A Universe of Five She counted to five, because there were only five things in the tiny cave that was her universe. The Bed, where she slept. The Hatch, where her food and water appeared while she slept. The Hole in the floor where the smelly stuff went that came out of her body. The…
Muse on Monday – June 13, 2022
I hope you have a good week. Here is a prompt you can use to write a story. Even if you don’t write it, down, think about what the story might look like. Where is the conflict? How does it end? If you think outside your normal patterns of thought, it can only broaden what…
Waterfell
This story is part of a weekly story challenge called Friday Fictioneers, where participants write a 100-word story based on a picture. Thank you to Fictioneers queen Rochelle for choosing my picture this week. This is from the Iguazu Falls on the border of Argentina and Brazil. I want to apologize for not being able…
Muse on Monday – June 6, 2022
One of the nice things about fiction is that you can write anything. Stories should be internally consistent and follow the rules you make for them, but beyond that, you are the creator of your own worlds. For example, I once wrote a story about a taxi driver who was a pigeon. The concept is…
Sapping Time
Sapping Time “I don’t see what the big deal is with GMOs anyway,” Mr. Watts said to assembled field trip. The children looked up at him, sucking on maple syrup lollipops from the gift shop. “Do you know that back in the old days, they would have to collect sap in buckets and then carry…
Writing Corner: Group Words
English has a lot of little quirks, but one of the quirkiest is all the words it has for groups of animals. If you look at a site like Owlcation, you can find a huge list of words, many of which sounds like they’re just made up, but probably were used very long ago. Still,…
Limited Sky
Limited Sky “You’re applying for a game developer position?” The manager flipped through my application in confusion. “Yes.” “Your background is law, though.” “I am a lawyer currently, but I’ve been studying coding for several years. If you look at my portfolio—” “No, it’s great.” The manager looked uncomfortable. “I’m just afraid you’re a bit…
Muse on Monday – May 30, 2022
Because of movies, we tend to think of action stories as having to do with fighting, crime or some other sort of swashbuckling adventure, usually since those are the most exciting stories to watch. However, an action story can be any kind of high-energy story that has a fair bit of movement. This week, I…
Writing Corner: The Right To Write
Today’s post is written by guest writer, Susannah Bianchi. Check out her slightly-on-slant essays and novels at athingirl.com. The Right To Write The Right to Write is my favorite go-to writing book by esteemed author, Julia Cameron. Though I have others…Bird By Bird, by Anne Lamott, Stephen King’s On Writing, hers is the one I…
Muse on Monday – May 23, 2022
I’ve been away from the site for a couple weeks since I’ve been down with COVID. It might have been a time to do some writing, but unfortunately, it was not the asymptomatic variety. But I’m back now and almost as good as ever. This week’s prompt is the first line of a story: In…
The Green-Walled Treehouse 