Do you have a favorite prompt or one you made on your own  jump starts your  creative juices and stimulates your writing muse? 

Oneword.com. is used by many writers.
From their home page:
Oneword.com wrote:sim­ple. you’ll see one word at the top of the fol­low­ing screen.
you have sixty sec­onds to write about it.
click ‘go’ and the page will load with the cur­sor in place.
don’t think. just write.

What prompts me to write: 
I don't turn to words for prompts. 
Remembering August 2010 was the first time since primary school that I have written fiction so I am no expert in how to write fiction, this is just what works for me.

 I use life experience as the prompt for all writing.

If I am not getting at least a dozen ideas a day it would mean I am not out there, experiencing life enough. 

If I feel stale and lack ideas at any stage, that's exactly what I do, put on the joggers or grab the car keys and get out there,  I listen to people talk wherever I go, I'm interested in people's stories, interested in life, past and present history.  Then once I choose a starting point from life, workout how I will change it from fact if writing fiction, I have all the prompt I need. 

For my reference nonfiction prompts I just go for a walk or drive and write about what I see and experience. 

All my blogging and booklet nonfiction is life experience.

My fiction writing ideas come easily because I am a late starter, I had been 'gunna-do-it', for 50 years so I already have 50 years of ideas stored away unwitting down, in my brain. It was getting a little crowded in there, about 5 novels waiting to come out, lol, I don't feel I need any site prompts, for the fiction I am going to draw on what has been an interesting and unusual life and just change and mix up the times places and people and learn how to make the characters larger than life so it's impossible to identify the actual life event that prompts me.

Whenever I read, what to write about chapters, in how to write books, most suggest writing about things you feel passionately about, and I guess I have a lot of opinions and passions about life, sensitive and emotional feelings and that is what I threw into my short story .
Unless that story drops a clanger when others read it, and the response so far has been good from most sources, that will be the way I write my novel, ‘Secret’, at the end of this year, drawing from life on an emotional and physical level but the characters themselves, fictitious.

 

I have had one full night sleep  since I submitted my fiction short story to the editor, managed a little of the backlog of house work this morning, and enjoyed catching up with a couple of blogs tonight and I gave my first art class in my Mooroopna studio this afternoon.

While I loved the writing experience it was very full on and I am going to enjoy catching up with other aspects of life during September and not starting my novel ‘secret’, until November when I join in with the thousand or more writers who take part in the November National Novel Writing Month, NaNoWriMo . I am setting a goal to be one of the winners. J

Tomorrow I have to submit my tally and I am sure I will be declared one of the winners of AUGNO, they had 50 worldwide winners last year and hope to get 75 this year.

My next writing plan is to work on some more nonfiction. I want to complete some more drawing and painting lessons for beginners and have these lessons available through my web sites.   So back to my comfort zone of art and nonfiction for a while.

 

With the rush is over, to complete my story for the Anthology Book being produced to showcase 30, AugNo – August Novel Writing Month, authors,  I am reflecting  for a moment.

What part of writing the short story made me want to tear my hair out?



The hardest part for me was breaking free of writing as the nonfiction writer, in a narrative style and changing to writing in the first person getting my past and present tense correct. Writing at an emotional, what is happening in my protagonist's mind and the actions level rather than just describing the surroundings in an impersonal way. I was dealing with dramatic tensions of emotions I had never put into words before and found myself writing through tears as I described the pain and highs of the protagonist. 

 

So in summery the hardest thing was the general shit from nonfiction to fiction style of writing.   The entire change to fiction from nonfiction raises problems as I am know as an nonfiction writer  therefore many people are assuming all of my work is fact.  In some ways I should take this as a compliment as it indicates that my characters are totally believable.

 

Set Free, my 9.300 word  realist fiction – Short story will be published through Amason as 2010 Anthology.

What part of the writing process do you find the hardest?


 

How arrogant I was on the 17th of this month to have written in my last blog post here, ‘I have finished the short story.’ 
My story is in a mess, but once finished it will be a so much better, I will have learned so much. 

 I am realizing that in one years’ time, I will most likely be embarrassed to read it,  if I learn as fast over the next few months as I have learned, during the last few days as a result of sharing the story with friends and asking for constructive criticism.

