Be Inspired / 103 posts found
Plot Twist Story Prompts: Second Life
Plot twist story prompts aren’t meant for the beginning or the end of stories. Rather, they’re for forcing big and small turns in the anticipated trajectory of a story. This is to make it more interesting for the readers and writers alike. Each week, I’ll provide a new prompt to help twist your story. Find last week’s prompt, Jurisdiction Battle, here. Plot Twist Story Prompts: Second Life For today’s prompt, reveal a character’s second life. The second life could be one that’s hidden in their past. For instance, a very serious judge may conceal a dark secret of their past […]
Carole Lawrence: On the Vast Canvas of New York City History
Carole Lawrence is an award-winning novelist, poet, composer, and playwright. In addition to Edinburgh Twilight, Edinburgh Dusk, and Edinburgh Midnight in the Ian Hamilton Mysteries series, she has authored novellas, short stories, and poems―many of them translated internationally. She is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee for poetry and has won the Euphoria Poetry Prize, the Eve of St. Agnes Poetry Award, the Maxim Mazumdar playwriting prize, the Jerry Jazz Musician award for short fiction, and the Chronogram Literary Fiction Award. Her plays and musicals have been produced in several countries, as well as on NPR; her physics play, Strings, nominated […]
F.T. Lukens: On When the Writing Flows
F.T. Lukens is the author of In Deeper Waters and five young adult novels published through Interlude Press. Their book The Rules and Regulations for Mediating Myths & Magic was a 2017 Cybils Award finalist in YA Speculative Fiction, the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Gold Winner for YA fiction, the Bisexual Book Award for Speculative Fiction, and on ALA’s 2019 Rainbow Book List. F.T. lives in North Carolina with their spouse, three kids, three dogs, and three cats. Visit them at ft-lukens.com. Find them on Twitter and Instagram. F.T. Lukens In this post, F.T. discusses the process of […]
Wednesday Poetry Prompts: 606
This is the final Wednesday Poetry Prompt until May. The reason for that is simple: Starting on Friday (April 1), we’ll be writing a poem every single day of April in the 15th Annual April Poem-A-Day Challenge. Can’t wait to get started! For today’s prompt, write an astrology poem. Make the title of your poem your astrological sign. Write an astrological prediction. Map the stars. Or even get into related (but completely not related) fields, like astronomy or tarot. Have fun with it, because it’s written in the stars that much poeming is on the way. Remember: These prompts are […]
Gilly Macmillan: On the Thrill of Letter Writing
Gilly Macmillan is the internationally bestselling author of several critically acclaimed, fan favorites, including What She Knew, The Perfect Girl, The Nanny, To Tell You the Truth, and more. She lives in Bristol, England. Find her on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Gilly Macmillan Photo by Celine Nieszawer Leextra In this post, Gilly discusses how a movie from the 1940s inspired her new thriller novel, The Long Weekend, how she navigated writing and researching a novel during a pandemic, and more! Name: Gilly MacmillanLiterary agent: Helen HellerBook title: The Long WeekendPublisher: William MorrowRelease date: March 29, 2022Genre/category: ThrillerPrevious titles: What She […]
N. Griffin: On Connecting Truth and Fiction
N. Griffin is the author of The Whole Stupid Way We Are, for which she was named one of Publishers Weekly’s Flying Start Authors of 2013, as well as Just Wreck It All, Smashie McPerter and The Mystery of Room 11, Smashie McPerter and the Mystery of the Missing Goop, and most recently, Trigger. She received her MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Find her on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. N. Griffin In this post, N. Griffin discusses merging her life experiences with fiction in her new young adult novel, Trigger, what surprised her most in the writing […]
Plot Twist Story Prompts: Jurisdiction Battle
Plot twist story prompts aren’t meant for the beginning or the end of stories. Rather, they’re for forcing big and small turns in the anticipated trajectory of a story. This is to make it more interesting for the readers and writers alike. Each week, I’ll provide a new prompt to help twist your story. Find last week’s prompt, Weakness Becomes Strength, here. Plot Twist Story Prompts: Jurisdiction Battle For today’s prompt, have your characters get caught in a battle over jurisdiction. As an example, you could have state law enforcement get in a turf battle with city law enforcement over […]
Announcing Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming!
I’m really pumped to share a new digital guide for poets: Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming! After more than a decade of sharing prompts every Wednesday (and daily in April and November) on the Writer’s Digest website, I’ve accumulated more than a thousand poetry prompts (and example poems). This digital guide collects 365 of my favorite prompts, including topic-based prompts, title-based prompts, and, well, weirder prompts. Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming, by Robert Lee Brewer Here’s my introduction to the guide: Welcome to the fun house! We’re about to do […]
Patrick Strickland: On the Importance of Empathy in Writing Nonfiction
Patrick Strickland is a journalist and author from Texas who has reported from some 15 countries across Europe, the Middle East, and North America. His reportage has appeared in The New York Review of Books, The Nation, The New Republic, Politico, The Guardian, Vice, In These Times, and elsewhere. He is the author of Alerta! Alerta! Follow him on Twitter. Patrick Strickland In this post, Patrick discusses how the pandemic altered the way he did research for his new nonfiction book, The Marauders: Standing Up to Vigilantes in the American Borderlands, the jobs he took in the midst of the […]
Wednesday Poetry Prompts: 605
For today’s prompt, write a forgetful poem. This could take the form of a poem about forgetting an important anniversary or an item (like the keys to the house that you locked on the way out the door). Or play off memory myths like that an elephant never forgets. Or write about forget-me-not flowers. Or, well, I feel like I might be forgetting a few other options as well. Remember: These prompts are springboards to creativity. Use them to expand your possibilities, not limit them. Note on commenting: If you wish to comment on the site, go to Disqus to […]