Prompt for Sept 13

Mickey didn't like his supper

Lizzie's response is fabulous. I'm asking her to post it.

Back At It

We're back to school work and 9-year-old Sam is trying to qualify for homeschooling this month. So we're doing 30 minute writes again. In Sam's case, he's dictating while I scribe his story. He has writing practice separately. I'm astonished at the creativity and flow of his stories. So we're posting again.

Oh, and Meg's response to the first writing prompt was surprising in another way. Yikes. I never guessed my sweet Meg would be so good at horror.

First prompt, from Sept 12, 2012 was: My dog buried a bone in the back yard.

Here's Sam's response:

Dear Journal,

My dog buried a bone in the back yard while we were looking for dinosaur bones.

"Snoopy," I said, "You're supposed to put that in the bowl." Then I realized it was a turkey bone, and I said, "Oh. You found that from the table. You can keep it."

Snoopy barked something and I'm pretty good at understanding animals. I said, "Perfect idea. We'll dig to China! Wait, Snoopy. That was a lame idea. How on earth could we dig to China in one day?"

All of a sudden, we heard a loud noise: Beep, beep, beep, beep. It was a tractor. Before I could say another word, Snoopy ran as fast as light and pushed the driver off the seat and onto the road. He was knocked out.

"Well," my best friend Will said, "we have a tractor and your parents are gone... so... let's not let it go to waste. All in favour, raise your hand."

Snoopy raised a paw, Will raised his hand, Russell raised his, and at last I raised mine.

I walked over to Will and said, "My parents are going to get me busted."

"I guess so... but not if we're in China," Will said.

"Does anybody know how to work this thing?" Russell asked.

Snoopy started jumping up and down. Before anybody could say, "No, Snoopy," he got on the tractor and started digging.

Russell pointed at ta big long digging tool and said, "We could use that instead of the shovel tool."

Snoopy drilled about six holes in the chimney before he got it aimed in the right direction. Russell decided that he should do it instead, but he was a little short. He accidentally drilled a hole in the dining room. So Will tried. Will was absolutely perfect except he didn't know where the brakes were. By the time he found the brakes, the house was in ruins. It looked like an atom bomb had just fallen on it.

There was one problem though. Right before Will found the brakes, he accidentally smashed Dad's new Lamborghini and Mom's new Jeep.

I decided it was my turn, so I jumped into the tractor and did it perfectly.

"At least your parents aren't coming home 'til tomorrow morning," Russell said.

"Yeah. Pretty good thing."

All of a sudden, the drill stopped drilling and we felt a nice, cold breeze from night. We had made it to China. But we figured out it was actually Snoopy's cold breath breathing on us. Apparently he had just eaten frozen fish from the shop.

"Bad Snoopy," I said. "You know you're not supposed to eat frozen fish from the shop."

"Ruff!" Snoopy said.

"Well, you're right. We're not supposed to dig to China with a stolen tractor, either."

"Why did the drill stop drilling though, "Will asked.

Russell looked. "It looks like Snoopy found a piece of a sausage on the brakes and lied on them and started eating it."

"Well, let's get back to work. China's not gonna dig itself down," Will said.

All of a sudden, we heard a loud noise. "It's the sound of our car that's not broken. I'm busted," I said.

"What kind of a car?" Will said.

"Oh, a rusted old truck."

"I wish we broke that instead of the Lamborghini and Jeep," Will said.

"Well, my parents are already thinking of taking it to the junkyard and having it smashed," I said.

"Probably not anymore. That's your only car left."

"Rrrr! Rrrr! Rrrr!"

"No, we can't hurry and dig to China. We've only dug 20 feet."

"Rrr. Rrr. Rrrr."

"You don't have super paws that will help us."

"Roo!"

"Do not..."

"Girls, girls! You're both pretty! We have to do something about this," Will said.

"Yes you do, young men!"

"Mom and Dad!"

"Hello son, or should we call you 'Destroyer of the Home'?"

Snoopy, Russell and Will all pointed at me and blabbered on about how it was all my fault. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blech.

