[Write On Wednesday] Write a Birthday Story For Someone You Love

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? 

[Write On Wednesday] Big Anniversaries

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”

[Write On Wednesday] Writing For The Solstice

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?

(Listen to the podcast where I tell you why I think this is important)

The Prompt

Write A Story Centered Around A Solstice

Tips

Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Writing For The Solstice”

[Write on Wednesday] National Handwriting Day

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

Tips

Continue reading “[Write on Wednesday] National Handwriting Day”

[Write on Wednesday] Different Selves

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.

Leave a comment and let us know how it went

 

 

 

[Write on Wednesday] Revisit An Older Story

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

Tips

  • Listen to this audio lesson (or read the transcript) that helps you shed any negativity you might feel about revision.
  • 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.)

[Write On Wednesday] The Artist’s Way

Welcome to your first post-May prompt of 2018!

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?)

What did you write about today? Leave a comment!

 

Day 30 – Change Your Point Of View

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.

Day 23 – Pick A Detail

The Prompt

Choose a detail that only your character would notice in this story

(This exercise is borrowed from Donald Maass’s The Emotional Craft of Fiction, a book I highly recommend.)

Think about your character’s past, so that you know what matters to your character, what background they came from.

As an example, I noticed a vase in my in-laws’ house because my parents had the same one. It was really the only notable thing about the vase! It tells you something about our relative backgrounds that our parents chose the same decor…

You might pick something with more emotional resonance: a smell, a song, a flower.

Tell a story about your character that includes a detail that tells us something more about your character.

Day 16 – We Need To Talk

Extra! Extra! A fabulous new collection of 100 word stories has just hit the shelves. It’s called Nothing Short Of 100 and it comes from Grant Faulkner (also the head honcho at NaNoWriMo), Lynn Mundell and Beret Olson, all of 100WordStory.org

To see four excellent examples of a 100 word story, hop on over to the publisher’s site now. Or pick up the book from Amazon or request it from your local indie bookstore.

 Today we continue our look at short stories as not-mini-novels and play with them in ways you can only play with short stories!

The Prompt

Write a story completely in dialogue

It’s probably best to keep this to two characters because it’s harder to have more than two characters, without attribution.

I want you to keep it straight in our heads, who’s talking, simply by the way they talk.

A guy who works on Wall St should sound different from a farmer from a rural area.

Don’t forget to leave a comment and tell us what you wrote today!

Bonus: Writing Contests as Prompts – a guest post from Elise Holland

Elise Holland HeadshotToday’s bonus prompt comes from Elise Holland, writer and editor of the 2Elizabeths online literary magazine

There are so many excellent contests available to short form writers.
Sometimes the clear-cut parameter of a deadline serves as inspiration, and
many contests are genre specific, creating a built-in, detailed prompt.

In order to provide a precise prompt, I suggest looking into submitting
your work to Nowhere Magazine’s Spring 2018 Travel
Writing Contest. Beneath the prompt, you will find my tips on how to find
writing contests, and how to use each set of submission guidelines as
future prompts.

The Prompt

Until May 31, 2018, literary travel magazine Nowhere is seeking
contest submissions from young, old, novice, and veteran writers.
Specifically, they are looking for stories with a strong sense of place.

Send your fiction, nonfiction, or essay, but be certain to specify which
genre your work falls into at the top of your manuscript. Submissions
should be kept between 800 – 5,000 words in length. The contest winner will receive $1,000 and publication in Nowhere. For further details and
to submit your work, visit the magazine’s website here.

Tips

  • You can access a free database of writing contests from Poets &
    Writer’s, here. For a minimal fee, you can access additional contest databases and information for writers through Writer’s Market or
    through Duotrope.
  •  When you write for a contest, be sure to carefully read each set of
    submission guidelines. Each publication will seek different stories based
    on criteria such as genre, word count, and deadline. Use these criteria
    dutifully to hone in on your story, and to ensure that your work is
    considered by contest judges.

