|
Free Updates
Navigation
Categories
Search
Archives
| | Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat |
|---|
| 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | | 29 | 30 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Blogroll
Writing Resources
|
 Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Can Writers See the Future?
Hey writers,
Intriguing post today at Wired’s This Day in Tech blog. It’s a topic you’ve probably heard wisps of at one point or another in the pop culture of writing—the author who more or less predicted the sinking of the Titanic. Contrasting any loose Nostradamus-style guesstimations, Morgan Robertson (born on this day in 1861) published his maritime disaster epic Futility in 1898. The book’s ship? The Titan. The culprit that landed it at the bottom of the Atlantic? An iceberg. As the blog also details, one of Robertson’s short stories in 1914 depicted a war between the United States and Japan, sparked by a surprise salvo. (Read more here.)
 Eerie coincidences for a writer with bad luck—or, OK luck, depending on how you look at it (after all, his ocean liner tome was reprinted after the Titanic went down in 1912).
Every so often, you hear about other coincidences between works of fiction and reality. What do you think: How do fiction writers do it? Do they have such a strong grounding in their subject matter that they can make informed guesses about what’s down the road? Or are there so many fiction writers with such a momentous output that someone's bound to hit the nail on the head from time to time? Or, sliding further down the rabbit hole, as Stephen King said in our May/June issue: “I think every writer who does this on a daily basis has a ‘back channel’ to the subconscious that can be accessed pretty easily. Mine is wide and deep. … I sense strongly that this world is a thin place indeed, simply a veil over a brighter and more amazing truth.”
Sure, it’s all a bit out there and may even border on new-age turf, but it makes you wonder. And as writers, isn't wondering the key to getting to the good stuff?
Here’s to you on your birthday, Morgan Robertson. Thanks for the prompt. (And sorry for the Titanic pic.)
--
WRITING PROMPT: Fiction to Fact
Feel free to take the following prompt home or post your response (500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring) in the Comments section below:
Take the last piece of fiction you wrote, and imagine that it actually happened—and found its way to the news. Now, write a piece centered around the reactions of a character watching a recap of the story on television. (What can you learn about the original piece—or the world around it—from this objective glimpse?)
--
The October issue of WD is now on newsstands. Check out our community issue here, featuring writing forums, online collectives, bestsellers riffing on writers’ organizations, and even the keys to making the most of a nightmare conference. What’s worth your time these days?
Traditional Prompts
Wednesday, September 30, 2009 9:17:19 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00) 
|
|
Monday, September 28, 2009
The Top 20 Lessons From WD Mag in 2009: No. 20
Hey writers,
The 90th anniversary issue of WD is fast approaching (it’s our January 2010 installment, which ships to subscribers Nov. 24 and hits newsstands Dec. 15), and Editor Jessica Strawser and I are rapidly working to get everything out on time.
Which means another year of magazines is about to start. Being the type of person who has a hard time parting with anything (I still have a rather hearty collection of Pez dispensers, not to mention roughly everything I’ve ever written), I want to hang onto the 2009 series of WD magazines for as long as possible. When you work on them long enough, they become a bit like old pals—quotable and even sometimes annoyingly omnipresent, but you're always sad to see them go.
Thus, to give the 2009 WDs their due, I’m counting down to the January 2010 issue two times per week with my favorite 20 writing lessons from the year. Think simple, quotable passages of wisdom from Stephen King, Rick Steves and others, from the bestseller to the savvy newbie.
No. 20: Get Messy
“During the course of writing six novels, I realized that the days when the truth shone brightest were the days my pen flowed the freest and messiest across the pages. And I was rewarded with longer and longer satisfactory passages. It’s paradoxical that giving up control rewards you with what you seek most: concise, insightful work.”
—Elizabeth Sims, on how writing freely without initial self-editing can bring new life to your prose, in “Rough It Up,” from the January 2009 issue of WD.
After each installment of tips, you’ll receive a regular helping of writing prompts to spark new life into your work. And don’t forget to stop by next Monday, Oct. 5. New York Times bestseller Dianna Love will share some great insights about her creative process, and offer prompts and a couple of copies of her new book, Break Into Fiction.
--
WRITING PROMPT: Old Habits Die Hard
Feel free to take the following prompt home or post your response (500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring) in the Comments section below:
You decide to give up an old habit—in exchange for something that was originally promised to you years ago.
Traditional Prompts | Top 20 Lessons From WD: 2009
Monday, September 28, 2009 4:11:10 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Friday, September 25, 2009
Remembering Jim Carroll in Prompts
Hey writers,
Here’s to poet, memoirist and rock n’ roller Jim Carroll, who recently died, reportedly working away at his desk. Carroll is perhaps best known for the chronicle of his heroin addiction and youth, The Basketball Diaries, which was raw, disturbing and poignant.
