging you to share your story on the new Anchor App (only available for iOS just now, sorry).

The Prompt

Write A 100 Word Story Containing A Reference To Grandparents

Tips

  • This can be a story about grandparents, or it can have the most tangential reference to grandparents (see my story on Anchor)
  • Even if you don’t remember your grandparents, the idea of grandparents saturates our culture. I’m sure you can find some way (syrupy or sarcastic) to write about this!
  • 100 word stories (also known as Drabbles) take some finessing, so I’m going to recommend writing something a little longer, then cutting it.
  • A good way to think about a 100 word story is to have 25 words to set it up, 50 words for the meat of the story and 25 words for the wrap up. It’s not that neat, of course, but the formula is just a ‘way in’.
  • Dribbles often come across almost like form-less poems. The descriptions and characterization certainly owe more to poetry than to novels.
  • If you’re new to Anchor, download it from the app store and go through the introductory ‘first wave’ instructions, then just mash the big red button to record your story. You have two minutes, so you might want to fire up a stopwatch. When you’re finished, you can listen to the finished ‘wave’ and then click the ‘next’ arrow to move to a screen where you can give your wave a caption and a hashtag (use #storytelling and #storyaday so that I can find it and listen). Then listen to other people’s stories and hit the ‘reply’ button (you’ll have one minute to reply. When you’re listening, the app will keep playing content until you
  • If you don’t have Anchor you could always record your story and upload it to your own blog or another audio hosting system.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Change A Headline

Did you ever, as a child, say a word so often that it lost its meaning? (“Basin”, anyone?)
Today I want you to stare at a news headline until it loses its original meaning and lets you play with it.

The Prompt

Take A News Headline And Change A Word Or Two, Sparking A Fictional Story.

Examples

For some reason, to me, this headline suggested some kind of epic fantasy with heroic quests, tasks the hero have been assigned. Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Change A Headline”

[Write on Wednesday] Write what you know

We’re always being told to write what we know but doesn’t that sound the teensiest bit boring?

Still, unless you have a lot of time for research, mining your own experiences can be useful…if you go about it in the right way.

The Prompt

Write a list of things you know about. Pick one. Give that knowledge to a character.

Tips

  • Dig deep as you make your list. Consider all the arcana of your brain’s storehouses.  Don’t discount very, very specific things like “growing up one street across from an elite military academy’s live-fire training grounds, in the 1970s” or “spending vacations in an apartment over my uncle’s store”.
  • Pick something from the middle of your list. The first will be too obvious and everyday (therefore the story will not excite you) and the last one will be too weird, because you were clutching at straws. That one would require too much research and then your short story would never be written (or would demand to become a novel).
  • Consider what kind of character you can give this experience to. Will the wnjoy it? Hate it? Grow up to try to hide it only to have it become important (remember Clarice in “The Silence Of The Lambs” trading secrets about her backwoods upbringing to buy Hannibal Lector’s assistance?)
  • Consider giving your character a sidekick to impress/show off for/frighten/lie to.
  • What does your character want? How can this specialist knowledge help/hinder in their quest. What would they do/never do? What do they need? Where are they at the start and the end of your story (metaphorically and physically).

GO!

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[Write On Wednesday] PostModern Pop Songs

The Prompt: Write A List Of Song Titles You’d Actually Be Interested In Listening To. Write The Story Behind The Song, for one of them.

After you reach a certain age — or stage — of life, it seems like no one writers songs for you any more. You’ve learned a lot of the lessons pop singers seem to be struggling with. Maybe you’re (gasp!) happily married. Maybe the things you struggle with are things other than love and boys and where to go on a Saturday night.

The Prompt

Write A List Of Song Titles You’d Actually Be Interested In Listening To.

Choose One.

Write The Story Of The Character In That Song.

Tips

  • Country music is probably a slightly better role model here than pop. I know there are lots of songs about a more mature kind of love, or about the kind of lifestyle people wish they were living. You could write a wishlist of how your life would look (similar to the country music odes to God, Guns, Mama, Girls and Trucks)

Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] PostModern Pop Songs”

[Write On Wednesday] Write A Secret Story

Inspiration for this prompt came from the very wonderful How To Be A Writer by Barbara Baig, which I’ve only just started reading, but which echoes what I’ve been saying here for years (so naturally, I think she’s a genius!)