I have been guided to use more dialogue, been shown my excess of repetition of words and commas and excessive long sentences. Wise words from fiends, helped me summarize what my writing is about.

Switching point of view mid way in a sciene is a mistake I am making, so editing is required. 
There is so much information, I need to learn. What wonderful friends to have shown me this.   

There are lots of books I can reference, even web programs and tonight trying to knock this point of view into shape, once and for all I found  this excellent example of writing in first person point of view.

So Click here -> Me Myself, I, to read Me, Myself and I: Writing First Person Point of View by Cheryl Wright.
 
I hope you find it as helpful as I did.

 

I have finished the short story I am writing as one of thirty writers, to be published in an August, WriMo Anthology, through Amason Books. It was exciting making the final selection and seeing there is a waiting list of writers wanting my spot if I do not make the deadline of Friday delivery-Yikes that's tomorrow.  I will make the deadline. Life goes on around you even when you are trying to fully concentrate on meeting a publisher’s deadline and I needed to stop and organize door hardware when the handle came off our back door in my hand.

After writing a lot of words, too many for a short story and thinking I would need to go through and do an abbreviated version, I decided i did not want to shorted that story, but turn it into a novel.  lol, now that is two novels I have in planning stage. 

So yesterday morning, at around 9am, I started again from scratch writing and editing chapters as I went, though until 3am and I have completed the full story.  I even managed to get myself out of my comfort area in writing and wrote about a topic I previously have been unable to structure into written words, one of those things I could only verbally tell, in the past.  OK, lol, so the old lady has handled the towels dropping to the floor and the naked love making bit, he-he, never too old to learn ;-) and it worked well in my story, more for humour than for sensualist pleasures :-).   Humour being one of the skills as a writer I am striving to learn.

I have submitter the story for proof reading to another writer, one I admire (thank you Carol Willis) and I am now going back though my story and changing more of the narrative to dialogue. Dialogue is another of the aspects of writing that I need to work on if I am to master becoming a novelist.   

My focus for today, is to bring the short story up to where I feel happy with it, to where I have edited as far as I can go, then I will resubmit it for comment to a couple more of my trusted friends, allowing myself time for a final rework if I feel after hearing their opinion, that ,my short story needs more work.  I believe I will have a short story, I am pleased with, ready to submit for publication by the 20th of August.

I do not know for sure the final word count.  It will be over 5,000 and less that 10,000 words.  I do not intend to pad it with words for the sake of word count, I would prefer to leave readers interested in coming back to read the next short story about the adventures of the heroes of my story.  I think my couple, Jane and Bill, would already like to go on another adventure, lol :-), maybe for the next AUGNO August Novel Writing Month.
 

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I picked a new reference book, Will Write for Shoes, How to write a Chick Lit Novel, by Cathy Yardley, and found it as uninteresting to me as, chick lit.   The wonder is why I ever thought I would be excited by a reference book about a genre that does not interest me.  I guess I was trying to broaden my writing horizons, lol, I will return to doing what I do best and letting the others do the rest.  If you love Sex in the City or Bridget Jones Diary, and want to write in this genre they now call, chick lit, this book might suit you. 


I have one brand new copy of Will Write for Shoes, How to write a Chick Lit Novel, by Cathy Yardley that does not interest me,  that I might pass on to another family member which is at that ‘certain age’, and does have a writers talent and absolutely adores Bridget Jones Diaries, movies. I have four grandchildren, two of them are great writers, for their age group and the eldest girl is writing novels already while her friends are writing Halloween invitations and I love having a younger novelist in the family to encourage


For those interested in this genre, I bought this book through fishpond; see the link in my side bar. I find them fantastic to order books through. This one is not a bad book, it has a lot of good general writing information in it, it is just that I will have that information covered in other writing books. I should have recognised this book was not for me by the books cover, (yes you should judge a book by its cover in this case),  lol, I don’t ‘do’, lolly pink or high heels.

