PROMPT:

• You’re on your way to a perfectly ordinary day at work when suddenly a sign looms up before you that says “Road Closed.” You’re forced to take an unmarked detour down an unfamiliar road that seems unusually devoid of traffic. Is it an ordinary short cut, or is something more ominous going on? What awaits you around the next corner? Will the pavement suddenly and inexplicably end? Have you crossed into the proverbial twilight zone? 
• Create your own mythos– H.P. Lovecraft did it with Cthulhu and the elder gods, and others have done it since (like Alan Campbell and the mythos of Ulcis and Labyrinths that rises out of the novel “Scar Night” or the Faith of Yevon from Final Fantasy X.) Write the stories that tie the gods, goddesses and other aspects of divinity and faith together for an entire people, then make a series of short stories (or even just one, like a creation story) out of them, almost as if you were the chief historian or head theologian dedicated to the preservation of all knowledge associated with this interesting and unique faith.
• Go somewhere that there are people, but not too many people (like a coffee shop, a class room, an airport terminal, an airplane, a business meeting, etc.) and then imagine that you (and the people around you) are suddenly the only people left on Earth. How does the story unfold? Do you all survive? Does someone die? What happens to this last, tiny fragment of the human race? Are there, by some freak miracle, others in similar situations lost in distant corners of the globe?
•  Craft a speech. It could be a future politician’s rallying cry, the war plans of a freedom fighter operating out of the underground, or the lost words of some hero (or villain) from the past. Make it real, make it crisp, make it strong and full of power augmented by whatever emotion the “speaker” is trying to convey, whether it be anger, pride, or a solemn sadness.
• Write a story about a place that comes into existence only once every hundred years or on some other rare basis, presenting itself as mythical and meaningful whenever it appears. It could be a restaurant, an island, a bar, an outhouse, or anything else. The person (or people) that encounter it can be oblivious tourists totally unaware of the majesty of it all, someone actively hunting for this mythical place, or anything in between. Make the place unique, give it character, make it stand out.
• Write a story that incorporates ideas or things that seem fantastically outside the norm of reality (like trees of glass and crystal that live and grow, or men and women that exist in a state of pure plasma.) What is life like in this new reality? What is different? What is the same? Be creative, and feel free to let your mind go places it would normally fear to tread.
• Write a story (though it could take the form of a mock interview or anything else) where the main character (even if [especially if!] it’s the narrator) is clearly under the influence of some kind of drug. It could be a hallucinogen, sodium pentothal (truth serum), some illegal substance, or even just a heavy dose of something prescribed by a doctor, but get creative with it. Cast the light on its effects, how it feels to be under its influence, and describe what the character sees that’s different or isn’t there (if anything.)
• In contrast (or perhaps in comparison) write a story where the main character is at the mercy of some kind of multiple personality disorder. He/she could be like a collective of souls, the victim of a botched possession, a simple psychotic, or anything else you can think of. Get creative. 
• Write a story where a dark secret in a character’s past comes back to haunt them. It could be anything from the blatant closet skeleton of a murder to something much more subtle and much more on the direct, everyday, human level. Whatever it is, make it real enough (no matter how fantastic it is) that the reader really feels it, really understands the haunting nature of it.

[credit:] earlswynn.hubpages.com

PROMPT(s):

