Today’s is a silly prompt designed to get you to lighten up about your writing.
One of the best ways to become blocked is to put pressure on yourself to write something good.
Today’s gift to you is a list if words it’s going to be very hard to turn into a good story.
So write something silly. Have some fun:
I was listening to a song I love this week. (“I Think Never Is Enough” by the Bare Naked Ladies).
In it, the protagonist is proudly telling us how he followed his own dreams rather than blindly going to college or backpacking through Europe or working in retail, like everyone else he knew (“I never worked a single day in retail/Telling people what they wanna hear/ Telling people anything to make a sale./ Eating in the food court/ With the old and the bored…”). I love it and want to play it to my nieces and nephew, my sons, everyone in their teens. I love his in-your-face arrogance. And then I started to wonder if the band ever performs this song now, and if, 20 years on, they’re ever faintly embarrassed by that arrogance. Even though it’s one of the things I love about the song…
And that got me thinking: one of the best things about being a writer is having an outlet for all those times you want to rant and rave unreasonably but can’t because you’re too damned polite.
Write a story about a character who says and does things you could never do/say.
Go!
One of the first internet-era writing challenges I ever attempted was over at 100words.net . The challenge was to write 100 words (exactly) every day for a month (I think the brain behind the idea originally did it for 100 days, but by the time I discovered the challenge it was a calendar month).
It was hard, but it was freeing too. And it was my experience with those limitations (and the rhythm of writing every day for a month) that set me thinking about my own StoryADay challenge, years later.
Write 100 words. Exactly 100.
Go!
Oh, and thanks to everyone who left comments or got in touch about the five-a-week prompts in September. The deal was that someone who commented would win a copy of my Time To Write Workshop. And (drumroll please) the winner is: Sarah Cain!! (I used the random number generator at Random.org — and got ridiculously excited waiting for the winning number to appear! Congrats Sarah. Hope it helps!
Remember when your teachers told you every story had a beginning, a middle and an end? Well, they missed a bit.
Write a Flash Fiction Story With Emphasis On The Climax
I love disaster movies — even the really cheesy ones — so my story today will be a mini disaster movie.
I don’t have time, in flash fiction, to build up all the characters a disaster movie would visit at the beginning (the screw-up anti-hero, his ex-wife, the wise elder who’s doomed to die, the young person who hates the anti-hero but will eventually become reconciled with him, the comic relief, the unrequited love interest, the bull-headed person in authority who hampers the anti-hero’s efforts to save the world and, of course, the villain who causes it all through action or arrogant inaction…see? I REALLY love my disaster movies!).
nstead, I’m going to have to concentrate on quickly establishing my flawed character, what he thinks he wants, what he actually needs, his wise-cracking character and his long-suffering assistant/love interest. Then I’m going to wreck his life — quickly — which is fine, cos his life was a wreck anyway. Then I’m going to threaten the last people he cares about, just like we practiced earlier this week.
Finally, I’m going to really concentrate on the climax. I only have up to 1000 words, so I’m not going to be able to go the full Bruce-Willis/Sharknado here, but I’m going to put everything on the line and do my best to pull at the reader’s heartstrings.
FInally, I’m going to spend 100 words or fewer wrapping up.
You have a maximum of 1000 words.
Go!
Yesterday we took your character’s dreams and dashed them in the middle of the story.
Today I want you to take your character, and their desire and cripple them not once, but twice. Of course you get to reward them with a little win in the middle.
Give your character a goal, frustrate them, let them make some progress but let it come at a cost.
Go!
This week I’m providing you with something your character needs. Your job is to create someone who needs this thing, REALLY needs it. Not wants it. NEEDS it.
And then torture them.
According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, security (of the body, of employment, resources etc.) is pretty high on the list of basic human needs. Today we’re working with one of them:
Today your character needs a secure place to shelter
This can be as simple as someone out walking in a storm, searching for a place to get out of the rain.
It can be someone whose house is being foreclosed on, or bombed, or overrun by zombies.