What fishpond says about this book.:-

Based on years of teaching about commercial women's fiction, this definitive guide provides invaluable advice and step-by-step methods for writing and selling a successful chick-lit novel. This title includes features such as: the history of chick-lit; a blueprint for writing a chick lit novel; new trends in the genre; and, tips and tools for breaking into the market. Complete with a directory of agents and publishers who acquire chick lit, "Will Write for Shoes" is a must-have for all women who want to write a chick lit novel!

 

Now I know why, when you begin to write the first draft of your novel you should not edit, just keep moving forward and allow the creativity to flow until you type, ‘The End’.   Then take a break, and then you can edit up to 300 times.

 

I just condensed chapters one and the unfinished chapter two into the one chapter, edited it and submitted it to two very trusted friends and writers for a proof read and suddenly I am overcome with analysis paralysis and I am thinking I have written the new world's words worst opening line and I keep anxiously checking my email to see if my friends think I should kill the novel or the heroine/hero before the end of chapter two. Lol J.

 

So what should I do?

 

Listen to the advice of the expert and my own knowledge as an artist. View the work as a large project, view it in its entirety, and move on and work over the entire project, do not stop and fiddle in any one area.  Time enough, to fiddle at the end.

 

In painting, this is the difference between the amateur and the professional. The amateur wants to work tight and do the detail at the beginning, the professional does broad confident loose large brushwork block ins.  Yes, I can do this, I can stop focusing in one small spot in the painting (I mean short story), lol, I can quit with the crippling analysis paralysis and move on. J.  We are all able to write.

 

This is how I teach people to paint and it is how I am teaching myself to write novels.
 

1/ Plan the work.

 

2/ Block the work in loosely.

 

3/. Refine and correct.

 

4/ Detail the work.

 

I know if I stick to that order of progression, stay confident, believe ‘I can do it’, my stories will work.  I hope I can inspire others to give their story writing a voice too. J.

 

Why do you write?

The question has been asked, on the AugNo forum, Why? There must be a reason that you are so fanatically devoted to something that might not even result in any sort of "profit".  Even if you do sell your work, you do not even get that much money (unless you are a genius or just plain lucky). Certainly, not enough money, to pay all the bills. 

I am looking forward to breaking away from only writing nonfiction and doing review work for vga cables and the like and trying my hand at writing fiction.


Why do I write?

*I am writing in memory of my mother.

I write because all my mother’s life she was ‘gunna’ write a novel and she could have written a great one, she had a lot of talent and a lot to say.

*I am writing to keep a promise to myself and achieve creative fulfilment.

From the age of 13, half a century ago, I have been ‘gunna’, write a novel and also have enough stories in me for 5 full length novels and have a rough diamond writers talent just waiting to polish up.

*I am writing to help my award winning essay-writing daughter, remember her childhood dreams.

Because one of my daughters as a child was ‘gunna’ write a novel and has lost, all interest and she tells me, ‘any memory of wanting to be a writer,’ now she is an adult.

*I am writing, to keep my non-writing daughter, proud of me.

My youngest daughter is encouraging her daughter and me to write a novel. I do not want her to see her mum as a ‘gunna doer’, I know she wants to see me lift myself out of the loss of my artist’s career and the closure of my art gallery business, due to her father, my husband, developing frontal lobe degeneration and requiring my care. She loves me regardless of my creative career status but I feel her pride in me when I am achieving and I know this brings her as well as me, joy and I will not let her down.  Setting the example that I follow through and achieving a stated goal, is the least I can do for her to reward her for her faith in me.

*I am writing to inspire my grandchildren, encourage them to reach for the stars.

Because I have two talented grandchildren who are ‘gunna’, be writers, one writes short stories.

*I am writing in appreciation of those writing skills my sister has shared with me.

Because my sister has been a professional writer for half a century, though like myself, up until now, a nonfiction writer, not a novelist.

*I am writing because I have succeeded in nonfiction writing and I am ready for the challenge of climbing (writing a novel) Mont Everest.

Because I am now a (lol poorly paid) writer of reviews, advertising, published essays and booklets’, and it is about time I broke this personal and family cycle, of; gunna-dooers, it is not about income it is about the creative satisfaction. “WE CAN DO IT”


Why do you write?

I would love to hear your reasons in the comments section :-) “WE CAN ALL DO IT”