    • Many contests will be genre-specific. For instance, the contest for Nowhere is seeking work revolving around travel. And later this
      year 2 Elizabeths, the magazine I edit, will host its second annual Love & Romance Writing Contest. (Grab a copy of our submission guidelines, here.)
    • Use these genre-specific contests to propel you into your work. You can
      either be hyper-focused and choose to enter work only into the genre you
      write, or you can choose to enter a variety of work into different
      genre-specific contests, expanding your repertoire.
    • I’m a firm believer that limitations breed creativity. And that’s exactly
      how I would encourage you to view word count restrictions pertaining to a writing contest. It can be a fun game, squeezing an entire tale into a
      limited number of words, and it’s a fantastic exercise in the economy of
      your words.
    • As you peruse any of the aforementioned databases, consider which
      contests you might like to enter. Use these contest deadlines to help you
      build your own editorial calendar.
  • Many writing contests require participants to pay a submission fee. This
    is generally intended to cover the prize which will be paid to the
    winner(s), as well as to keep the publication running.
  • When submitting your work there are a couple of key terms to be aware of:
    simultaneous submissions and multiple submissions.

    • The term simultaneous submission means that you will be
      sending the same piece to several literary magazines or journals at the
      same time. Most publications accept simultaneous submissions, but some do not. If a publication does not accept them, this will be stated in their guidelines.
    • Should your work be selected for publication by one magazine, it is
      important to notify other publications where you have submitted that piece.
      This courtesy will prevent complications, and will keep you in good graces with various editors, should you wish to submit to them again in the future.
    • The term multiple submission means that you are submitting multiple pieces to the same literary magazine or journal. This is generally accepted, but if it’s not, that will be specified in the submission guidelines.

About Elise Holland

Elise Holland is the editor of 2 Elizabeths, a literary magazine
focused on poetry and short fiction, with an emphasis on romance and
women’s fiction. Her work has been published inWriter’s Digest Magazine, The Writer’s Dig, and at DIY MFA. Find Holland online at 2Elizabeths.com.

[Writing Prompt] Day 9 – Character Desires Are Key

Knowing what a character wants, tells us what’s at stake in the story. Conflict between the character’s desire and their circumstances will keep your reader hooked.

The Prompt

Establish, within the first couple of sentences, your character’s desire. Put them in a situation that conflicts with that desire. Tell us how it works out.

Tips

It’s important for a reader to know what your character wants.

Once they know what your character wants, is afraid of, would never do, or desperately wants to do, the reader knows WHY they’re reading this story. That will keep them reading.

Keep it simple. In a short story, you can only examine one of your character’s desire.

Day 2 – Quick Story Formula

Yesterday’s awesome prompt was written by one of the authors who contributed to the Signature’s 2018 Compact Guide To Writing Short Stories. I can’t recommend it enough.

Signature Short Story Guide

For Day 2, here’s a sneak peak of what you’d be seeing all month if  you were a StoryADay Superstar. Join us! 

(For the rest of the month, the prompts here will be text-only and not as detailed)

Superstars get videos like this, a private forum, guided meditations and a weekly video hangout. Join us?

The Prompt

Use this story formula to to create an interesting character, give them a desire, kick off some intriguing action and plan the kind of resolution you want.

Once you have that skeleton, you can start filling in colorful details…and soon your creative brain will be demanding you start to write!

A _______ (adjective) ________(noun), who _________(verb) ___________(subject), then _________(related verb) __________(resolution)

TIPS

Continue reading “Day 2 – Quick Story Formula”

[Write On Wednesday] Making Good From Bad

First lines.

They can be the inspiration of something great. Or they can be the omen of bad things to come.

We all know that clichés are one of the things to avoid as a writer. Lines like “It was a dark and stormy night” sounds like a pretty good mood setter to a beginner writer…well, maybe not even to them.