Not everything you write should be written with a view to showing it to anyone else.

Just as you would practice the piano in private for months or years before hoping to be able to bring any pleasure to a listener, writers must practice their craft too…sometimes in private.

The Prompt

Write A Story That Is You Will Never Show To Anyone

Tips

  • Don’t cheat and tell yourself that something magical is bound to happen and that you’ll end up writing a story so good that you’ll feel compelled to show it to people. Promise you will not show it to anyone and stick to that.
  • If you’re having trouble coming up with something to write about, dive into your stash of Story Sparks (you have been collecting them, haven’t you?)
  • If you haven’t been collecting Story Sparks out in the real world, take ten minutes right now and look deep inside yourself. What news story annoyed you this week? Which political candidate do you despise the most? Why? What did you see that was beautiful, recently? What is your strongest memory of your mother? Why? What did summer smell like when you were growing up? Who do you miss? What’s your favorite swear word? What frightened you when you were a child? What frightens you now?
  • Make a quick list of 30 Story Sparks. (If you don’t know what I mean by story sparks read this article)

Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Write A Secret Story”

[Write on Wednesday] Regret

I’m not big on regrets. Everything experience contributes to the person we become, so there’s not much point in wishing to change the past.

But everyone has regrets.

And what good is a character in a story without a few regrets?
Regret - Contrast

The Prompt

Write A Story Centering On A Character Wrestling With A Big Regret

Tips

  • Think of a character (do this exercise: adjective noun; e.g. nervous housewife; tired teacher; suicidal businessman; carefree duke)
  • Give that character one thing in their past that they regret.
  • Think about how this thing has affected where they are today.
  • Ask yourself what would this character do if given a chance to act on the regret (to confront the person it concerned, to change the decision they made, to make amends, to take revenge).
  • Think about the different options open to your character. How does each of them work with the person the character has become in the intervening years? (A rich young man with no responsibilities might swear revenge on the woman who broke his heart. When he meets her again, as an older man who has inherited his wealth and title, does he still want revenge? What will it mean for him if he takes revenge? Is it worth it?)
  • Decide which course of action your character will take (or not take).
  • Set them on the road to taking that course of action.
  • Now start the story. Don’t start with the backstory. Start with them on the road, in the room, in the middle of the fight, in the midst of the heist. You can weave the backstory into the conversations they have during the story.
  • Make sure to let the reader know what’s at stake.

Go!

[Write on Wednesday] The Lie, Revisited

I’ve been browsing the archives here at StoryADay, unearthing some gems from the first year I ran the challenge.

I also decided to recycle a prompt or two. Here’s one from the middle of May 2010:

Ooo, the lie. We’ve all done it. We do it all the time, even though we know we shouldn’t. Sometimes we get away with them and other times they come back to bite us in the most spectacular fashion.

The Prompt

Write About A Lie

Is it a tiny one? A whopper? Does no-one find out about it? Does that mean your character really ‘gets away with it’? Does it spiral out of control and become a Fawlty Towers episode?

GO!

[Write On Wednesday]

In honor of Groundhog Day, today’s prompt encourages you to tell a story over and over and over again…

In honor of Groundhog Day, and one of the best films ever made about an obscure holiday, today’s prompt encourages you to milk one simple plot for all it’s worth.

The Prompt

Write A Very Short Story About An Incident In Your Character’s Day, Then Make Them Relive That Incident

Tips

Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday]”

[Write On Wednesday] Zeitgeist

Are you even moved by an injustice in the world? A news story? A historic event that you feel has stories in it that haven’t been told?
DSC_1639

It can be hard to figure out how to write a story that is of the moment, but doesn’t become irrelevant when the news cycle moves on.

Yesterday’s Reading Room post was all about a story just like that and it pointed one way forward: set your story in the moment (in that story’s case, it was during the Occupy Wall St movement), but make the story about more universal issues. The protagonist of “We Was Twins” was not part of the the Occupy movement, but got caught up in it anyway. He was struggling with issues of poverty, life after military service, grief, estrangement…issues that are universal and timeless.

This week I encourage you to try something similar.

The Prompt

Write a story set in a specific time/place in history, but tell the story of specific individuals dealing with issues that are both specific to them, and part of the human condition.

