Here we go: May 1, the start of StoryADay May!
It’s always tempting to get excited on Day 1 and launch in to a really long, involved story. Or maybe your story-telling muscles are out of shape and you end up writing a long, rambling story because you don’t have a framework and the story runs away from you.
Either way, biting off more than you can chew on May 1 can be a bit discouraging. Especially when you wake on May 2, work the cramp out of your fingers and your brain…and realise you have to do it all again!
So today’s prompt is a simple one:
Write a story of not more than 1,200 words.
That gives you 100 words for intro, 100 words for summing-up (or for the twist) and 1000 words to play with in the middle. (Hint: something should have happened by the time you’re 400 words in, to make me want to keep reading.)
That’s it. Happy writing, and see you tomorrow!
Sadly I’m late to the story a day in May, however, I’m going to be trying to pick up the pace and write a story a day, maybe if I’m lucky catch up on the days I hadn’t written. For day 1 I’ve written a piece involving a woman who finds out she’s dead.
Better late than never :). Welcome!!
Wrote a nonfiction account of my beginning. I hope to reread and share tomorrow – I will be writing a variety of styles and topics….
Each day’s final line will begin the next day’s story…..at least, I think it will!
I’m excited to find this challenge because I need a kick in the rear to get back into writing. My first story is complete … cruddy but complete.
My hope is to write all very very short stories this month. Just a couple hundred words or less…we shall see.
I didn’t see this prompt in time. I had to be gone til around 2 then started my story. I’m pretty sure it’s less than 1200 words though. I’ll be home tomorrow and check the site earlier.
Cat
Okay. Sticking to stories that make up the series of novellas. Last one needed for the first. Probably fits the word limit since its handwritten. But short is not my forte!
Short can be harder than long, for sure!
I’m going to write a part of a chapter of a novel I’m working on everyday. Here’s what I wrote today,
Tony the cop slammed the door on his way out. He was pissed because Red threatened to stop paying protection if he harassed Joe who had begun working for him the day before. Red entered his bar just before Tony and Joe started fighting. Tony suspected Joe of trying to have sex with a girl who came into the bar daily and sat close to a radiator to get warm, because she dressed in clothing not suited for a Chicago winter day.
Joe had taken pity on the girl and furnished her with free coffee and food with no evil intent. He got upset when the cop accused him of being nice so he could get lucky. He told the cop he’d be glad to step outside to fight as soon as Red returned, but Red defused the situation before he went upstairs with his gay friend.
Two hours later, Red’s friend stepped through the hall doorway and sauntered over to the bar walking as if he strode down a runway in a fashion show. He could have been as every eye in the place followed him.
“Hellooo, Joe,” he/she said, in a sing-song voice, “My name is Melody. Red said to tell you to give me anything I want on the house.”
Joe saw she had washed off the heavy makeup she wore when she first came through the barroom door a few hours ago.
“Did you go to Apartment 2-B?” Joe had to ask if they had used his bed for their tryst.
“Honey, I wouldn’t be caught dead in a dump like 2-B. Red hired my friend Suzy Campbell to decorate 2-A, and sweetie, she’s a top notch decorator, believe me. That apartment is absolutely fabulous.” Melody looked at Joe with wide-open eyes and said, “I’ll give you a tour anytime you want.”
“Thanks, but I’m not interested,” Joe said, but by the way the other men at the bar gawked at her, he figured she wouldn’t have any problem finding a playmate. “What can I get you?”
“I’ll have an Appletini Please,” Melody said in a feminine voice.
“Sorry, I don’t know what that is.” Joe wasn’t a mixologist. The Palace where he worked before served mostly beer and shots, and maybe a gin and tonic or whiskey sour now and then, but nothing fancy.
“Oh dear, I guess I better educate you so you’ll be able to make an Appletini just right. Use a martini glass, put in 1 1/2 oz Smirnoff Green Apple Twist vodka, add 1 oz DeKuyper Sour Apple Pucker schnapps, stir them together with crushed ice, and serve.”
Joe followed Melody’s directions and when he set the glass in front of her she picked it up with three fingers, delicately took a sip smiled and said, “Perfect, thank you.”
“Hey Joe,” came from the end of the bar. He walked there and Elmo held up his beer bottle, “That’s why I never drink from a glass.”
Joe laughed remembering Elmo telling him it was safer to drink from a bottle because you never knew who had drunk from a glass in the bar.
“Honey, come on back down here,” Melody sang out. Red said you like to listen to stories, so I’ve got one to tell you.”
“Why not tell everyone here?” Joe didn’t want Melody whispering in his ear or singling him out for her tall tale, whatever it was.
“Sweetie, I’m not going to strain my vocal cords telling my story.”
“Tell you what Melody, I’ll turn on the microphone and you can whisper into it, and everyone in the place will be able to hear you.”
“Oh goody,” Melody clapped her hands together and stood up.
Joe went to the stage and turned the sound equipment on, picked up the mike to test it, “hello, hello, all you lucky people are going to hear a story told by, Melody”
Melody stepped onto the stage and put his hand over Joes holding the mike. He yanked his hand from under hers. Melody glared at him for his rejection. “Hello all, my name is Melody, in case you didn’t know,” she said demurely. I want to tell you about. . .
“saturated” “compact” (perhaps “bijou”?)
Let’s not leave room for anyone to interpret ‘short’ negatively. I’ll probably write much less than 1,200 too, but I know we have some epic novelists around here who need a firm hand 😉
And those aspiring to epic novelling. 😀
Put pencil (or finely-wrought fountain pen) to paper, young man! Less of the ‘aspiring’!
Done: only just in the limit though!
That was fun. Can’t wait to do it again tomorrow!
I wrote exactly half that! And I doubt that will be my shortest, either.
When I write short, I write short.
done :), in spanish tough
It was tough enough in English!
Finally, the clocked clicked May 1 and the prompt is here and the words flow.
Storytime has arrived.