If you’re just jumping on board, you might want to read last week’s prompt where I discussed one method of building characters for your stories.

This week, we’ll use the same method for coming up with some interesting situations to put them in: a bone for your muse, so to speak.

Here’s Your Prompt:

As you did last week, divide a sheet of paper into thirds and label the first third, “Article of Clothing/Weapon/Random Object,” label the second, “Event or Action,” and label the third, “Emotion, Feeling or Mood.”

(If we were in grade school, I’d make you fold the paper into the three sections, and complete each column before moving on to the next. But you can do this anyway you want. However, I caution against writing across the row, because it’s too easy to come up with hackneyed situations, for example: bouquet, a wedding, happiness. Yuk!)

The first column should be filled with words or phrases such as: chain mail armor, dagger, persimmon.

If you’re having trouble coming up with words on the list, try the Random Noun Generator, which lists up to 10 words at a time. (Not all of them are nouns, unfortunately. You may need to push the generate button a few times to get enough words for your lists.) But do try on you own at first, it’s always good practice to think!

Seventh Sanctum has a Random Weapon Generator, but the weapons are fictional. You’ve got to decide what they do.

The second column should list words such as: “the wedding of the century,” “someone sneezed,” “a robbery,” “a car broke down,” etc.

The third column should be filled with emotions, feelings and moods, such as: mad, happy, glad, forlorn. Try to find some nuances among these, instead of sticking with the mundane. If all you can think of are “the usual,” write down the first ten (10) on a different sheet of paper, and then toss it out. Dig deep into your mind.

Now comes the fun part: choose one item from each column (and never more than one item from each row). You’ll use these to write a scene with the character you created last week.

For a true sense of randomness, use a random number generator from Random.com to pick the item from each column.

I suggest, however, that you choose the event or action which will most upset your character. Conflict will make the scene much more dramatic.

A point of note: I used quotes around the phrase “Good Characters” in the title because I mean good in the sense of well crafted, rather than meaning a goody-goody character. Similarly, “bad” in the title means “unfortunate for your character” rather than (necessarily) dire.

So, your (well-crafted) pre-teen gang member might hate to attend that wedding of the century, or worse, be a bridesmaid.

Once you’ve picked from each column, write the scene described with your character.

I couldn’t decide whether to quote Hemingway or Twain, when it comes to discussing characters.

“A writer should create living people; people, not characters. A character is a caricature.”
~Ernest Hemingway

Hemingway gets right to the heart of it, but Twain’s irreverence takes it a step further: echoing Hemingway’s thoughts, but noting also that it’s what authors do with those characters that makes us want to keep on reading.

“The test of any good fiction is that you should care something for the characters; the good to succeed, the bad to fail. The trouble with most fiction is that you want them all to land in hell, together, as quickly as possible.”
~Mark Twain

Twain’s right: We want to see those characters bound in figurative chains, writhing in agony, in whatever cesspit of a situation that will make them the angriest, or saddest, or vengeful. That makes good reading.

Characters are more than their eye color, how they dress, and their physique. So, to write a great story, we’ve got to get into the psyche of the character, know his loves and hates, what makes him tick and how he’ll react, and then expose him to the very flames which will make him twist.

When you know your character well, you’ll find story and plot ideas will leap out of the knowledge, begging to be written.

Here’s Your Prompt:

Build a character by identifying traits, phrases and situations which can be mixed and matched. Divide a piece of paper into thirds and write “Adjective” at the top of the first column, “Person or Profession” at the top of the second, and “Phrase or Situation” at the top of the third.

My example:

The tendency is to write across the page, filling out the row…but I urge you to fill in the columns instead. It’s too easy (see my belligerent teenager? My lonely middle-aged woman?) to come up with ‘cardboard’ characters while filling in the blanks.

While you’re at it, choose some interesting adjectives and situations. Challenge yourself to find words and labels beyond the ordinary.

Do you write in a particular genre? Then choose appropriate words and situations. If you write fantasy, stay away from the mundane. Include wizards and gremlins and dragons on the page. Sci-fi? Add some interplanetary locales or some phrases based on future tech. Victorian romance? You get the idea…

Write to the bottom of the page, more if you can. Do the same, even if you’re typing. The more options you have the better.