It might be someone who has challenged themselves to build a tiny house that they can live in
After you decide on the specifics of the NEED that will make this interesting for you, you must then figure out why the character NEEDS it so, so badly. What is there, in his history, that is driving him to find or protect or build this home? Why does it matter on a psychological level as well as a physical one? You don’t need to be explicit about this in the story, but you should know enough to slip in a few clues.
Next, think about some ridiculously challenging ways that the bad buys/the weather/the forces of evil or indifference can thwart your character’s plans. Make him really squirm. (NB This is why he must have an unusually strong desire for this shelter at the start. He’s going to have to overcome some interesting things. If he doesn’t want it badly enough, he’ll just give up).
Go!
Today we’re concentrating on a character: in particular the kind of person who would have been known to me, when I was a child, as “a little old lady”.
Write a story featuring a little old lady
Go!
I’ve been binging on Twilight Zone recently. Things I have noticed:
Write a story featuring someone with a strong (or problem) character trait.
Throw a wrench into their nice, everyday routine.
See what happens.
Don’t feel the need to explain the ‘how’ if something unusual is happening (i.e. talking dolls, houshold objects that activate themselves; out-of-body/time experiences). Just focus on what it means for your character.
I don’t often do this, but this week I wanted to mention a special offer from a friend, Michael Stelzner. Michael is the driving force behind the the Social Media Success Summit. The summit has been running for a few years as an outgrowth of Michael’s copywriting summits and has become the headline event for anyone who’s anyone in social media and online marketing (Chris Brogan, Mari Smith, Michael Hyatt…).
I attended one of Mike’s copywriting summits a few years ago and it was more than worth every penny – i.e. I used what I learned to immediately earn back the price of admission times four.
If you are serious about making a name for yourself using social media, you should check this out. The 50% discount goes away on August 30, so don’t delay. (And yes, this is an affiliate link, so I get a kickback if you buy, but I wouldn’t recommend it if I didn’t honestly think it’s great value for anyone looking to market themselves on social media.)
Important note: If you are still concentrating on building up your writing skills and don’t yet have anything to market, don’t get distracted. Don’t click on this link. Back to your writing, wordsmith!
OK, so I know it’s not back to school time everywhere (or for everyone), but we’ve all had that clean slate, back to school feeling: starting a new project that is all promise and no disappointment yet; sharpening your new pencils; buying new notebooks; making timetables.
Write a Back To School Story
Go!
Brevity is the name of the game this week.
Write a story that is exactly 500 words long.
That means you have about 50 words to set things up, 100 words send your character out on their adventure, 200 words to introduce a complication, 125 words for the crisis and climax, and 25 more words for your pithy summing up.
If you need a theme, use this: your character needs to do something/get somewhere quickly. Time is brief, as is your word count.
Go!
I’m reading an autobiography written in the 1830s — when steam travel was the new big thing. The author (a mother of small children) just gave a vivid and opinionated account of a trip she took from Philadelphia to Baltimore. With very few words she conjoured the layout of the carriages and the hot, smoky atmosphere inside — heated as it was by a coal-fired, iron stove in the middle of the carriage (no health and safety, clean air regulations in the 1830s!). She told an amusing story of an encounter with a fellow passenger, while she was at it. I feel like I was ON the train with her.
Tell The Story Of A Journey
Use any transportation technology you can dream up, but include details to allow us to see, feel and perhaps even choke on the atmosphere.
Don’t forget to make something happen, and then resolve it (or leave it unresolved).
Give us a character we can root for (or against).
This week sees both Independence Day in the US and Canada Day in the north of the continent.
Write a holiday-themed story
It doesn’t have to be related to this week’s holidays. If fact you might want to start planning ahead for autumnal and winter holidays, especially if you’re interested in releasing those stories this year.
Did you know that magazines, online publications and anthologies are starved for date-appropriate stories?
And think about it, these stories are evergreen: release them yourself and talk them up every year on the same date. Or how about putting together a collection of date themed stories and releasing them as themed anthology of your own writing?
We’ve all lived through holidays – from the ones that give you a day off school, to the ones that come replete with custom and tradition and obligation and anticipation. Use your own experiences to bring the story (and its details) alive for the reader, but don’t forget to include a vivid character with a strong desire for…something.
