Day 27- Last Will by Michele. E. Reisinger

Today’s prompt from Brenda Rech gives you a chance to stretch your imagination

The Prompt

A lawyer I know once told me there are only two kinds of people in this world: Those who think the pre-deceased should decide how to disperse their life’s work and those who think themselves entitled to it.

Write a story told as a LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT.

You can be silly or serious, realistic or really weird.

Which of the two kinds of people is your protagonist?

Which is their beneficiary? Is there a third kind of person?

What message may your protagonist be trying to send, and do the beneficiaries agree?

Consider your time period and genre, as well as the bequests. Are they sentimental, practical, or fantastical?

The gold pocket watch in 1886 could be a family heirloom, but in 6881 a portal between universes. What if the watch were BOTH those things, regardless of space and time?

Play around with the topic.

Maybe instead of writing the document, you write the story of the passed-down object or one of the beneficiaries.

Maybe you write about the ugly vase or the empty booze bottle, around whose necks cryptic notes are strung.

Maybe you focus on the relative who expected everything and received nothing. Or the lawyer, maybe, duped by the pre-deceased into unscrupulous behavior.

Whatever you decide, your story needn’t be macabre or gloomy. It can be, of course, but it can also be playful.

It can be joyous.

Michele E. Reisinger

Michele is a writer and StoryADay Superstar living in Bucks County, PA, with her family and never enough books. Her short fiction has appeared in Across the Margin, Stories That Need to be Told, Sunspot Literary Journal, Dreamers Creative Writing, and others. Find her online at mereisinger.com.

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Day 25 – You And Them by Julie Duffy

Write a story using this helpful prompt from Julie Duffy

The Prompt

Write a story in the first person point of view, but include three characters

Put the characters in a position where they must make a decision and must work together to achieve something.

The point-of-view character and one other want the same thing, but the third character wants something different.

Remember that, since we are only every privvy to the person in the “I” point of view, you can’t tell us what the other characters are thinking. We’ll have to figure that out, along with the point-of-view character, from their words and actions (including body language) as they progress through the story.

Will your POV character get what they want? Will the second character back them up or switch sides? How will you show the progression of the relationships, through only words and actions?

Can we trust what your point of view character thinks, or are they fooling themselves? Are they insightful about their companions or do they misinterpret their actions?

Julie Duffy

I am Julie Duffy and this is a first-person bio. I founded StoryADay May in 2010 because I was stick of never finishing anything I started. Ironically, StoryADay May turned into an annual event and now I hope it will never end! I also encourage people to make monthly goals during the rest of the year, in our Serious Writers’ Accountability Group posts.

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Day 24 – At The Precipice – A Visual Prompt from C. MKCane

Write a story using this helpful prompt from Julie Duffy

The Prompt

Two people standing, silhouetted on a ridge with sun and blue sky breaking through clouds

Try to incorporate this visual prompt into a pivotal moment in a story.

Perhaps these two people are adversaries or a couple.

Consider the location: this could be a real trail in the mountains or on a whole other planet.

C. McKane

Cee is a nursing student, writer, photographer, and family herbalist who loves micro fiction and Italian poetry. She is currently exploring Notes on Substack:

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Day 23- A Catalogue of Complaints by Julie Duffy

Settings are important in today’s prompt

Write a list of complaints. Focus on the voice of your character, and what the particular complaints tell the reader about that character.

Things To Consider

You can write this as an exaggerated version of yourself and your own complaints about the world—but be wary of doing this if you are not blessed with a strong sense of the ridiculous, or if you’re feeling particularly dark about the world right now. The point of this exercise is NOT to validate your complaints, but to communicate to a reader certain human commonalities.

Start with a character and think about what stage of life they are in, what their hopes are, what their experience of life might have been. Try to write the list the way they would, with an eye to providing context clues for a reader.

You might model your character on someone in public life who frustrates you, inspires you, or confuses you. What would a fabulously wealthy heiress have to complain about (it won’t be nothing). How do those complaints reflect on her? What would an admired philanthropist still grouse about, privately? How would that change a reader’s perspective from the start to the end of the story?

Use the title to tell us whose list of complaints we’re reading (for example, it might read like an advice article in a glossy magazine: World Champion Ice Dancer Melody Swope shares Fourteen Things to Prepare Your PreTeen Ice Queen For When They Go Pro; or How Famed Naturalist Sir Danny Arbuckle Packs For A Trip To The Wilderness, A List of Grievances by Olivia Snyder, Aged 12 1/4).

Write the list as if your character wrote it for their eyes only, because you want to get to the honest parts of the character, the parts they wouldn’t necessarily air on purpose.

Remember to provide a sense of discovery for the reader–they will be searching for meaning, so take them on a journey.

It doesn’t have to be a list of complaints, but do try to pick something that allows you to dig into a particular character and take the reader on a journey.

Be brave. Leave lots of gaps. See what happens.

Julie Duffy

Julie is the creator of StoryADay May. She tries not to complain too much. If you’d like to receive writing lessons and prompts from Julie throughout the year, consider signing up for the StoryAWeek newsletter.

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Day 16 – Very Short Story by Julie Duffy

Write a story using this helpful prompt from Julie Duffy

The Prompt

Tell a story in 50 words

Imagine someone has taken away something your character cares about deeply, to the point where their focus on its absence feels obsessive.

Tell us that story in 50 words

Tips:

Think through everything that would matter to your character, then distill, reduce, concentrate all that you would like to communicate to the reader.

How little can you say and still have character, tension, change, imagery?

You could write about the moment when it’s just a threat to take the “something” away. How hard will they fight to keep it?

The “something” could be a physical object, a person, a right, or an anticipated reward…

Remember: the reader doesn’t have to understand it on first reading.

You should feel free to use your title to tell us a lot.

Julie Duffy

Julie Duffy is the founder and host of StoryADay, its challenges, community and podcast. For more prompts and deeper writing lessons weekly, throughout the year, subscribe to the StoryAWeek newsletter

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Day 14- The Whole is Greater than the Sum of its Parts by Neha Mediratta

We’re diving into structure and character today with this prompt from Neha Mediratta

The Prompt

Write a short story about an accident from the PoV of three different characters:

  1. involved in the accident (e.g. as a passenger or driver of a cart or cycle/bike or car/plane or spaceship),
  2. witnessing the accident ( e.g. as agent who tried to avoid or confront the accident as it happens),
  3. trying to put pieces of what really happened when investigating (e.g. could be a public figure like a police officer or a person just coming to terms personally with this incident).

The playing rules here are to

a) develop our practice muscles to inhabit different perspectives.
b) dig deeply into a small but decisive moment.
c) convey a final impression of the whole (i.e. The End) with the help of three different characters in the compact space of a short story.

And most of all, have fun writing!

Neha Mediratta

Neha is a generalist currently obsessed with stretching, mind-body-world connection and the spirit’s dwelling place. She writes fiction, non-fiction, takes on editing assignments and works with people she admires. She lives by a lake in an overcrowded coastal city with her family and some wildlife. Check out her writing here

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