Tips

  • You might write a story about an idealistic twenty-something who goes to help at a refugee camp in Europe only to find that she still gets picked on by people because she can’t stand up for herself.
  • You might write about someone working on Donald Trump’s Presidential campaign, but with an intriguing complications in their personal life.
  • What if your main character got caught in Winter Storm Jonas on their way to do something life-changing?
  • You could combine this idea with ‘evergreen’ occasions, like Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, the first day of spring. Write a story like this and you can republish it every year, or sell it to a publication that’s looking for holiday stories. Make sure your protagonist has an interesting story to tell, that you can highlight/echo/make poignant with the holiday you choose.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Aphorisms Are Ace

Finding a topic for a story, then, needn’t be hard. Try your hand at this week’s prompt and remember to have fun (even if your story is dark and depressing): Use An Old Saying As A Title

Not every story has to be sparked by a deep desire you need to share with the world.

the first rays
Every Cloud Has A Silver Lining! Photo by: Richard West

Sometimes we write for fun. Most people read to be entertained.

Finding a topic for a story, then, needn’t be hard. Try your hand at this week’s prompt and remember to have fun (even if your story is dark and depressing).

The Prompt

Use An Aphorism As A Title

Tips

[Write On Wednesday] Myers-Briggs-plosion

Myers-Briggs

Today I’m encouraging you to put some personality conflict into your story.

The Prompt

Put a particular personality type into a situation they would never choose

Tips

Use the Myers-Briggs personality types (hover over the table at the bottom of this page, to get a list of characteristics for your main character).

Take some of the traits that define your character and put them in a situation completely unsuited to those traits. See what happens.

For example, Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Myers-Briggs-plosion”

[Write On Wednesday] Manipulation

Marionette

Today’s prompts is all about manipulation.

The Prompt

Write a story with two characters: one manipulative and one manipulated

Tips

Think about what characteristics you associate with a manipulative person. Are they bossy? Aggressive? Passive Aggressive?

Use the contrast between the two characters to highlight the ‘truth’ of the each character- in their own minds, in each others’ minds, in the reader’s mind.

Have some fun with reader expectations here: allow the reader to think that the brash, bossy character is the manipulator when really it turns out that the seemingly submissive character is the one who gets their own way. Or vice versa.

Consider using an unusual setting for a very domestic dispute (an argument about housework during a car chase) or a domestic setting for an unusual conversation (two people making the bed, discussing the evidence for the the theory of multiverses).

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] A Winter Tale

The Prompt

Write a short story with an atmospheric feel set in any of the wintery types of weather that present opportunities to give that additional ingredient of mystery and suspense.

Sat here on a dark, cold, wet morning I thought what a wonderful time of year for a story prompt! Winter offers so many more options to add tension and drama to a scene.

Tips

  • Think of Victorian London, thick, swirling sulphurous fog and the menace of Jack the Ripper.
  • A cold frosty morning, crunchy grass underfoot. The sound of someone following you, dare you look behind.
  • Where do the crazy footprints in the deep, crisp snow lead?
  • A howling gale, is that a ghost I can hear moaning behind the tombstones?
  • A misty morning on the heather clad moors, Cathy frantically searching for Heathcliffe.

Winter tales don’t have to focus on Christmas or New Year (or any other religious festival), there are so many varied forms of winter weather that you can use to give your story that extra buzz of originality and authenticity.

An atmospheric opening paragraph to a story can give a wonderful sense of foreboding. But don’t forget your character; he, she or it needs to be introduced early and be placed in the middle of the dramatic scene.

And don’t ignore your character’s motivation that is driving them to pursue their dream or chase that thief. Then the reader asks ‘why is he there in the middle of nowhere?’ or ‘what is she doing wearing only a bikini in the middle of a snowstorm?’

Go!

Malcolm Richardson has been writing creatively for the last ten years. After a slow start focussing on a novel, which is still only half completed he has concentrated on short stories over the last few years. His recent focus has been entering short stories in competitions. Freshly renewed over the last couple of months, he is now getting grips with his novel with the aim of completing a full first draft early next year. Malcolm is a latecomer to blogging, but his September Story a Day stories can be found here.

 

[Write On Wednesday] Holiday Story

Screen Shot 2015-11-10 at 5.12.57 PMIf you haven’t written a story for the the Nov/Dec holiday-of-your-choice, now’s the time.