Don’t forget: at 1PM (EST) today (Wednesday) I’m hosting a webinar on how to write, revise and release a story all in one week, with DIYMFA’s Gabriela Pereira. And we have a special announcement. Register Now
Last week Neil Gaiman’s new novel The Ocean At The End of the Lane came out.
I like his books. But I LOVE his online journal. So on reading the book, it was clear straight away, that he was mining his personal memories: both as an adult attending his father’s funeral (which he did in reality a few years ago, and blogged about) and as a child growing up (one county over from where I would grow up during the following decade).
I’m reading the book slowly, but so far here’s what I see: the details. The details — of what the child sees, where the adult goes — are startlingly clear and appropriate to each voice. The adult goes for a drive to avoid the funeral hooplah, and sees the world as it is and how it has changed. The child looks unflinchingly at a dead body until he is hustled away by the grown ups. But he notes, disgruntled, that the body is draped in a blanket from his own bedroom. He takes in details of the body looked unlike the person as they had been, alive. He measures money in how many four-for-a-penny Blackjacks and Fruit Salads it can buy him (the pervasive, child-accessible sweeties/candies of Mr. Gaiman’s and my childhoods!).
Write a story based on one strong image from your childhood — or at least a decade ago
It doesn’t need to be anything as shocking as discovering a dead body. Just take a vivid memory-image and weave a story around it. Have your characters recall details that you recall. Have them feel the way you felt.
For instance, I remember being allowed (encouraged?) to visit an elderly neighbour of ours when I was very young. I went round one day and saw, in a window above her living room window, a stranger, cleaning her windows from the inside. This person was wearing a white, sleeveless top, hair slicked back, cheeks red. I can remember that the house was attached to other houses on either side, built of brick. The windows were sash windows. The door was up a step from the long path that ran between two strips of lawn. There was a garden gate made of wood with one of those metal latches you have to lift to open it. I still remember the physical sensations I felt when I said…
I *know* this character. I know the mistake she’s about to make and her reaction to it. Now, can I put that into a story where it turns out that the person upstairs is not who Mrs McKay thinks it is? Can I have my character go on to make a similar but bigger mistake? Can I have her triumph over her personality flaws, or will she be defeated by them?
What memory will you write about?
Today’s prompt is from writer, illustrator and all-round good egg Debbie Ridpath Ohi, who shares one of her Daily Doodles with us today to help inspire a story. Thanks, Debbie!
It Wasn’t Me!
Debbie Ridpath Ohi (http://DebbieOhi.com) writes and illustrates books for young people in Toronto, Canada. She is the illustrator of I’M BORED by Michael Ian Black, published by Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers, chosen by The New York Times as a Notable Children’s Book. Debbie has current and upcoming book projects with Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins and Random House. More info about Debbie and her projects: http://debbieohi.com. Her blog for writers/illustrators:http://inkygirl.com. Twitter: @inkyelbows.
I love stealing inspiration from other sources.
Write A Story Based On A Character or Scenario From A Game
This prompt was inspired by a link Dan Blank shared. Apparently there’s weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth in the artistic community about how the rise of data is crushing creativity.
The gist is: storytelling is changing. We’re not writing or consuming stories the same way. What does that mean for creativity?
Personally I think it’s awesome. Some of the best stories I’ve read in recent years eschewed the straight narrative (this happend, then that happened, crisis, climax, resolution, the end). One was written as answers to a police investigation, some have been written as lists, or tweets. A recent best-selling novel is written in second person, as a faux self-help book.
Of course, the straight narrative will always have its place, and it’s certainly a helpful structure on which to hang a story (more on that tomorrow), but it can help us stay out of a rut if we try new things. So:
Write a Story That Uses Numbers To Shape The Structure.
Can you imagine your life without email, Facebook, Twitter, text messages? Can your characters?
Can you imagine your life without email, Facebook, Twitter, text messages?
Can your characters?
If you’re writing contemporary fiction and your characters are still calling and popping round to see each other, you might want to rethink that.