Thus, today, I offer a pair of Literary Roadshow prompts from Carroll’s Fear of Dreaming. If you’re looking for more on Carroll, check out CatholicBoy.com, a site loaded with some great articles about the author from the last few decades.
Also, after three concrete swag-offs and insightful feedback from a few of you, I’ve decided to suspend the competitions angle of Promptly and refocus a bit. Since the beginning, the ongoing competition has cast a bit of a shadow on the blog, and perhaps detracted from what it’s really all about: the prompts, and spurring creativity.
I’ve always wanted Promptly to be a hub where you can come to help break block by picking up some writing ideas, feeding off the creativity and wisdom of others, and delving into some rambling on the writing world by yours truly in the process.
To that end, we have some stirring goods in the works for the near future (including Q&As with authors and guest prompts, Your Story prompts that can land your work in WD magazine, prospective interactive challenges, and more), and of course, your pieces are always welcome in the Comments section of the blog, if you’d like to post them there for your colleagues’ inspiration, thoughts and comments.
Moreover, what would you like to see in Promptly? How could we take things a step further? Give me a shout at writersdigest [at] fwmedia [dot] com with the subject line “Attn: Promptly,” and no matter what you do, have an excellent weekend.
Onward!
Zachary
--
WRITING PROMPT: Something To Cry About/The Siren
Literary Roadshow: Proving that one author’s stray sentences can be another’s writing exercise gold. Feel free take the prompts home or post your stories in the Comments section below.
Write a story inspired by or containing the following, from Jim Carroll’s Fear of Dreaming:
“There, now you really have something to cry about!”
He looks back over at me after a moment of silence, and we begin laughing again. I throw my arms around him and lay my head to his shoulders, continuing to laugh until my tears fall down the lapel of his suit.
[and/or]
When the traffic is still, I lower my hands and pass through.
I arrive before the siren, through the Post Office doors …
yet the siren has been broken, some jealous women explain, and I am far too late.
--
The October issue of WD is now on newsstands. Check out our community issue here, featuring writing forums, online collectives, bestsellers riffing on writers’ organizations, and even the keys to making the most of a nightmare conference. What’s worth your time these days?
Literary Roadshow
Friday, September 25, 2009 9:03:47 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Did your story take home the Promptly gold?
It’s that time again — time, alongside a Writer’s Digest comrade, to gnash our teeth, hold our breath and force ourselves to pick a top story from the past month’s creative cavalcade of responses to various prompts.
For August-September, with the help of magazine staffer and WD Books Editor Scott Francis, we selected Megan Hyman’s “Cynic!” piece. As Scott said, “the voice and the tone are so telling that though the story is short, you come to understand the emotions of the characters.” For her story, Megan will receive a copy of Bang The Keys: Four Steps to a Lifelong Writing Practice by Jill Dearman, Thanks, But This Isn’t For Us by Jessica Page Morrell, Sorrow Wood by Raymond L. Atkins, a copy of the WD Novel Writing special newsstand publication, and a copy of the WD Guide to Creativity newsstand publication.
As always, thanks to everyone who shared their work here in the last month. It means a lot to me, as the blog’s curator, and I’ve heard from other people at WD and scattered about the country how much they love reading all of the pieces, too.
Every time you write a story here it could take home some picks from the WD office swag bag, but perhaps most important, it may help other writers get their creative wheels turning, and it flexes and sharpens that strange muscle—the one most of us don’t have a hope in the world of burying or setting aside, even if we wanted to.
Here’s to hoping we never do.
*Megan, please send an e-mail to writersdigest [at] fwmedia [dot] com marked "Attn: Zachary Petit," so I can get the goods shipped out to you!
--
WRITING PROMPT: From the Attic
To respond to the following prompt, courtesy of Scott Francis (check out his blog at seescottwrite.wordpress.com) post your stories, in 500 words or fewer, in the Comments section of Promptly:
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.
--
The October issue of WD is now on newsstands. Check out our community issue here, featuring writing forums, online collectives, bestsellers riffing on writers’ organizations, and even the keys to making the most of a nightmare conference. What’s worth your time these days?
Traditional Prompts | Winning Stories
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 6:05:03 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Monday, September 21, 2009
Worst Tweet Ever?
You can run, but you can’t hide: Talk of Fail Whales, talk of Ashton vs. CNN, talk of how you found out your sibling is engaged through a revelatory 140-character missive, and so on—anything and everything, all the time.
What do you think of Twitter?