Please make them stop!

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blech.

Love,

Sam.

*Poke* Prompts?

Ehem... So I'm not sure I'm technically allowed to do this, but since it's been awhile since the last prompt, I thought I'd suggest a new one - if that's alright.

My roommate showed me this very interesting book a few weeks ago called The Mysteries of Harris Burdick.

In the introduction, it says that a man named Harris Burdick came to the publisher with a set of drawings. "I've got a story planned out for each of these drawings. Would you publish them?" the man asked. The publisher took a look at the set. Each page had an odd picture, a title and one line of a story. He was intrigued. He agreed to publish Harris Burdick's stories. Burdick left the pictures with the publisher and went away to write the stories, but never was to be seen again. Eventually, years later, the publisher decided to publish the pictures without the stories.

So, my idea for a writing prompt is this. I'll post below the links to a few of the pictures, and then we can all choose one to write about. Sound good?

Picture one: Mr. Linden's Library. "He had warned her about the book. Now it was too late."

Picture two: The Third Floor Bedroom. "It all began when someone left the window open."

Picture three: The Seven Chairs. "The fifth one ended up in France."

If you guys like this idea, we might do some of the other illustrations as well.

On Love

First off, there's still an hour to win an ARC of ENDLESSLY by entering a love poem at Kiersten White's blog here: http://kierstenwrites.blogspot.com/2012/02/very-lovely-contest.html?commentPage=2

Then, writing prompt for today is Britney Spears' "Oops I Did It Again." Prompt chosen because somebody has already written a fabulous piece prompted by that song, and I'm hoping she'll post it here. Really fabulous. Character voice is bang-on and infuriating, kind of like the voice in My Last Duchess.

Show and tell... or don't tell

Today's exercise from Seize the Story is to help develop vivid character pictures. It's a three part exercise:
1. Write a one-line description of a professional boxer without calling him or her a boxer.
2. Write a two-sentence description of a dancer without calling him or her a dancer.
3. Write a three-sentence description of a burglar without calling him or her a burglar.

My addition: these characters are not engaging in their jobs at the time you describe them. They are at the community Christmas buffet.

Shoes

One truth we all need to recognize is that small things make up the big picture. And each of these have a place in which they belong. In order for this experiment to work, you must not read ahead.

1. Free write for about 15 minutes. (you can choose the topic)

2. Go through your writing and edit anything that doesn't flow like it should, until your left with a piece of writing you wouldn't mind showing to your worst enemy.

3. Remind yourself that you're a good boy/girl, and would never, ever skip ahead.

4. Replace six plural nouns with the word "shoes".

5. You may now rewrite those sentences with a substituted word in attempt to make it make sense, but only those sentences which have had a word replaced.

Notice how the story no longer makes any sense, no matter how hard you tried. This is a rather obvious example of the role that good vocabulary plays in both your plot and diction.

Seize the Story

For the next little while, I'll be posting writing prompts taken from Victoria Hanley's Seize the Story. We bought two copies of this book, because one isn't enough for the aspiring writers in our home. I noticed great growth in Sarah's and Meg's writing thanks to this book, which is why I am now going through the exercises myself. (Because, frankly, it's a little humbling to do Nano with your daughters and discover to your delight and distress that they are now writing experts and you, gasp, need to work on it).

When I'm done these exercises, I plan to listen to Brandon Sanderson and others' podcast Writing Excuses, because, again, it's been so good for Sarah and Meg. But first, today's exercise.

So, from Seize the Story, today's prompt is:

Think of something you wish you had the nerve to say. Now imagine a character who could easily say this thing you can't. Think about the character for a few minutes. Try to see him/her with your mind's eye. Now interview him or her. Like you would if you were a talk-show host. You don't have to ask him/her about that thing you wish you could say, because, of course, then we would all know what you're wishing you could say and that might be personal. Probably is. Or you would have no trouble saying it. Just ask them whatever you want. Get to know them. For 1/2 an hour. Post the interview here.