Your Prompts and Tips
Some free resources to help you write better and achieve the success you deserve
This is a selection we've harvested from our archives, RELOAD THE PAGE for more!
Prompts:
1. Write a few pages in which an aspect of a character’s life correlates with increasing warm weather. For example, as temperatures rise, so does the number in the character’s bank account. How hot will it get?
2. Spring is a time of rebirth, and this a popular theme for writers. Write a few pages about a character who experiences a change of heart that causes them to be, in a sense, emotionally reborn.
3. Write a few pages in which two characters, who are vastly different and not particularly fond of the other person, get “trapped” somewhere—at a snowed-in cabin or an accidentally locked closet at work, for example—and start to see the other in a different light.
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Tips:
1. Know the rules before you break them! Or as Dorothy Parker once said, "If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to tell them to quit now, while they’re happy.
2. We joke about the cliché of a psychologist asking “How does that make you feel?” but it’s valuable to take stock of how a story makes you feel. Since emotions can be complicated in the world of stories and real life, oftentimes it’s a mixed bag. Do you think the writer intended for you to feel that way?
3. Whether it’s a new word, a different perspective on a life experience, or a writing technique we haven’t used before, every story has something to teach us. It is good practice to think of yourself as a student anytime you read. Always think about what you can take away and apply back to your own writing to make it stronger.
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TO DO LIST:
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SCRATCHPAD:
Cache your gems as they fall in this always accessible place.
PRIVATE JOURNAL:
Reflect on your process — good, bad and ugly — in your dated diary.
TRACKING:
Measure your progress with key writing metrics, automatically,
TO DO LIST:
Add tasks to your sortable list, then revel in checking them off.
SCRATCHPAD:
Cache your gems as they fall in this always accessible place.
PRIVATE JOURNAL:
Reflect on your process — good, bad and ugly — in your dated diary.
TRACKING:
Measure your progress with key writing metrics, automatically,
ADD DO
Show Dones
Metric:
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Words
Minutes
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