Category: Writing prompt

Tropes in Literature

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In Taylor Holden’s novel The Sense of Paper, the image of paper binds together the lives of the main characters. For example, Charlie, a journalist who actively sought out dangerous places in the world, is now researching the different types of paper used by artists, information which she is using to write her own book.

Alan, an artist, prefers a particular paper for his work, which he uses to paint a picture for Charlie. He also puts her in contact with researchers in the field of art, who help Charlie understand the importance of paper.

This is an example of a trope, a literary device that is carried throughout a story, maintaining a crucial tie to characters and events.

Can you think of a story that you’ve recently read that aptly uses a trope? I suppose the Fifty Shades trilogy relied on the trope of sexual bondage as both reward and punishment.

Any other stories?

Have you ever written a story that contained a trope? If so, pull up that story and see if the trope helped or hurt the story. If it helped, in what ways? Is it possible for its meaning to be strengthened? Are there more instances in which the trope can be utilized?

What is you’ve never played with the idea of a trope? Now might be the time to do so.

Think of an object that has multiple meanings or usages. Create a character for each meaning. Now bring the characters together and see what happens.

This will not be an easy task. Many wonderful books are written without a single trope. But at least you will have played with the idea.

Have fun with this one.

 

Character Strength

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Recently I had a bout of pneumonia, followed by an asthma attack. It has left me weak and tired. I am not able to do much in any given day.

This has led me to think about strength, in all its various forms.

Physical strength is what usually comes to mind first. It is a truth that some people are stronger than others. We hear stories about individuals who, in times of need, lift one end of a car up in the air. There are those who are required for a job to display prowess in a challenge, such as a rope course or an obstacle course in order to be accepted into the military, fire or police departments.

What about emotional strength? I’m the type who cries at anything. Cute kittens, cartoons, a love scene in a movie, all bring me to tears. But I am strong in that I have been able to overcome doubters, people who said I’d never graduate from college, or ones who doubted by husband’s love. I’ve stood up to bullies as a teen and as an adult.

But I’ve known individuals who backed down whenever threatened. Who refused to fight for their rights or speak up when denigrated by a boss.

Stop and think about one of your characters. What kind of strength does he/she have? There has to be something or your character will not be able to carry the weight of a story. No one wants to read about a weakling, a whiner, a defeatist.

Read a section of your story. Find instances where your character shows strength, or, if no strength exhibited, places where you can make slight changes to give your character the skills he/she needs to stand up to the world.

Rewrite a scene or two. Then reread. Do you sense the difference? How do you feel about your character now? If nothing changes, then rework the scene.

Have fun with this one.

Gender Awareness

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Gender has always been, and will continue to be, an important issue. Much has been said recently about workplace discrimination in terms or hiring, promoting, and paying.

Gender influences the way students are perceived and tracked. For example, there is an assumption that boys are better at math and science, girls at English and languages. While there are many examples in which this is disproved, teachers, parents and other students still cling to this stereotype.

Gender influences how we dress when we go to work, school and out in the public. There are perceived notions about what a boy wears and what a girl wears, and they are quite different.

At some point in your life you have encountered gender stereotypes, either as the recipient or the observer.

Your task is to write about a time in which you became aware of gender. For me, it was when I was a hot little girl who wanted nothing more than to take off my top like my brother had, and found, with a spanking, that it was unacceptable for me to be bare.

What about you? Try to tell the story with as much candor as possible, retaining the innocence that you held at the time. Include dialogue that might have taken place. Actions that you witnessed or that were imposed upon you. Things that you felt, heard, perceived even if no words were spoken.

Humor is okay if it is appropriate to the telling.

Work on this one. Be honest.

 

 

Characters Have Friends

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Just as in real life, our characters do not walk alone. At least interesting ones don’t. They must have someone they care about, someone to share ideas with, someone to go places with.

Friendships are developed over time, and if well-founded, can survive illness, an argument, and even separations caused by time and place.

Some people believe that you are who you are with, so choose friends for appearance, for stature, for success. For example, a teen who wants to be popular will seek out popular kids and attempt to befriend them. A business woman who wants a job in the tech field, will associate with other techies.

Your character’s world must be populated with friends as well as potential friends. A story in which interpersonal interactions are casual meetings, is an in-your-head story and might not be too appealing. The pace would be slow and tedious.

We must have conflict. Not punches and beatings, but words that force characters out of their shells and to face the situations that arise. Friends help to accomplish this.

For example, a middle grade student hates his teacher and so talks back and disrupts class. He ends up hanging with the tough kids, those that regularly defy authority. Imagine the trouble that ensues as the student finds himself more and more enmeshed in this group.

Your task is to take one of your stories and add in a close friendship. First decide the purpose of the relationship. Is it to become a love interest? A daring-do combative contest? A study partner with equal interests in college?