But suppose you use a bad first line on purpose? Suppose the entire point is to take that bad first line and write a story around it that is…not as tacky? Or makes the reader forgive the first line or make it totally acceptable? Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Making Good From Bad”

Write on Wednesday – Quick Story Formula

This is an awesome way to quickly launch (and finish) a new story, any time you have time to write but are short on inspiration. Try it!

 

Use this story formula to to create an interesting character, give them a desire, kick off some intriguing action and plan the kind of resolution you want. Continue reading “Write on Wednesday – Quick Story Formula”

[Write on Wed] Story Sparks for May 2018

We’re less than a month away from StoryADay May 2018.

Yes, I’m going to be providing you with optional writing prompts. The best stories, however, come from ideas that you care about.

You can use my prompts, but it is going to be the sparks of ideas that you collect, that ignite your stories.

That’s why, before every challenge, I encourage you to gather Story Sparks, fragments of maybe-story-ideas.

The Prompt

Gather three Story Sparks a day for the next week.

Tips

  • Read this post on Story Sparks, with some ideas to get you started.
  • Read the “Secrets To Your Success” article from the StoryADay Essentials series, which defines a Story Spark and how you can use them to ‘win’ StoryADay.
  • If you’re already on the mailing list, dig out the Creativity Bundle you received when you subscribed, and use the Story Sparks Catchers I created for you. If you aren’t on the mailing list, sign up to get your Story Sparks Bundle now!

The StoryADay Productivity Bundle sign up button

If you collect three Story Sparks a day now, you will

  • Gather 21 interesting nuggets for inclusion in stories, this week alone
  • Start looking at the world like a writer does: it’s all material
  • Train your brain to start thinking creatively
  • Be bursting with ideas when you sit down to write!

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] A Prose Sonnet

Today’s prompt continues the month’s theme of looking at different short story forms you can try out.

This one’s a challenge, but really fun.

Right-click to download the audio only

The Prompt

Write a story in 14 sentences

Tips

  • You can simply write 14 sentences.
  • You could use the Petrarchan form of sonnet where the first 8 lines/sentences propose an argument or an idea and the second 8 answer or refute it.
  • You could use the Shakespearean form, with three groups of 4 linked sentences, followed by two lines/sentences that provide illumination, a revelation, a twist or an explanation.
  • You could write a sonnet series, with each group of 14 lines fulfilling a different function in your story.
  • Writing this way is hard but it frees you. Instead of worrying about writing well, you’re concentrating on the form. Sometimes that tricks your brain into writing really well; sometimes it’s just a triumph to have written at all.

Leave a comment telling us how it went!

Write On Wednesday – Writers Bloxx with Gary Zenker

Allow me to introduce Gary Zenker, a flash fiction writer, game designer, marketer, and awesome leader in my local writing scene.

After eight years of reading mostly-my-prompts, I wanted to give you the opportunity to play in someone else’s sandbox from time to time. I looked around for someone I trusted to be both creative and generous, and didn’t have to look any further than Gary.

Please leave a comment and make him feel welcome!!

Gary ZenkerHi!

Julie invited me to be her guest-prompter ongoing for each third Wednesday of the month. Thanks Julie!

As a flash fiction writer, I love short story writing and challenging myself in doing so. I found that sometimes, picking things that don’t go together brings out my creativity even better. The bigger challenge offers better results.

So I created a game, WritersBloxx™, that generates random prompts in six categories. We use a PromptGrid™ and six special 20-sided dice that point us to the prompts to be used.

writersbloxx, the party game for writers

Each PromptGrid generates up to 64 million different combinations.

As a game, participants are challenged to write a short story in 6–7 minutes using all six prompts and then compare them to the others’ stories. Solo writers can opt for a bit more time and a more developed story. I recommend 15 minutes with a hard stop.

Hints

In this play, you aren’t looking for perfection. You are looking to challenge yourself to complete a piece quickly.

Use all six prompts and tell a real story…don’t simply shove six prompts into a narrative.

You are looking to create at least one memorable character, a conflict and a resolution.