• A man who can see ghosts voluntarily checks himself into an institute. Little does he know, that institute has been closed for thirty years.
• A young girl has dreams of a dragon. In one of the dreams, the dragon says "you made me". The girl, so obsessed with the idea of dragons now, grows up to be some sort of genetic scientist that can actually create & hatch a baby dragon.
• A family of five is driving across the desert on their way to vacation in California. They get lost, then the car breaks down in the middle of nowhere. The cell phone is dead and the sun is setting. The kids are hot, tired, and hungry. Mom is scared and frazzled. Dad, a mid-level sales manager with no survival skills, is frustrated and angry. An animal howls in the distance.
• The only thing that Daniel ever wanted was to be a musician. He loved playing piano more than anything in the world. But after his mom and brother died in a car accident, Daniel’s dad insisted he become active in sports and drop the music. And being active wasn’t enough. He had to be captain of the team or suffer through endless jibes and insults that his father uttered through a beer-induced haze. Then, on his eighteenth birthday, a delivery man brings him a piano, and tells the boy that it’s from his father.
• The sky is laden with dark clouds and the land is buried under a blanket of pale, gray snow. The ground, the streams, and the lakes are frozen and the whole world is eerily quiet and still. It’s the perfect day for . . .
• You’re flying somewhere — anywhere — but when your plane lands, you and the other passengers quickly realize you didn’t reach your intended destination. In fact, you’ve arrived in a strange, wondrous (or terrible) world that you never knew existed.
• On the first day of school, two best friends discover a terrifying secret about one of their new teachers.
• It’s a great time of year for a garage sale. You can have one of your own or take a Saturday to tour all the sales in your neighborhood. Maybe you’ll find a unique treasure with special qualities.
• All the kids are looking forward to the winter break. There’s a school-sponsored ski trip, and one girl is aching to go so she can try snowboarding for the first time.
• There is a light drizzle. The skies are mostly cloudy but the sun is doing his best to show his face. A man and woman stand beside a car outside of a convenience store. They are arguing.
• After a twenty-year career as a successful, underground singer with a voice that gives audiences chills, a singer with no other skills or experience loses his or her voice.
• A young, professional dancer injures her knee and can never dance professionally again. She decides if she can’t move to the music, she’ll make it. Which instrument does she choose and why?
• Write a monologue in which your character summarizes his or her life story; be sure to write it in the character’s voice

[credit:] all of these prompts were gathered at www.writingforward.com

PROMPT(s): multiple prompts from 2010 v2

[credit:] ALL of these are also from writersdigest.com: promptfest 2010

The Wait is Over 


After a year’s wait, you finally strike—it’s yours. But once you get home, you discover that it’s nothing—nothing—like you thought it’d be.


*

Test Drive


You go on a test drive in a new car. With the dealership representative in the passenger seat, you pull to the side of the road, turn off the engine, and lock the doors. 
“There’s something I should tell you,” you say.


*

Plenty of Fish in the Digital Sea


You venture into the world of online dating. Browsing through profiles, you drop your coffee mug and it shatters on the ground—it can’t be.


*

Clash of the Characters


Create a scene using four characters: One based on yourself, one based on someone you personally know, one based on someone you heard about in the media, and one spawning strictly from the imagination. Make the media story the hook or reason they’re all together, and base the scene around that.


A Second Day of Valentines


It was Valentine’s Day. You took your date to a movie–only it wasn’t the Valentine’s Day epic you had imagined, and what happened in the seat in front of you only reinforced that.


A Suitor for the Suitcase


A man enters your subway car with a small suitcase. He places it under a seat and gets off at the next stop. You eye the “LEAVE NO PACKAGES UNATTENEDED” sign. Another man boards the train, picks up the suitcase, takes something out of it, and moves it down a seat. At the next stop, he leaves and a woman enters, takes something out of it, moves it down a seat and exits. And then another. Finally, it’s placed under your seat.


The Last Thing You Expected to See on the Menu


The waiter handed you a menu. Only what was written inside wasn’t merely a listing of food
.

*

The Chairman


Your father made the chair when he was a boy, and it’s gotten rickety. Preparing to finally throw it away, you flip it over to carry it to the trash, and notice a message etched in with a knife.


PROMPT(s): Multiple prompts from 2010

[credit:] ALL of these come from writersdigest.com: Promptfest 2010

The Tapping (courtesy of WD’s Scott Francis)


You are awakened in the middle of the night by a strange tapping noise coming from your attic. You decide to investigate, and after moving a few old boxes, you find what appears to be a telegraph receiver hidden in a small hole in the wall.


Breaking Down


A tire blows out as you’re in the car with someone on the verge of his or her own breakdown. Stuck in a small town, you’re about to do something you haven’t done in years.

Prompts, courtesy of bestselling author Dianna Love

Below are five opening lines for a scene. The first three are in third person, the fourth is in first person and the fifth can be either one. You can change the point of view from third to first or first to third. There are no names, so you pick the characters. Write the first scene that comes to mind. Don’t worry about being correct on anything—just write and have fun.  


He opened his eyes and slowly took in his surroundings, searching for one thing that looked familiar.