The Prompt

Write a Christmas/Other Religiously-Affiliated Seasonal Story, a Thanksgiving Story, or a New Year Story To Include With Your Seasonal Greetings Cards.

Tips

  • Write a short piece that you could include with your holiday cards instead of the dreaded ‘family update’ letter.
  • Think about a few of your friends and what kind of story they’d appreciate (make it your most fun/twisted/dearest friends)
  • Keep the story to about 500 words, so it fits on one side of a printed page.
  • You don’t have to actually send the story, just imagine delighting these particular people, as you write.
  • Feel free to send it to them, with a note saying you were thinking of them.
  • You could do a parody of a traditional seasonal story, or a parody of the family update letter.
  • You could write a sweet, sentimental seasonal story, or a dark piece especially for the friend who you know hates the holidays (especially useful as cathartic therapy when you’ve been out trying to shop in the holiday crowds!)
  • You can post it as your holiday greeting on Facebook or your blog.
  • Get creative. Let loose.

Go!

P.S. I collected a few of my holiday stories into a little ebook collection. You could try this too!

[Write On Wednesday] Get Your Kicks on Route 66

Detours Sometimes Lead to Conflict

How often do our travels – or our lives, for that matter –  go exactly as planned? The detours often lead to conflict, and conflict drives drama. Conflict provides the impetus for action and the catalyst for your characters to change. Conflict keeps things interesting – if it doesn’t get everyone killed! Don’t leave your reader wondering, “Are we there, yet? When are we gonna get there?” Road trips are meant to be fun, interesting, enlightening experiences for the whole family. All too often, we get lulled into complacency, boredom, and “white line fever.” Roadside attractions provide opportunities to stray from the planned path – and opportunities for it all to go terribly, shockingly, or hilariously wrong.

Today’s Prompt

Your character is taking a road trip cross country with two people who are not family or close friends. Something goes horribly wrong at the World’s Largest Cockroach and Frozen Custard Stand (or other odd or humorously cheesy roadside attraction) located in the middle of nowhere.

Ideas to Explore:

  • Who are these characters and why are they traveling across the country together? Was it by choice? Will they be closer by the end of the trip – friends for life, perhaps – or will one or more of them (barely) live to regret it?
  • Now’s your chance to camp it up – you can use an actual roadside attraction (the more ridiculous, the better!) or invent one. Don’t just describe it, though – make us feel like we’re there.
  • What could possibly go wrong? Here’s your opportunity to add over-the-top drama, nail-biting action, or hilarious comic relief. Can you work in all three?

Tips:

  • Create 5-10 brief character sketches on scraps of paper. Fold them up, drop them into a Mason jar, and pull out three of them. Throw them into the car together and see where it leads.
  • Build your own roadside attraction. Make us feel like we’re there. If it really existed, would we want to visit it – or would we pray we didn’t have a flat tire within 30 miles of it?
  • Use descriptive language that appeals to all five of the reader’s senses.
  • Add additional characters who are not in the car with your main characters. Throw in an animal, maybe a pet. Maybe it’s part of the attraction.
  • How do your characters solve their problems? What does that reveal about them that we didn’t know before?

Have fun! Be sure to come back and share your story links in the comments.

 

Holly Jahangiri is the author of Trockle; A Puppy, Not a Guppy; Innocents & Demons; and A New Leaf for Lyle. She blogs at It’s All a Matter of Perspective. You can find her books on Amazon at http://amazon.com/author/hollyjahangiri. For more information on her children’s books, please visit http://jahangiri.us/books.

[Write On Wednesday] – Cargo Cult

Such Bounty from Above!

Today’s prompt, should you choose to use it, involves the creation of an imaginary cargo cult.

A cargo cult is a religious movement usually emerging in tribal or isolated societies after they have had an encounter with an external and technologically advanced society. Usually cargo cults focus on magical thinking and a variety of intricate rituals designed to obtain the material wealth of the advanced culture they encountered.

The term “cargo cult” has caught the imagination of the public and is now used to describe a wide variety of phenomena that involve imitating external properties without the substance. In commerce, for example, successful products often result in “copycat” products that imitate the form but are usually of inferior quality.

Cargo cults exemplify the third law of Arthur C. Clarke: that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

See http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Cargo_cult for more info. Your cargo cult can be set anywhere you like – how did it first come into being? Who are its adherents? How has it affected their lifestyles?