Your Prompts

We rolled the dice for you and here’s what you ended up with:

  • Genre – Crime/Detective
  • Character –  Auto Mechanic
  • Object – High Heel Shoes
  • Timing – 1970s
  • Setting – Italian Restaurant
  • Event – Fishing

Check out the full game at www.WritersBloxx.com.

writersbloxx, the party game for writers

Next time around we’ll make it more challenging by adding a few additional elements. Be sure to show us your resulting masterpiece!

Gary Zenker is a writer, a marketer, a game designer and co-wrote a book with his six-year-old son. He would love for you to share the stories you came up with, in the comments!

[Write On Wednesday] Epistolary Stories

This month I’m encouraging you to write stories in non-narrative forms. Last week was a story as a list, this week we’re back to one of my favorites: letters!

The Prompt

Write a story in the form of a series of letters/updates

Tips

  • The ‘letters’ can be anything really: letters, journal entries, log entries, found documents, Tweets, Facebook updates…
  • The letters might come from only one person — in which case we hear only one side of the story.
  • The letters might come from various sources and in various time periods.
  • You might mix letters with documentary evidence (school report cards, obituaries clipped from a newspaper, a termination document from an employer).
  • Your writing might be in the form of a ‘gospel’ for a new religious or political cult.
  • Your story might be the log entries left behind after a disaster.
  • Your updates might show the slow unraveling of an online scam on GoFundMe.
  • There are so many ways you can tell a story that don’t involve expository writing. Have fun with this!
  • This might grow to be a bigger project than you can handle in one day…

[Write on Wednesday] Lists As Stories

This month I’m pushing us to write short stories in odd forms, lists, conversations, letters, all kinds of things.

Short stories can be told in narrative form, like mini-novels, but they don’t have to be. Part of the fun of being a short story writer is the ability to twist people’s brains, surprise them, make the familiar unfamiliar. You can do that with your images, but you can also do it with a story’s form.

The Prompt

Write A Story In The Form Of A List

Continue reading “[Write on Wednesday] Lists As Stories”

[Write On Wednesday] Openings & Endings for Flash Fiction

Maria
People’s memories of events are shaped by their experiences in the last few minutes. Stories are no different. You could write the best story in the world but if the opening isn’t good, no one will read it; and worse, if the ending is bad, they will remember the let-down, not the beautiful writing and ideas in the body of the tale.

We’re going to work on avoiding that problem, today! Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Openings & Endings for Flash Fiction”

[Write on Wednesday] Terrific Titles

Flash fiction writers often miss a fabulous opportunity by leaving a quick, ‘working’ title on their story.

That’s like selling a product by telling people how hard you worked on it, instead of selling them on what the it will Do For Them.

Here’s the thing:

  • Title are not usually part of the required word count, so you can go as long as you like!
  • Titles are the sizzle that sells the reader on the steak of your story.
  • Titles can add a whole new layer of meaning to the story, when the reader is finished.

    The Prompt

    Write a 300–500 word story,

    Then, spend an equal amount of time writing a title that is at least 3% as long as the story (that is, 9 words long for a 300 word story, 15 words for a 500 word story)

Tips

  • It is completely acceptable, for today, to use a flash story you’ve written in the past and just re-title it. (And yes, it can be a longer story, just remember I want you to make the title proportional to the story length, so this could get kind of crazy. Good crazy…)
  • If you’re stuck for ideas, write a story based on a Story Spark you’ve gathered, a character you’ve already created, or an issue that makes gets you excited (for good or ill).
  • Read through the story and pick out the theme.
  • Play with puns, double-meanings, and common proverbs.
  • Remember that your aim is to catch the eye of a potential reader and pull them in, intrigue them enough that they’ll want to read your story.
  • Write a title that is at least 3% as long as the story (word count divided by 100, multiplied by 3) 300 words=9 words, 400 words=12 words, 500 words=15 words, 1000 words= 30 word title! (For the rules-lawyers: you may round up or down as you feel appropriate. This is just an exercise!)
  • Try to make it have a deeper meaning, after the reader has read the story (or to add something to their understanding)
  • Bonus points: Post your title in the comments and see if we’d be intrigued to read it.
  • Extra bonus points: post on someone else’s title to say whether or not you’d read it.