If she didn’t make the last ridge before the portal closed in the next 15 seconds, she’d end up losing her bounty and getting blood on her new solar boots.  


He appreciated having a choice, but generally he was given at least one option that allowed for a chance to walk away alive even if he had to sacrifice dignity.  
   

My mouth fell open in shock at the gangly man carrying a cardboard box, not believing he would dare to enter my real estate office again.   


A palomino horse trotted into the yard sans rider, daisies braided into the mane and a sword hanging from a leather loop on the saddle. 


Your Story Contest No. 22


Suffering from a mid-life crisis, a 50-year-old businessman quits his job and goes on a quest to “get the band back together.”
 —From The Writer’s Book of Matches by the staff of fresh boiled peanuts: a literary journal

Vacation From Vacation 


With your cell phone and souvenirs in hand, your torn map falls to the ground. 
“He wasn’t even supposed to be here,” you mutter. 
And just like that, you need a vacation from your vacation.


The Agreement (courtesy of WD Editor Jessica Strawser)


You consider the stranger’s odd request and decide to agree. What do you have to lose? And just like that, you’re not alone on your adventure.


Rising Sun (courtesy of Jessica Strawser)


A man in a business suit, briefcase handcuffed to his wrist, stands on a quiet beach watching the sunrise.


Why?

“Why did you cut it all off?”

She stares out the window.

“Why?”


Self-Help Surprise


A self-help guru makes you an offer you can’t refuse, no matter how much you’d like to.


Paparazzi 


You try to snap a discrete photo—but it just doesn’t work out that way.


Sunset


The sun is setting in dramatic hues of pink and tangerine, but nobody is watching it—they’re all staring at him, instead.


Strangers on a Train


You’re on a train and for some reason have missed your stop—which, as you soon discover with the stranger sitting next to you, is a blessing in disguise.

Holiday
Something comes down your chimney, but it’s not exactly Santa. In your bed, you stir as you hear footsteps.

Resolute
 

It’s Dec. 31, and you’re scrambling to make a resolution come true that you made last year. The sun is setting, and it’s time for action.

Your Story No. 24 


Parents look on in horror as a magician’s trick goes horribly awry during a child’s birthday party. —From The Writer’s Book of Matches by the staff of fresh boiled peanuts: a literary journal


Raising the Alarm
 

Yet again, you draw a breath, mumble an apology, and pull the fire alarm at the shopping mall.


*

Trapped in the Ice
 

Your car breaks down in the midst of a blizzard—and a critical cell phone call. Trudging through the snow, you discover something frozen in ice that will prove to be invaluable in the moments ahead.


*

Cellular Apologies 
 

A stranger asks to borrow your cell phone. You agree. She turns away and talks on it for a moment, then faces you once more. 
“I’m sorry,” she says, eyes red. “I’m so sorry.” 
Then, she runs away.

Your 15 Minutes
 

You’re watching a daytime talk show. A familiar face walks onto the stage, you drop what you’re holding and she utters your name on national television.


*

The Broadcast Boon

You’ve never done it before, but this time you call in to the radio station. You win something you didn’t anticipate—or want.

PROMPT:

I awoke to the sound of someone pounding on my door, and I shook my head as I looked through the corner of the curtains at the striking orange sky, guessing what time it was. It was then that I realized that wasn't sunrise - those were flames.

[credit:] jessica.elaine @ NaNoWriMo

CHARACTER TYPE: ice mage

Snie:

Snie is a skilled ice mage, despite her young age. She has silver hair, pale, snow white skin and wears nothing but a white dress with blue symbols, even when it's cold, because she doesn't feel it and never shows any signs of freezing. Something that you can't say about her enemies because most of her spells turn humans into fragile blocks of ice. If you want to engage her in close combat, she will form a weapon by freezing the air around her hands. Swords, Axes, Lances, you name it, she can fight with every weapon. Also, she can throw knives made of ice after you. If she is really angry, she can cast a devastating snow storm. The nastiest things however are her magic mines. These are almost invisible and if you get too close to one of them, it will explode and freeze everything in the area. Yet she is terrified of fire, because she had a bad experience with it as a child. A scar on her cheek remained ever since. Also she feels uncomfortable at warm temperatures, since she can't use her magic then. But then again, she's quite skilled in fighting with ordinary weapons...