This is something new in life and newer in fiction. How to integrate this stuff into the narrative? It’s an exciting chance to do something new. But “exciting” and “new” can also mean “challenging” and “fraught with clunky first attempts”.
Why not get your first attempts out of the way today?
Write A Story Using A Facebook Timeline
This prompt is inspired by “Vanilla Bright Like Eminem” by Michel Faber, a story that captures a moment in time for one family as they travel on a train. (Read my review.)
Write A Story That Features A Mode of Transportation You Have Used So Often You Take It For Granted.
This post is the second of two. Check out last week’s prompt or stay here to go straight to the part where you steal a story from someone else!
This prompt is part of a two-part prompt. Last week we wrote stories for other writers to steal from. This week we’re doing the stealing.
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Don’t miss my short story: Steal A Story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/open-2
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See my story – and write your own, today: Steal A Story at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/open-2
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
This post is the first of two. Come back next week to steal a story from someone else!
This prompt is part of a two-part prompt. This week we’re writing a story that we won’t mind someone stealing. Next week we’re going to look at someone else’s story and steal their character, setting, premise or twist, and write our own story (a kind of derivative work).
Don’t worry if the story is less than perfect. As long as it has one appealing feature (character, setting or premise), let the rest go. Just finish it and post it.
Don’t try to write something you’re so proud of that you’ll be loathe to let it go.
Think of this like the kernel of a piece of open source software (like WordPress, on which this site is built). Someone came up with the original nugget, then let everyone else into the sandbox to play with it. Are you more mature than a four year old or will you get annoyed if someone else builds on top of your sandcastle?
Post the story somewhere and provide a link to it. Post it in the comments here if you don’t have a blog of your own.
Come back next week, read the links/stories and create a story based on someone else’s.
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Don’t miss my short story: Open Source Story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/open-1
This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is an Open Source Story! #storyaday https://storyaday.org/open-1
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/open-1
See my story – and write your own, today: Open Source Story at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/open-1
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
But this morning I was listening to an interview with a writer who found a fascinating way into the POV: his novel, “How To Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia”, is written as a self-help book. (It’s a great interview, full of all kinds of good stuff. Have a listen.)
The writer, Mohsin Hamid, sounds like such a nice guy that I hope he won’t mind us stealing his idea for this weeks’ writing exercise:
Write a second-person fiction tale as if it was a self-help book/article.
Think of all the ‘How To Write” articles you’ve read over the years. Have some fun with them
It doesn’t have to be ‘self help’, it can be aping any type of non-fiction that lends itself to second person.
You can often find this kind of writing at McSweeney’s. It isn’t always obvious that you might apply the label ‘fiction’, but it certainly is.
Read a sample of “How To Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia”
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Don’t miss my short story: Self Help Story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-second
This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is Self Help Story! #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-second
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-second
See my story – and write your own, today: Self Help Story at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-second
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
People have been writing about robots for a long time and fans of Science Fiction will instantly know what I’m talking about if I mention Isaac Asimov and his three laws of Robotics.
Twenty years ago I couldn’t have asked those of you who are not fans of Science Fiction to write a robot story unless you were writing about heavy industry.
Ten years ago, you could have written about the Mars rover or those funnily little circular robots that were starting to sweep our floors (and sweep for mines in the military).
Today you could write a story about your grandmother, being brought her medicine and being entertained by her own robot butler and only be on the edges of speculative fiction, according to this report from the BBC: Robot Designed To Care For The Elderly.
Reading this article gave me the strongest sense that I was living in an Asimov story (or very shortly might be)
Write a story featuring one of the everyday robotic technologies available to us today
You can make it, like early sci-fi, an exploration of humanity’s relationship with machines and what that means. Or you can simply use the robot as a primary or secondary character.
Perhaps your robots are sentient but it would be also interesting to see how living with highly-efficient, highly-programmed machines that are NOT sentient affects your characters’ actions.
Some of the robots available in day to day life today (or soon) include the Roomba
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Don’t miss my short story: Everyday Robots #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-robot
This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is Everyday Robot! #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-robot
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-robot
See my story – and write your own, today: Everyday Robots at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-robot
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
It’s February.