Examples of Long Titles

Clearly Lettered in A Mostly Steady Hand by Fran Wilde, nominated for a Nebular Award for Short Story in 2018. Isn’t that an intriguing title. Why does ‘clearly lettered’ matter and why is the hand only ‘mostly steady’?

Sorry Dan, But It’s No Longer Necessary For A Human To Serve As CEO Of This Company by Eric Cofer

Further reading on Good Titling

Naming the Baby by Bruce Holland Rogers (Flash Fiction Online)

Choosing The Right Name For Your Story by Jason Floyd (Writing World)

 

Leave a comment, telling us your title. Bonus points: leave a comment on someone else’s title, saying whether you’d read on!

[Write On Wednesday] Specific to Universal

The best stories move from the specific to the universal (or vice versa).

Flash fiction is a wonderful venue for practicing the short-story skill of moving from the specific to the universal.

Stories relate a specific event happening to a specific individual and how it affects them. The best stories also contain ideas that apply to the wider world: to you, to me, to society.

The Prompt

Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Specific to Universal”

[Write On Wednesday] Make It Flash

This month at StoryADay we’re all about Flash Fiction!

Flash Fiction image

Flash fiction is loosely defined as being between 250 and 1200  words long, but it is so much more than that.

The best description of Flash Fiction I’ve ever seen goes like this: Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Make It Flash”

[Write on Wednesday] Through The Keyhole

This month at StoryADay, I’m focusing on Flash Fiction. Be sure to check in  regularly and follow me on Twitter.

A novel invites the reader to explore an entire house, down to snooping in the closets; a short story requires that the reader stand outside of an open window to observe what’s going on in a single room; and a short short requires the reader to kneel outside of a locked room and peer in through the keyhole.

Bruce Holland Rogers
(2013-02-25). The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction

Let’s take Bruce at his word.

The Prompt

Imagine you’re looking through a big, old-fashioned keyhole, into a room. Write a story of fewer than 1000 words, about what you can see

Tips

  • Think of this as a way of reducing the events of whatever is going on in the room to the moment.
  • Use powerful imagery and strong verbs to narrate the story and make it ‘flash’.
  • In a story this short you probably only have room for one or two characters.
  • A story this short can only focus on one moment/event.
  • Use dialogue to convey information. Hint at backstory with tone and word choice.
  • When you have finished your first draft (and therefore know what the story is about) go back and work on your opening lines

Leave a comment below, letting us know how you got on with this prompt, or what ideas it sparked for you.

[Write On Wednesday] All Writing Is Rewriting

Write Me
Sticking with this month’s theme of Getting You Writing and Breaking Blocks, today’s prompt shares another technique for quieting your inner perfectionist: stealing a story from someone else.

Rewriting a classic story, reworking a story of your own, or just stealing the plot of a folk tale, means there’s one less thing to worry about: plot. Writing this way lets you concentrate on other aspects of your writing:

  • Playing with character
  • Concentrating on your voice
  • Messing with Point of View
  • Trying out unconventional/non-narrative forms of storytelling

The Prompt

Rewrite a story (yours or someone else’s)

Tips

  • Remember that if you’re rewriting a story for publication, you’ll need to be careful you’re not infringing anyone’s rights. Best to stick with classic folk tales, for this. Or, if you’re just writing for your own amusement, infringe away 😉
  • Think about rewriting a story from a secondary character’s point of view. Why do the events of the story matter to them? How do they interfere with this character’s life?
  • Remember that stories don’t need to be told in the right order. In a short story, you don’t even need the beginning, middle and end to all happen within the story. One of them can be implied.
  • In short fiction every word counts. Don’t worry about this too much on a first draft, by try to keep it in mind as you choose how you describe events and scenes. For example, instead of ‘he ate two cheeseburgers, hungrily’ try ‘he inhaled the first cheeseburger, put the second away with workmanlike efficiency’. Notice how ‘making every word count’ doesn’t mean writing fewer words. Don’t you feel you know more about how the scene looked, from the second example?
  • If you need a resource for folk tales to steal, try the University of Pittsburgh’s archive.