[credit:] vulture @ NaNoWriMo

CHARACTER: The Mask

A serial killer who goes by "The Mask."

His greatest strength is his powers of observation. He stalks someone for a year, then on New Year's Eve he murders them and hides the body. He then impersonates his victim for the next year (or until he gets bored living their life) all the while stalking his next kill. When he moves on, his last victim's family and friends find out about the murder- a year after it happened. As a younger man he made a lot of mistakes, so he thinks that doing this gives him second chances at life.

[credit:] swordtech @ NaNoWriMo

CHARACTER: whisper

Whisper: (Serial killer concept)

She is quite the ball of screwed up. Due to abuse as a child, she has a split personality, Whisper being her dark side that deals with the dregs of this world, her positive half would never be seen as a possible pairing with Whisper. The way she gained the name is that she never speaks above a whisper. Favorite methods of death are modified children's toys. Toy planes that shoot real bullets, exploding dolls, a cricket bat she always has on her...you get the idea.

best part, Whisper knows about her alter, but the positive side does not know about Whisper.

[credit:] William Blackrose @ NaNoWriMo

DREAM:

Everything was white. As in blinding, flash, entire world of emptiness white, the way dreams are sometimes. And then, suddenly, it was like there was a small window in the white that showed a black storm zooming in and in.

[credit:] steelblue71 @NaNoWriMo

CHARACTER: twin sisters Pepper & Bee

Name: Penelope Cotton
Nickname: Pepper
Age: 14-15
Personality: Pepper is sweet, friendly and immature. She's very idealistic and expects the world to be fair. She's the older twin, but she is treated like a baby most of the time. She loves art, especially sculpting. Pepper also enjoys cooking, which she is spectacularly bad at, and has a penchant for adding far too much spice. She's a little naive and relies on her sister for a lot of things.
Appearance: Pepper has shoulder-length curly blond hair and blue eyes. She's about 5"5 and wears bright colors with paint-splattered jeans and is almost always smiling.

Name: Beatrice Cotton
Nickname: Bee (family only)
Age: 14-15
Personality: Beatrice is the responsible twin. She's a little resentful of Pepper for needing so much looking after and making friends so easily. Beatrice struggles to trust people, loves jazz music, and gets reasonable grades without doing much studying. She mostly focuses on looking after other people, and always thinks things through.
Appearance: Beatrice has short curly blond hair which is always tied in an inch-long ponytail, a heart-shaped face and blue eyes. She loves skinny jeans.

History: When they were two, their mother left to travel the world. Their father was heartbroken. Growing up, their aunt (their mother's sister) was their mother figure. Recently their father has started dating again, which Pepper and Beatrice are not happy about.

[Credit:]  StrawberryFields@NaNoWriMo

SYNOPSIS: Storyline 1 - Eve

I have been looking for a very long time for a main back story that allowed me to have a variety of fantasy "beings" (for lack of a better term) in a modern day world. However, as the final outcome is going to be based on a combination of several different story lines I need help bringing everything together. I have so many aspects of this world that I highly doubt it'll be contained to one "novel", but I plan on branching it out into a series of events that end in an ultimate showdown with the Big Bad (ie: the Demon King). The whole basis starts with him in the very beginning and weaves its way through various other characters (some human, some not so much) and ultimately ends with either his resurrection or his permanent fatality.


[credit:] Dervish98 @ NaNoWriMo for creating the actual Demon King.
Just to give you a basic idea, mine is in a world where everything & its brother exists unknown to humans. So there is a lot of fantasy potential but in a mostly modern setting. I will have a ton of stories going on that will eventually come together when they're against the Big Bad, so to speak. Right now, I'm focusing on the first main character's story. (A millennium ago, 4 powerful supernatural humans (the Elders?) united to defeat a Demon King. They couldn't ultimately defeat him, but they were able to contain him. Now its present day and one of the Demon's immortal lackeys has been searching for a way to bring him back. [[I was thinking maybe the demon would be a body jumper: his soul can live forever as long as he escapes the human body he chooses before it dies or he'd be trapped in death]] 4 Descendants of the (Elders) hold the key. Each has a (talisman?) that as long as they stay separated, the Demon King will be "contained". But if the four are combined, it will release him into the world again. So the demon, upon finally discovering this, is after the 4 descendants to kill and take each of their (talismans?) So now, I'm back to present day and the telling of each individual descendants story.