What does it mean to you? Shortest month? Leap year? Darkness and winter? Summer in the southern hemisphere?
What might “February” mean to an old woman? A young man? A kid whose birthday is in Feb?
Might you write a story with a sentence for each day in February? A 28-sentence story? (or maybe 29)
What unexpected stories could you tell, with a theme of “February”?
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Don’t miss my short story: February #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-february
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Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-february
See my story – and write your own, today: February at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-february
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
Today’s prompt is a whole scenario with a named character and a tricky situation. Your job is to decide who this character is and how they will ultimately react. I’m really curious to see how different people deal with this, so please do post either the story or a link to your version in the comments, if you’re OK with posting it online.
Lorina Dorsey is nice. Always has been. Which is probably why she’s 52, unmarried and still teaching 5th Grade at the same school after 29 years, she thinks, wryly. She sometimes wonders if people think her weak. If they only knew the strength it took to…but no.
As our story starts, Lorina, is returning to work after the shattering business of burying her widowed mother. Lorina has no siblings. Walking into the school where she has taught fifth grade for 29 years, she sees that the door to Dr Tatchell’s office is closed. She can, nevertheless, hear voices. Dr Tatchell is roaring at someone. It’ll be that nice young Mr Santiago, getting some ‘professional development’ from Tatchell, no doubt. Only the timid, like her, stayed here longer than a semester.
Rounding the corner, Lorina sees a heap of coats on the floor outside her room. She tuts. Nothing bothers her more than sloppiness. Reaching down to pluck the coats off the ground, she is startled to find Andrew Smeel, the smallest boy in her class, curled up underneath them, sobbing. With some coaxing he tells her that he’d been involved in a scuffle with the other boys yesterday and the substitute had sent them all to Dr. Tatchell. At this point, Andrew curls up in a ball and refuses to say any more.
Lorina is standing, looking down at an 11 year old boy, curled into a fetal position outside her door. She turns to see Mr. Santiago stumbling towards her, white-faced. Her mother is dead. All she has is this school. Her eyes bore into the door of the Principal’s office. She takes one step.
Write Lorina’s story.
Feel free to change the gender or ethnicity of the characters, as well as the period if it helps.
Start anywhere. Use the backstory explicitly or, better yet, simply use it to inform the choices you make for Lorina.
Ask yourself what Lorina wants, what she’s capable of, what you can show the readers to make them suspect she’s capable of anything.
Will you write this realistically, or take a flight of fancy?
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Don’t miss my short story: Lorina’s Story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-lorina
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See my story – and write your own, today: Lorina’s Story at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-lorina
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
“What’s that girl? Timmy’s stuck in the old well?”
We all have TV shows that we love even though they are formulaic, populated by ‘character types’ rather than characters, and a real guilty pleasure. And we keep watching them, even if we don’t always admit our deep, abiding love for them to our more sophisticated friends.
So why do we watch? Because on some level they satisfy a need for escapism, heroism, humour, idealism. They may even have moments of brilliance that keep us coming back for more.
(For me, it’s Star Trek, Murder She Wrote and almost anything featuring Robin Hood or King Arthur).
We know the hero is (almost) always going to win. We know none of the major recurring characters are going to die. We know the bad guy will get what he deserves — even if it’s only the frowning disapproval of the hero.
*If you need inspiration, track down a copy of “Heart of A Champion” by T. C. Boyle, a wonderful parody of the Lassie stories.
*Don’t be lazy. Don’t just reach for inappropriate romance or make the characters stupid. (Check out Jon Scalzi’s “Redshirts” as an example. It starts as a fairly unimaginative parody of the action scenes in “Star Trek” (you know, the ones where the no-name ensign in a red shirt goes on an away mission and gets eaten by pink slime to prove that the landing party faces some peril) but moves on to a more thoughtful and affectionate examination of science fiction tropes.
