Posts Tagged ‘writing exercises’
The challenge: Write a one page (~250 words) description of a barn as seen through the eyes of a man whose son just died in a war overseas. Do not mention the man, the son, war, or death. My work: The barn looks to be the color of dried blood. The roof, taken by a [...]
Source: Can’t remember where I found it, but the exercise is to list ten random material nouns and ten random immaterial nouns. Then, connect one of each using “of” to create a series of interesting descriptions to use in a sentence. Material Nouns: calendar, photograph, bolt, bottle, platter, book, microphone, wire, frame, sword Immaterial Nouns: [...]
Source: Writing Forward. Take an original paragraph you’ve written and cut everything you can without losing the original meaning of the work. Original: Exhaustion of the deep, bone-weary variety has a unique way of numbing an emotional response. The trio — Addy, Khalid, and Markus — had watched the supply hopper come in through the [...]
Source: Writing Forward. Write one sentence that is at least 100 words long. Then, rewrite that sentence in 10 words or less. Part One: A truth: getting shot and living is akin to being born and John knows that because he’s living through it all over again from the moment of the bullet’s impact into [...]
This exercise is to write a fragment of a story (500 words) written entirely in imperative commands. Source: 3 AM Epiphany Here we go:
This exercise is to write a 600 word short story from the first person POV, using a personal pronoun only twice. Source: 3 AM Epiphany Here’s my take:
So I’m counting this as a writing exercise since I blew it out in about 10 minutes. BoingBoing is having a 100-word fiction contest. The theme is “Found in Space.” My first draft was 122 words. I really had to work to get it down to 100. Here’s my results: The machine moved, Scott followed. [...]
I’ve been thinking about writing lately, and how my productivity has basically tanked since I departed college for the RealWorld™. There is a litany of contributing factors to that, and I think that with this post, I’ll be scratching the surface of that set. First and foremost, it’s because I am not regularly in the [...]