Once you’ve defined the purpose, then think about how the relationship factors into the story. Does the friend push the protagonist to new heights or drag him down? Does the friend want something out of the relationship that maybe the protagonist isn’t interested in at this time?

Rework your story, adding in the friend. Something has to happen. They have a fight or fall in love. They design new apps for cell phones or open an antique business. They go on a vacation together or rent an apartment.

Make things happen that drive the story along and add interest.

When you are finished, think about what has happened. Does the friendship enrich the story? Why or why not? If not, then go back and rewrite until it does.

Just remember that friendships count in the fiction world as well as in real life.

Have fun with this one.

What to do at Night?

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Our characters don’t just move around in the day time. And they don’t just curl up and go to sleep when the sun sets. They do things.

If they’re young enough, they might go to the park and hang out. They might go to parties, football games or visit friends.

As young adults, they might go to clubs and dance. Attend concerts and go to the theater. Dinners with friends and coworkers. Sit at home and cheer for favorite sports teams.

Once we have kids, activities center on gymnastics, swim lessons, school performances and religious functions. We go to playgrounds and parks. We hang out with couples with children, leaving behind single friends. We go to pot lucks at the swim club and monitor bingo as a fund raiser for the school.

And as we get even older, we settle down. Curl up with a good book at night. Watch TV. Go to movies on Senior Day. Lunch at the Senior Center.

We stay busy, well into the night. So when you write, make sure that your character has places to go and things to do.

Your task is to write a scene that takes place after school or after work. Surround your character with friends. Write engaging dialogue. Make things happen that are interesting to read. Be logical and realistic in your approach. When you are finished, reread and look for places to add detail that enriches the scene.

Have fun with this one.

Autobiographical Fiction

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When I was a small child, maybe three or four years old, my father worked at a union-based factory in Dayton, Ohio.

Every winter there was a huge party in which Santa came and distributed gifts, a large cake was shared and some type of entertainment kept the kids from getting into trouble. One such entertainer was the famous Sherry Lewis with her sock puppets. Another time it was a TV comic cowboy. My memories of the events are few and scattered, the bulk of them most likely built by stories told about me as I was growing up.

There are no pictures of the events for me to rely on, so if I chose to retell the stories, I would have to fabricate much of the setting and action.

We can use these stories to create original characters and situations, informed by the basis of those few facts stored in our memory.

Your task is to think of an event that occurred when you were quite small. If possible, pull out photos that take you back to that time and place. Then begin constructing a list.

Setting: where were you and what did it look like? Adding in your senses, what smells might there have been? What foods might have been served? Was it indoors or outside? In a house or apartment? Backyard, playground or school?

Appearance: your approximate age. Were you small compared to others your age, the same, or larger? Were you thin or heavy? Did you have short legs and arms or long? What color was your hair? How long was it? In what style did you wear it?

Clothing styles: In my story, I wore dresses, white socks turned down to create cuffs, and saddle shoes. What would you have been wearing? What was the fabric like? Scratchy? Stiff or soft from many washings. Threadbare or rich?

Characters: Who was present in your story? Brother or sister? Aunts or uncles? Grandparents? Parents? Outsiders, such as would be in my story, just people that my dad worked with. What did the principle characters look like? How did they behave toward you? Did they laugh at your funny ways or smirk? Chastise you or praise? Were they harsh or gentle?

Action: Every story must have action or it isn’t a story. So what happens? When you write, try to emphasize what makes it unique, original, interesting. Include conflict of some kind. Remember that there needs to be rising action, a series of events that lead to the climax. And, of course, resolution.

Tone: You have to choose whether your piece has a comic sense to it or whether it is a serious event. If comic, then your story has to be light, energetic and humorous. If serious, then there must be trauma of some kind that is resolved.

This will not be an easy task.

Have fun with this one.

Pet Ownership

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How many people do you know that currently own a pet or have had a pet in the past? I bet it’s a huge number!

People are funny about their pets. They talk to them as if they understand every word they use. They feed them premium food, often times, in the case of a poor senior citizen, better food than they eat themselves. Some dress their pets in fancy clothes and take them to fashion shows.

Some train their pets for protection, while others are looking for companionship. Many pets are like children, pampered and petted and loved.

But there are also cruel, inhuman owners who abuse and neglect their pets. They confine them to shabby, filthy, disgusting cages. Breed them and keep every last cat or dog until the house/apartment is so congested with animals that it’s impossible to keep clean. Some beat their animals, starve them, burn them  and then abandon them along highways, not caring if they get run over and killed.

Does your character currently own a pet? What kind and how is it treated?