I'm starting with Eve. She lives in Daytona Beach, is studying to become a vet and is actually working as a Vet's assistant at the Beach Walk Vet Clinic. When she was 5(ish) she was kidnapped but was saved/escaped(?) and returned to her home. [[she is going to somehow be saved by a wolf which actually ends up being a human shape-shifter who has been watching her since she was born]] She doesn't remember much about what happened and the doctors said she may never regain memories of the traumatic event. They never caught the guy, but its been years and now she's grown up. One day, she bumps/runs(?) into someone and something about their scent triggers a flashback of when she was kidnapped and she knows without a shadow of a doubt that this person was her kidnapper. But whoever it is either doesn't recognize her because it's been so long OR doesn't realize she suddenly remembers. At this point, I'm going to bring the wolf back into her life [[I was thinking either someone could hit it with their car and bring it into the vets clinic where she is and she has to take care of it or she, herself, hits it one night in a situation. There's just something about it's eyes that catches her and she ends up bringing it home to tend to, obviously not knowing that its human(?).]]  So now, wolf-boy needs to be introduced into her story somehow without her yet knowing that wolf and man are one and the same. ALSO, here's another kicker: she is a healer. But she hasn't come into her powers yet, doesn't even know she has them, so those will have to start coming into play soon, also. 

Now, we've come full circle to where she recognizes her kidnapper and the wolf is now actively in her life as a human, instead of watching from the sidelines like he has been. 

[sidenote:] Her best friend & roommate is a bartender at a bar/club down the street from their house. They are staying in a beach house that is actually Eve’s parent’s vacation home, but since she is attending that college, she & her best friend, Ryssa Grannan, are living there in the interim. There is a bouncer, Scott Peterson who comes into play also. He is very close with both girls & is protective of them. I was thinking he had a thing for Eve who also comes in all the time to see Ryssa. Ryssa is tall, tan with short super straight reddish/black hair. She's a do what she wants, say how she feels whether you like it or not type. Knows how to work a crowd and all the guys LOVE her. She's flirty and adventurous. Scott is more of your hometown country boy. He was raised on a farm in a horse town a couple of cities over. He's not overtly tall, but what he lacks in height he more than makes up for in muscle mass. He always wears a cowboy hat & boots and when he's not wearing the official bouncer t-shirt, he wears a long sleeve button up tucked into his skin tight wranglers. He drives a beat up truck and Ryssa drives a Mitsubishi eclipse. Besides the wolf-man, those are the only two solid characters I have. I need to have one or two more humans as well as fantasy characters that can help her along the way, too.

 

PROMPT:

On a day that started like any other, your friends and family have started to treat you a bit strangely and you suspect that something is up. On a whim, you stay out a bit later then curfew. When you return your house is surrounded by police cars.

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: animals can talk?

You are taking your dog for a walk when he starts talking to you. In fact, all the animals in the world have just become extremely conscious and have begun talking to you. What's up with that?

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: One day to live

You have been given one day to live. Detail it from beginning to end.

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: suddenly a celebrity

A series of events has made you a target of the paparazzi and one of the world’s most sought after celebrities. How did this happen and how are you dealing?

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: alter your past

The opportunity arises to go back in time and alter one event. What event do you alter? Describe your encounter from the past and its consequences in the present.

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: dead relative at door

You answer your doorbell and you are surprised to see your grandfather standing in the doorway. Mostly because he’s dead. He says, “I have some important things to tell you.” Talk about your reaction and what happens next.

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: wedding ring

You go to work the morning after a long night of drinking. You notice a cheap wedding ring on your finger that wasn’t there yesterday. Describe your action steps to determine what happened.

[credit:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: passing out

As you are walking down the street, you hear loud sirens. Before you can figure out the reason, you see a giant flash of light and you pass out. You wake up in a giant pile of rubble. What has happened and where do you go from here?

[creidt:] Bryan Cohen

PROMPT: 5 yr old

You wake up to find yourself in your five-year-old body and back in time. How do you spend your first 24 hours in this situation?

[credit:] Bryan Cohen