Ideas to Explore:

  • World building – while cargo cults are typically associated with the South Pacific, you can set yours anywhere. It doesn’t even have to be on this planet.
  • What might the central cargo or technology be? How does it shape the cult’s thinking and behavior? What myths spring up surrounding it? Is it useful, harmful, or merely…decorative?
  • What sort of conflicts might arise in such a society – between its members or between its members and the outside world?

Tips:

  • Think about setting, character motivation, props, and conflict.

Have fun! Be sure to come back and share your story links in the comments.

Holly Jahangiri is the author of Trockle; A Puppy, Not a Guppy; Innocents & Demons; and A New Leaf for Lyle. She blogs at It’s All a Matter of Perspective. You can find her books on Amazon at http://amazon.com/author/hollyjahangiri. For more information on her children’s books, please visit http://jahangiri.us/books.

Sept. 30 – A Dozen Roses

The Prompt

Jeff  was walking to the parking garage after work when he comes upon a flower stand full of beautiful roses. Jeff decides to buy a dozen roses for his lover. 

Go!

Deanna Denny is retired after many years of working in Human Resources. She became interested in writing in 2014 and started her blog with opinion pieces but has since been exploring different forms of writing. She has taken Writing 101 through WordPress, and Gentle Introduction to Meter through Allpoetry.  Deanna will be joining the Story A Day challenge to adventure into short stories. You can follow Deanna’s journey into writing at deannadenny.com.

Be sure to leave a comment below.

 

Sept 28 — See, Hear, Smell

Today, take a few minutes to notice your surroundings (you can do this at home, but going out may work better): Write down five things you see, five sounds you hear and three to five smells.

The Prompt:

Write a story with a character who has a difficult decision to make. Put this character in the setting you observed and use your sensory detail in the story.

Tips:

  • Your setting doesn’t have to be the literal place where you collected your details. Turn it into a fiction if it works better for your story.
  • I left out touch because depending on where you are, touching stuff might be out of the question. But add tactile details if you can.
  • Use the details as reminders of what the character has to do.
  • Use them as distractions.
  • Use them to present a solution.
  • Difficult decisions don’t have to be huge: your character might be an old person who’d like to get a dog but who can’t walk well anymore. Will the character choose more loneliness or physical discomfort?

Now go write!

Sonya Oldwin publishes a 100-word story every day – yep, it’s as crazy as it sounds.  

Don’t forget to share a link to your story in the comments below.

Sept 27 — Lost and Found

Today’s prompt is exactly what it says on the tin: lost and found.

The Prompt: 

Write about something that has been lost and then found.

  • What has been lost? It could be something concrete, like a set of keys, a city, or a murder weapon. It could be a person, maybe a husband or a baby. Or maybe it’s something intangible: dignity, love, a sense or purpose, or the feeling of safety.
  • In what sense has this thing been lost? Has it simply been missing? Has it been driven away? Stolen?
  • What are the consequences of losing this thing?
  • How long was this thing lost? Five minutes, five months, five years?
  • How has it been found? Was it found in the same state as when it was lost, or was it changed? Perhaps the lost thing did not change, but your protagonist’s relationship to it did.
  • Think about the feelings that loss provokes. Sadness, disappointment, anger, panic? Or, on the flip side, maybe it’s relief.
  • And how does your character feel about finding what was missing? Joy, comfort, hope? Consternation, annoyance, shock?
  • This prompt can be as dramatic or as subtle as you want to make it.

Go and create some reunions!

I hope everyone has been finding these prompts productive. Best wishes for the rest of Story a Day September – you’re almost there!

September 24 – Three Micro Stories

Today you’re not just going to write one story. You’re going to write three!

The Prompt

Click on this photo.

Flickr Commons Gallery

Flick through the gallery and pick the first three pictures that catch your attention. Now, write a short, 50-100 word story for each. No more than 100 words each.