One way to give hints as to a character’s personality is through pet ownership. For example, there is a woman in my neighborhood who walks her cat every day, wearing a halter and leash. Sometimes the cat is draped over the woman’s shoulders. It’s obvious from the way they interact with each other that there is love.

Your task is to write a pet into your story. First, decide what type of pet. Is it a tarantula or snake? That would repulse me. What about a hamster or guinea pig that escapes on a regular basis? That happened in our house.

If you select a dog, what breed and what is the purpose of the dog? How does the owner interact with the dog? Does he pet it often? Take it for walks? Brush and comb it? Let it share the bed or sleep on his lap?

Or is the dog kept outside no matter the weather? Given food in an indifferent manner? Allowed to roam the grounds with the expectation that it will bark, growl and attack an intruder?

You’ve got a lot to think about.

Have fun with this one.

Weather Affects Story

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This morning when I got up, a dense fog obliterated my view of the house across the street. If I had driven somewhere, it would have been perilous.

The fog reminded me that our characters’ lives are affected by weather. Some of them might live where it snows. They have to shovel their driveways clear, brush snow off their windshields and drive on slippery roads.

Other characters might live where there are torrential rains, tornadoes or hurricanes. Coming home from a shopping trip, their car might get swept away by roiling water or a tree limb might fall and crush the front end. A tornado might destroy houses and hurricanes might wash away miles of beach.

Huge waves batter the coast, causing cliffs to crumble and buildings to teeter preciously.

When we write, we need to take into consideration the elements of weather, which are determined by where our characters live.

My stories are always set in the west, in a place where it does not snow and our biggest potential disaster is an earthquake. Our temperatures are mild, our evenings usually comfortable as long as the fog comes in.

What about your stories? Reread one of your pieces, looking for places where descriptions of weather can influence behavior, actions, and even thoughts. Rewrite elements to add in how your character reacts to what goes on around him, what he thinks and how he feels.

When you are finished, reread again. Is your story richer? It should be. Because of these details, your readers will have a better image of where the story takes place.

Have fun with this one.

The First Step

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As the topic of a story is formulating in your mind, you must come up with the moral question. What is the probing question that the story is going to solve?

For example, in a coming-of-age story about a teenager who desires to be included in the popular group, the question might be “How do you join a group when you are seen to be an outsider?”

This quest for an answer drives the character’s motivation throughout the story. At the end, either the protagonist is now a part of that group, or has come to an epiphany that membership is not what she really wants. And why.

What if the main character sees an injustice in society at large and wants to correct it. The driving moral question would be “How do I motivate others to help me in this quest and what steps do I need to take to make things right?’

Perhaps the character sees poor kids going hungry in school which impacts their ability to learn. How will the protagonist provide healthy meals on a consistent basis?

Another part of the question is motivation. What happened to the protagonist that made her aware of the problem/issue? Why does she feel she is the one to correct the situation? What knowledge or experiences does she have that allows her to be the organizer?

Your task is to create a situation in which your character has a burning moral question that he is compelled to satisfy. First, define the question. Then make a list of possible solutions.

Establish the society in which the character lives, works, plays. Put things in motion and see what happens.

When you are finished, reread what you have written. If you are satisfied as a reader, great. If not, what changes need to be implemented to bring fulfillment?

Have fun with this one.

Writing About Someone You Know

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Often we are fearful about writing the stories of real people. We’re terrified that if we tell the truth, they will sue us/hate us/avoid us/never speak to us again.

It is correct that we should be concerned. Libel is a crime that could cost you real dollars and possibly damage your reputation as a writer.

So what do you do when Aunt Tilly’s story is too good to be silent? You create a persona who is like your aunt, but different. Your character doesn’t look like Tilly, doesn’t talk like her or walk like her. Her life experiences have not been the same. She hasn’t lived in the same house or attended the same schools.

Even the story is changed somewhat, just enough to protect the identity or your aunt.

Instead of walking on the beach in New Jersey when she found a seashell that reminded her of her late husband, she’s walking through the forests of northern California when she discovers an old journal half-buried under a pile of leaves.

Whereas the shell reminded her of a lovely vacation she shared with family and a few close friends, the journal speaks of love and loss.

Your task is to pull from your memory a person that you knew well. This person had an interesting life in which he traveled the country/world, visited unusual places, saw amazing sights, and experienced an event that changed his perspective/brought joy/introduced new hobbies.

Alter the person so that he is not recognizable, then write. Tell this new character’s story in an interesting way. Make him funny or crass. Place him in the midst of turmoil, either emotional or physical. Give him people to talk to and write the dialogue that ensues.

When you are finished, go back and reread. Find the places where you can add detail that enriches the story. Search for places where telling slows pace, and where the pace can be increased in order to build tension.

Make sure that your character wants something and that there are impediments in his way.

There are the things that make for an interesting story.

Have fun with this one.