[Write on Wednesday] Story Starter

Starting can be the hardest part of writing a story, so this week I’m giving you an opening line, to break through that block.

I’ve written before about opening lines and how important they are to a story, so don’t think that this opening line has to be your story’s opening line forever. In fact, these Wednesday prompts are designed to get you writing and often result in throwaway tales, rather than works of art, but the point is: you’re writing.

Read more about opening lines here (listen to the podcast version, here).

The Prompt

She had never understood why anyone would want a tattoo.

Tips

  • You can change the gender pronouns to suit your preferences
  • You can change the POV and voice of the piece
  • Think about setting a timer and just seeing where the story takes you
  • Or think about a character and their wants/needs before you start writing
  • You might want to think about the climax/midpoint of a story about a character like this, and write towards it
  • Will you character end up getting a tattoo? Understanding why people want them? Being tattooed against her will?

Feel free too share here, in the comments.

[Write On Wednesday] Word Salad

Sometimes lowering the stakes for a story can be the best way to make your writing go well.

So let’s play. Let’s be silly. Let’s write a story that can’t possibly be a masterpiece and just, instead, have some fun.

How? I’m going to give you a list of words and you’re going to write a story using them. I’d love it if you’d post your story in the comments, so we can all compare notes.

(Sometimes it’s surprising how much non-terrible writing comes out of this exercise!)

The Prompt

Use these words in your short-short story: die, ago, seat, time, imagining, even, making, league, sacrifices, rose

(These words were all drawn at random from The Sword of Summer by Rick Riordan, which just happened to be lying near my desk.)

Go!

[Writing Prompt] The Cruelest Month

Happy New Year!

Here’s your first writing prompt of the year.

The Prompt

Use the title The Cruelest Month and set your timer for 30 minutes. Write a story with a beginning, middle and an end

Tips

  • Spend five minutes brainstorming a character, a situation, a problem, and then start writing.
  • At the ten minute mark, make sure you’re moving into the meat of the story, complicating your character’s life.
  • At the twenty minute mark, start writing your way to the finale. Even if the story is sketchy, start planning your ending, and race towards it.
  • Spend a few minutes reading over the story, making notes on things you might like to change/add.
  • Revel in your ability to tell a story!

[Writing Prompt] Write A Seasonal Story

Maypole

Today I’m encouraging you to write a seasonal story, just not one for this season.

Of course, you can write a Christmas/Hannukah/Kwanzaa/New Year/Festivus story if you want, but if you’re thinking about building your portofolio of stories that you might submit to a market soon, your best best is to write 3-6 months ahead. Publications have reading deadlines, lead times and design concerns to wrestle with, so yes, it is time to start thinking about your Mother’s Day stories now!

The Prompt

Write a seasonal story for a publication you enjoy, for a holiday/event six months from now.

Tips

  • Lots of editors tell me that they are always looking for timely stories for the lesser holidays, like Father’s Day (sorry, Dads) or about people dancing around a Maypole.
  • Pick a holiday or anniversary that hasn’t been done to death. Make sure it is 3-6 months away.
  • Leave more time if you like to submit your work to critique partners before you submit.
  • Go beyond the obvious ideas for a story about that holiday: look for the underlying themes, and write about that. For example, rather than telling a story about a father and son doing something on Father’s day, your story could address expectations, generational issues, frustration, disappointment, joy and other issues that come up on every Hallmark holiday.
  • By all means, write a ChristmaKwanzukkahNewyear story if you like to send it out directly to your readers, family and friends. (That’s probably what I’ll be doing today!)

Come back and leave a comment to tell me what you wrote about.

Go!