Once you’re done, choose an item from each column and meet your new character. Try unusual pairings to see what you can come up with. At no time can you use any two (or three!) items from the same line.

Write a few sentences about your new character. Why is the middle-aged woman venomous? How did a teenager from (fill in the blank) get lost in Detroit City? Decide how your character got to be this way: give him or her a little back story. Judging from that, what are your characters likes and dislikes?

Next week: we’ll find some awful situations to put your characters in!

Happy Autumnal Equinox!

Today is the first day of Fall, my favorite season.

I love crisp weather, the smell of woodsmoke, and the changing of the leaves. I’m also a big fan of shorter days and longer nights. (I love the night!) And, I can’t wait to wear all those things I’ve been knitting.

I love fall colors…crisp, red apples; heavy, orange pumpkins; papery, yellow leaves.

Summer is a shadow — a watered down step-sister — of her vibrant kin Autumn, and I’m glad she’s moving on.

Fall is rich in sights and sounds that just aren’t as available in the summer months. It’s like Mother Nature turns a switch and suddenly, instead of these hazy, lazy, sultry days, we’ve got sound and motion when the wind rattles dried leaves still on the branches; and, we’ve got rich color in pumpkins and gourds and mums; and we’re bombarded by the perfume of pie, and wood smoke, and simmering stew and baked turkey.

Yum! Autumn is a hedonist’s delight!

Here’s Your Prompt:

A veritable cornucopia of writing prompt ideas…

• Write an essay about something you did or remember during the Fall when you were growing up — something you have strong feelings about, good or bad: raking leaves, carving pumpkins, sneaking cigarettes outside in the cold, a bonfire, a family get together.
   
• Word Association: Harvest time. Falling leaves. Corn mazes. Acorns. Pumpkins. Scarecrows. Hay rides. Halloween. Haunted Houses. Thanksgiving.
   
• Tell a ghost story: one you’ve made up, or one you or someone you know has experienced.
   
• Imagine that you (or your character) is forced to live outside though Fall and Winter. How would you survive? What would be the worst part about it?
   
• Write about the changing of the seasons. How they affect you or your characters. What’s bad about the change? Or good? What if the season never changed?
   
• Write about your favorite season. Why is it your favorite? what makes it better than all the others?
   
• Write about your least-favorite season. Why do you dislike it? what makes it the worst time of year?
   

Haiku is a form of Japanese poetry consisting of (usually) one stanza of verse.

Traditionally, the first and last lines contain 5 syllables and the second line contains 7.

More strictly:

The soul of a haiku poem is a “cutting” word – which separates two ideas – but also shows how the two ideas are related.

Most pre-19th century Haiku also contain a “kiro” – a seasonal reference in the poem. These kiro come from a strict, delineated list of words, mostly references to nature (which made some folks mistakenly conclude that all Haiku are written about nature.)

Finally, traditional Haiku are written vertically, instead of horizontally. (I love the visual appeal of words tumbling down the page.)

Here’s Your Prompt:

We’re not going to be strict today. Simply write a haiku of three lines, containing 5, 7, and 5 syllables (in that order). Write it about some recent event or something you feel strongly about.

Bonus points if you post in the comments!

Here’s mine:

Displaced, dispossessed
No office to call my own.
It rained in the house.

 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The image used above comes from the website Alice nel paese delle gozzoviglie.. It also contains the translation in English.

A drabble is a 100-word story, not including the title, which can be up to 15 words. (Here, you can read about the history of drabbles.)

When I was an editor at NFG Magazine, we published a similar bit of flash fiction in the form of a contest: 69ers – short stories of exactly 69 words, including the title. (Here, you can read all the 69ers published by NFG.)

(Until Twitter came along, these were the ultimate in Flash Fiction.)

Here’s Your Prompt:

Write a drabble or a 69er. Stick with their respective rules: if you write a drabble, it must be exactly 100 words and can include a title of 15 words or less. If you write a 69er, the title (required!) must be counted in the 69 words.

Need a plot to get started? Here are some nifty plot generators:

• Archetype’s Plot Scenario Generator
• Seventh Sanctum’s Story Generator (My favorite!)
• The PLOT-O-MATIC™ Script Generator