Tips

  • Your stories can link together or not.
  • You may discover a theme that ties them together as you write the stories. You may discover it afterwards. You may never discover a common thread among the three pictures you write about. (Your readers might.)
  • Try doing something different for each story. Make one a monologue, one a fragment of conversation, another a more traditional narrative telling the reader something about the incident/person in the story.
  • Do this as quickly as you can. Don’t spend any time wondering why you picked the pictures or whether what you’re writing is strictly a ‘story’. Just work fast and move on.
  • You don’t have to write about three. If you find yourself writing a longer story inspired by one of the pictures, feel free to continue.
  • You don’t have to tell the story of the person in the picture. The key is to write something ‘inspired by’ the picture. It could be someone telling the story of his grandmother (pictured) or it could a story that evokes the emotions you felt when you looked at the picture.
  • You can write more than three if you feel inspired. Just keep them short. I’m interested in seeing what ideas pour out of your heads, after three full weeks of writing a story a day.
  • Try to let us know which pictures you used for which story, if you’re sharing your stories online.

Go!

Sept. 23 – The Attic

The Prompt

Before she knew it, she was just another set of eyes in a dusty attic, waiting for the stairs to creak.

Go!

Deanna Denny is retired after many years of working in Human Resources. She became interested in writing in 2014 and started her blog with opinion pieces but has since been exploring different forms of writing. She has taken Writing 101 through WordPress, and Gentle Introduction to Meter through Allpoetry.  Deanna will be joining the Story A Day challenge to adventure into short stories. You can follow Deanna’s journey into writing at deannadenny.com.

Be sure to leave a comment below.

Sept. 21 — Running Away

Today your character is in trouble. I mean really BIG trouble.

In fact, your main character (mc) has had enough. So he (or she) is going to do it.

Run away, that is.

The Prompt

Your character is being forced into something they do not want to do: an arranged marriage, eating their broccoli (!), working for someone they know is evil. So he or she is running away to avoid it. Suddenly there’s voices nearby/a light flashes on/someone steps into the passage ahead…Your character stops, heart pounding, afraid of discovery.

What happens next? Only you know the answer…

So get writing! I’m dying of curiosity over here! 🙂

Leslie Marie Dawson is an indie author, blogger and artist who revels in stories of fantasy, romance, and comedy. She can be found hiding in her hermit cave with her laptop, a stack of good books, and a glass of water (sadly she’s given up soda). Please stop by her Hermit’s Cave to see the cool things she makes!

Don’t forget to comment below and share what you wrote!

Sept 20 — Genre Jump Challenge

Today’s prompt is meant to propel you out of your comfort zone. Most writers have a particular set of themes that they write about or a certain kind of mood that they tend to favor. Some writers keep very strictly within the realm of individual literary genres. Many writers don’t write genre fiction: they write in-between genres, or they mix genres, or they create their own. Today’s prompt will force you to pick a genre and think about its conventions, challenging you to change your typical writing perspective.

The Prompt

Write a story in a genre that you wouldn’t normally write. If you’re a squeamish sort of person, try writing a gory horror story. Or if you hate everything mushy and lovey-dovey, try a tender romance. If you don’t normally write within a genre, pick one and try it out! 

Tips

  • You can write a new story in a new genre, or re-write an old story in a different genre
  • You could even re-write a fairy tale in a particular genre (like a hardboiled noir version of Little Red Hood, or Goldilocks in the Wild West)
  • Some common fiction genres include: Mystery, Horror, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Humor, Romance, Historical Fiction, Epic, and Folktale
  • Think about what you have come to expect from different genres. You can stretch, challenge, or change those expectations in your story, but you do need to be aware of them.

Go forth and make yourself uncomfortable!

Please feel free to share your thoughts and stories in the comments below, and remember to check back every day for more guest prompts.

Visibly Invisible

Prompt: Visibly Invisible

Today’s prompt is about the inner self of your character trying to break out, to be seen, to be heard, to simply be acknowledged.

Think along the lines of being present in a group, yet you’re being discussed as if you were not there.  Now multiply those feelings by 100 for your character who, for reasons you will develop, cannot (at the moment) speak up for themselves.

Tips

  • Why is your character ‘invisible’?
  • You may want to go down the path of personal knowledge, for instance someone with a severe disability which restricts their line of communication.  Yet they are ‘in there’ and fully aware of what is going on around them.  How do they feel?  What can they do to get attention, and help?
  • Perhaps you want to go the fantasy route and your character has had a spell put on them.  What or who will break it?  How does the ‘invisible’ one deal with the situation they are in and what do they do to help themselves?
  • Your story should conclude with your character achieving ‘visibility’.

Not too many tips this week – let your imagination, and your emotions run free with this one.

Let’s GO!