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Don’t miss my short story: Affectionate Spoofing #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-spoof
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Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-spoof
See my story – and write your own, today: Affectionate Spoof at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-spoof
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
Prompt: Write a story in the present tense from a limited third person perspective
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
Wolf Hall: A Novel, by Hilary Mantel, is a strange, disorienting read. I couldn’t figure it out at first, but finally I realised what was keeping me off balance: the book is written in the present tense and from a limited perspective: that of Thomas Cromwell, advisor to King Henry VIII. Everything we learn comes either from Thomas’s direct experience or from things he has heard from other people. Sometime he is reminiscing, sometimes observing in the moment, but the present tense keeps the whole experience very immediate.
In Wolf Hall it is sometimes hard to follow what is going on, because of course, the main character’s thoughts don’t pause to explain. He thinks of one person, who reminds him of another, and the reader has to trust that — at some point — it will be explained who these people are. or what that place was, and it will all fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. Don’t be afraid to confuse the reader, especially on your first draft. Leave out more than you put in.
Here is an excerpt from the novel to help you see how the author tells the story from Thomas Cromwell’s perspective:
Monday morning the dukes are back. Their instructions are to turn out the occupants this very day, because the king wants to send in his own builders and furnishers and get the palace ready to hand over to the Lady Anne, who needs a London house of her own.
He’s [Cromwell] prepared to stand and ague the point: have I missed something? This palace belongs to the archdiocese of York. When was Lady Ann made an archbishop?
But the tide of men flooding in by the water stairs is sweeping them away. The two dukes have made themselves scarce, and there’s nobody to argue with. What a terrible sight, someone says: Master Cromwell balked of a fight. And now the cardinal’s ready to go, but where? Over his customary scarlet, he is wearing a traveling cloak that belongs to someone else; they are confiscating his wardrobe piece by piece, so he has to grab what he can. It is autumn, and though he is a big man he feels the cold.
See? It’s a bit confusing, not always knowing who ‘he’ is, but once the reader settles into the style, it becomes enjoyable, puzzling out what Thomas Cromwell is thinking, what he is observing and what he is admitting (to himself and others). Don’t be afraid give your readers this pleasure.
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Don’t miss my short story: Inner Thoughts #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-inner
This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is Inner Thoughts! #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-inner
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-inner
See my story – and write your own, today: Inner Thoughts at #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-inner
If you would like to be the Guest Prompter, click here.
The Write On Wednesday story prompts are designed to prompt quickly-written stories that you can share in the comments. It’s a warm-up exercise, to loosen up your creativity muscles. Come back every Wednesday to see a new prompt or subscribe.
It’s that time of year again. Everyone’s made their New Year Resolutions and they’re all hitting the gym. I admit it. I’m one of them.
As I looked around my Zumba class last night I was struck by what a great setting it would be for a story. All those people from all different walks of life, all with their own stories and their own reasons for being there. And guess what? That’s your prompt today!
Write A Story Based Around A Set Of Characters From A Gym (Class)
You should use the prompt in your story (however tenuous the connection).
You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.
Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.
Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!
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Last week I talked about the benefits of writing seasonal stories and yesterday I highlighted a seasonal story over at Six Sentences. Today I’m combining the two, for today’s prompt:
Your story should have something to do with “January”.
It might be set in the month, have something to do with the Roman god Janus (after whom the month was named), or feature a character named January.
Don’t forget that your experience of January is different from that of many others. (hint: even the weather is different in the other hemisphere.)
The Prompt
Write A Story In Which Something Is Beginning
(I know it’s what you’re thinking about! It’s January 2, for goodness sake!)
Write A Story In Which Something Is Beginning
1. You should use the prompt in your story.
2. You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.
3. Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.
4. Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!
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This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is about beginnings #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-beginnings
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-beginnings
See my story – and write your own, today: beginnings! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-beginnings
Don’t miss my “Beginnings” story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-beginnings
Every year at this time I stumble on holiday-themed stories wherever I look: Christmas mysteries, Hannukah radio anthologies, contests themed on New Year’s. Collection after collection after anthology on seasonal stories. And why?…
Every year at this time I stumble on holiday-themed stories wherever I look: Christmas mysteries, Hannukah radio anthologies, contests themed on New Year’s. Collection after collection after anthology on seasonal stories. And why? Because they make great perennial gifts that publishers and authors can wheel out every year at the same time.
