Prompts

Make a list of pivotal events. . . Prompt #40

Today’s Prompt is Part 1 of 2.  Part 2 is “How to Write Fact Based on Fiction,” Prompt #41. Part 1 Make a list of pivotal events in your life. Those times when, at night, you were not the same person you were in the morning.  By day’s end, you were a different person.  Just write a list. When you are finished writing the list:  take something from your list and write the details . . . as you remember them.  You can be as detailed, or as general as you want to be. Write about an event that altered your life:  all the gritty details. . . be as honest and as genuine as you can. Bleed onto the page. Part 2 will be the next prompt post.

Prompts

What games did you play? Prompt #32

Today’s prompt is from To Have Not, a fascinating memoir by Frances Lefkowitz. When us kids used to walk down 16th Street to the schoolyard or across Sanchez to the corner store, we’d keep a lookout for cool cars. When one drove by – a red mustang convertible, a tiny MG, a black Jag with the silver cat ready to pounce off the hood – whoever saw it first would point and say, “That’s my car!” We could play this game anywhere, my brothers and their buddies and I, shouting the words loud and fast to drown out anyone else who might be thinking about claiming the same car.  You could even play it alone, whispering the three magic words while walking home from school or sitting in a window seat on the bus, leaning your drowsy head against the sun-warmed glass. Then the car would speed through traffic, carrying…

Prompts

Your best gift or your all-time favorite gift. — Prompt #28

You can use these prompts to write memoir, fiction, poetry, or to just write. It doesn’t matter what your genre is, you can use these prompts to develop the craft of writing.  You can respond to the prompt from your personal experience or as a fictional character would respond. Here we go: There are tacky gifts, insulting gifts, selfish gifts the giver secretly wants, cheap gifts and re-gifted gifts. But some gifts are transcendent. Have you ever received such a perfect gift? One that amazed you with its imagination? Perhaps it was a gift that completely touched your heart, changed your life, opened a new world? Maybe it was a gift so dear you held onto it for a lifetime.  What was it and why was it so special to you? Prompt:  Your best gift or your all-time favorite gift.