Make a list. Write about things you have learned. Today’s Prompt: Things I’ve learned. . .
Month: September 2015
Writing as an organic process. . .
“Think of writing as an organic, developmental process in which you start writing at the very beginning – before you know your meaning at all – and encourage your words gradually to change and evolve. Only at the end will you know what you want to say or the words you want to say it with.” –Peter Elbow
See your story and tell it.
Relax into your chair. Escort your inner critic . . . your editor out the door. Shed your ideas about what perfect writing means. Give yourself permission to write the worst stuff possible. Writing isn’t about talent, it’s about practice. Creative writing is an act of discovery. Take a deep breath. Relax into your breathing. Rather than write for an audience, write from an instinctual level. Immerse yourself in writing. Let go of your worries. Just let go. Write to satisfy an inner desire and to go to a meaningful place, that’s all your own. Go deeper into the recesses of your mind and really write. Write to get to a powerful level – not for an audience. If you notice thoughts and feelings that cause discomfort, take a deep breath and exhale. Look around the room. Get up and walk to a window, or get a drink of cool,…
100 Word Story
Do you like to write short pieces? If yes, then Grant Faulkner’s 100 word story is for you! From the 100 word story website: “One hundred seems perfect. It’s the basis of percentages, the perfect test score, the boiling point of water (Celsius), purity. Pythagoreans considered 100 as divine because it is the square (10 x 10) of the divine decad (10). Even a Scrabble set has 100 tiles. And yet 100 is a fragment. It’s an arbitrary marker, like the ‘First 100 Days’ of a president’s term—merely a promise of what’s to come, or a whiff of what has passed.” Submit: 100 words … no more or no less. Tell a story, write a prose poem, pen a slice of your memoir, or try your hand at an essay.
Zazzle. . . . Prompt #186
Today’s writing prompt: Zazzle You can write about something that happened to you, something that happened to someone else, or write fiction. I look forward to reading your writing about Zazzle.
Jennifer Lynn Alvarez: The Book You Were Born to Write
Guest Blogger Jennifer Lynn Alvarez writes about The Book You Were Born to Write. I recently read The Martian, by Andy Weir. It’s a unique, thrilling, and detailed survival story described as “Apollo 13 meets Cast Away.” I thoroughly enjoyed the book, in spite of all the math equations and the use of the metric system (English Lit. major here). But I’m not writing about Andy Weir to review his wonderful book, I’m writing about him because of something he said in an interview: “I love reading up on current space research. At some point I came up with the idea of an astronaut stranded on Mars. The more I worked on it, the more I realized I had accidentally spent my life researching for this story.” Andy Weir (Book Browse online interview) You see, Mr. Weir is a self-proclaimed space and science fanatic inspired by the idea of humans…
Ice cream . . . Prompt #185
Today’s writing prompt: Ice cream
Brevity publishes extremely brief essays.
Brevity is an online journal, publishing short narrative essays (750 words or less). Employing strong verbs and using sensory detail increase chances of your writing being selected. “There is no room for throat-clearing in search of a point. . . You need each sentence to do more than one thing . . . provide setting, forward the action and give insight into character, all at once.” Founder and editor Dinty W. Moore, interviewed by Kerrie Flanagan, The Writer August 2015 Information about using sensory detail can be found in the Just Write section on The Write Spot Blog. Good Luck!
Random Words + Photo . . . Prompt #184
Today’s random words writing prompt: honey, drunk, fast, feet, power, languid You can also use the photo below as a writing prompt. It will be fun to see what you do with this!
Guest Blogger Steve Fisher writes about Musical Writing
Guest Blogger Steve Fisher writes about Musical Writing Writing is a mysterious craft. Part inspiration, part perspiration. This is about inspiration. Or rather one form of it. Music. When I’m looking for a magic tonic of creativity, I turn to motion picture soundtracks. Think about some of the most effective films you have seen. Chances are they started with a great script, added competent and creative direction, exceptional performances, sublime cinematography and brilliant editing. But perhaps the crowning element was the evocative score. What would Star Wars be like without John Williams’ majestic symphonic score? How effective would Titanic be without James Horner’s haunting themes? How chilling would Psycho be without Bernard Herrmann’s staccato strings? A good film can be made great by the music. A film can also be ruined by a bland or misguided score. In deference to the filmmakers, I won’t cite examples. So what does that…