Of course, with the lead-time involved in publishing, if you want to have a hope of submitting a story to a themed anthology, you need to have it ready 6 months to a year before the occasion. So this is the perfect time to write.
Write a Themed Story For The Season
1. You should use the prompt in your story.
2. You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.
3. Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.
4. Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!
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Some tweets/updates you might use:
This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is very seasonal #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-seasonal
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-seasonal
See my story – and write your own, today: seasonal stories! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-seasonal
Don’t miss my seasonal story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-seasonal
Want to bore your readers and ensure they never get past your first paragraph? Write your opening as it were stage directions: describe a character or a room or the light or the hills…
YAWN!
It’s a familiar trap and we do it for a good reason — we’re trying to create an atmosphere or paint a picture in the reader’s head. The problem, from a reader’s perspective, is that we haven’t given them a reason to care about the pretty picture we’re painting.
One of the best pieces of advice I’ve seen to combat this problem is to start your scene as close to the action as possible (and by ‘action’ I mean ‘conflict’, and by ‘conflict’ I mean ‘the thing that’s going to torment/delight your character and therefore your reader, until the story is finished.)
Reservoir Dogs is a deeply unpleasant, unsettling movie, but when I went to see it in the theaters I came out stunned, not just by the gore, but also by the masterful storytelling. And it started right from the opening.
The opening scene takes place in a diner. No, there’s no ‘action’ in the scene but the conversation sets up all the characters (including a discussion about tipping). The meal is over, we’re entering the scene at the last possible minute, right before the interesting stuff happens and the characters reveal themselves. We feel that the characters existed, knew things, had lives, before we started to observe them.
Immediately after the credits, we jump to the interior of a car where, clearly, something has gone wrong. Mr Orange has been shot and Mr White and he are racing away from somewhere. Granted, Reservoir Dogs ‘cheats’ a little because the rest of the movie is told in flashbacks, but for our purposes, this scene illustrates my point. This scene could have started with the crime going wrong. It could have started with Mr Orange injured and being dragged to the car. But it doesn’t. They’re in the car. He’s sure he’s dying. Mr White appears to be helping him (quite tenderly, for a foul-mouthed criminal…). Horrifying as the scene is, you are fascinated. It’s hard to resist finding out what is going on.
And all because we walk in to the story when the action has already started. This is something we, as writers, need to do in our stories.
Write a heist story, but start it as late in the action as you possibly can.
You don’t have to go all Reservoir Dogs. You can write a gentle, comedy ‘heist’ where no-one is really in peril (a little old lady trying to make off with a pie from one of those rotating cases in a diner, armed only with a crochet hook…)
Try not to use ‘flashbacks’. Instead, start the scene when it’s getting interesting (when the crook is confronted? When the pursuit is in full flight?)
Make sure your readers know, early on, what’s at stake, and gradually unfold the reasons for your main character’s actions as the story goes on.
You can make the criminal sympathetic by giving them a good reason for attempting robbery, or you can make someone else the hero.
Keep putting obstacles in your protagonist’s way.
1. You should use the prompt in your story.
2. You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.
3. Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.
4. Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!
Share this challenge on Twitter or Facebook
Some tweets/updates you might use:
This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is about openings #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-openings
Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-openings
See my story – and write your own, today: openings! #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-openings
Don’t miss my heist story #WriteOnWed #storyaday https://storyaday.org/wow-openings
The only qualification to be a ‘Superstar” is a desire to write and support your fellow writers.
A supportive group of committed writers, who meet virtually, support each other’s efforts, and inspire each other.
Registration for 2024 open now-June 8, 2024
The only qualification to be a ‘Superstar” is a desire to write and support your fellow writers.
A supportive group of committed writers, who meet virtually, support each other’s efforts, and inspire each other.
Registration for 2024 open now-June 8, 2024
A 6-part journey through the short story.
Starts July 28, 2023
![[Writing Prompt] Write A Compelling Opening](https://storyaday.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/image.jpg)