While it can be a force of evil—think unnecessary info dump overload—I think it can indeed be a positive tool in your writing arsenal if you devote time and a benefit-oriented approach to your posts. (In our May/June 2009 issue we ran a guide to social networking that offers tips on how writers can max out their use of Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Click here to check it out for free.)
Or, if you’re like me and not directly on Twitter, there can be a lot to gain from other people’s Tweets. Our publisher and editorial director, Jane Friedman, runs a great (and I’m not just on the hunt for a raise) roundup series on the Best Tweets for Writers, downsizing for us the massive task of sifting the gold out of Fail Whales, "watching Nick@Nite" updates and Ashton Kutcher wars.
Speaking of bad Tweets … what form might the absolute worst take, and how might it spread like a virus?
--
PROMPT: Worst Tweet Ever?
In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring, feel free to post your story in the Comments section of the blog:
Write a scene about the fallout from one of the worst Tweets ever. Or, simply draft a few of the worst Tweets ever.
--
Also, the October issue of WD is now on newsstands. Check out our community issue here, featuring writing forums, online collectives, bestsellers riffing on writers’ organizations, and even the keys to making the most of a nightmare conference. What’s worth your time these days?
Traditional Prompts
Monday, September 21, 2009 6:01:36 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Friday, September 18, 2009
Weekend Prompt: Strange Happenings in the RV
The RV is full. The gas is low. From the expressway, nobody has any clue what's inside. But that may change soon.
--
Hey writers,
The WD offices in Cincinnati are silent. A stack of queries sits, pensive, anxious. A few tapped keys echo. Mini notes on computer monitors assure passers-by their owners shall return soon.
Magazine/book imprint apocalypse? Quite the opposite. The majority of our staff has jetted off to New York City for the Writer’s Digest Conference: The Business of Getting Publishing. If you couldn’t make it this weekend, you can follow the goings-on live as my friends and comrades blog about the latest developments in publishing—and what it means to writers—at writersdigestconference.blogspot.com.
Meanwhile, your trusty managing editor will be holding down the fort, working on the Writer’s Yearbook 2010 magazine and the WD Interview for our 90th anniversary issue—which is, in my opinion, one of the coolest legends we’ve ever featured.
If you’re outside of New York, say, perhaps, landlocked in the great Midwest, pack up your mental RV and take a stab at the prompt above. In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring, your stories are welcome in the Comments section of the blog, where they’ll be entered in our monthly swag giveaway. Or, chime in with your thoughts about Dan Brown and his success here, where J. Alvey has posted some great insights about the industry and the author.
Have an excellent weekend,
Zachary
Traditional Prompts
Friday, September 18, 2009 3:46:18 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Mid-Week Prompt: A Novel Speech, Derailed (plus Dan Brown)
You’re supposed to be giving a speech, but your mind seizes. You look up at the massive crowd, frantic, and start reciting the contents of an alarming letter you received last week, instead.
(In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring, feel free to post your stories in the Comments section of the blog.)
--
Hey writers,
Imagine: “Symbols from the book's cover were projected high on the walls. Catering staff wore bright white George Washington-style wigs. Lost Symbol cocktails were offered in oversized martini glasses, followed by champagne for toasting. Delicious finger snacks came by. A White House cake was on display, then sliced up for dessert.”
Oddly, this wasn’t a Gatsby party, but rather Dan Brown’s book release soiree for The Lost Symbol, as documented by Los Angeles Times writer Carolyn Kellogg. (And for the record, Kellogg also said Brown was pretty great behind the mic, contrasting the fictive non-Brown based prompt above, which would be more likely to happen if it were, say, me up there.)
For many in the publishing industry, there’s a lot banking on Brown’s new book, which was released this week. Some see it as the book world’s potential savior, and its colossal output is undeniable—according to Bloomberg, it broke the preorder and Day 1 sales records for adult fiction, and the first U.S. print run was a hulking 5 million copies.
Reviews are in the positive–mixed range, with some citing Brown’s ability to weave a killer plot, and others bashing a lack of style. What do you think: What's the secret to his success? Will it be what’s needed to pull the book biz out of a slump?
No matter what happens, I'm pumped to see the mainstream book world partying again, or at the very least, smiling, finger snacks in hand.
Traditional Prompts
Wednesday, September 16, 2009 4:29:18 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Monday, September 14, 2009
Promptly Special: Get Published in WD Magazine
Seven people board a small boat for a tour of the islands, but when the boat returns to the dock, only six people remain on board. —From The Writer’s Book of Matches by the staff of fresh boiled peanuts: a literary journal
Hey writers,
Quandary: In WD magazine, we’re typically cramped for open space, and I’ve gotten e-mails from some of you about how it’d be cool to publish a Promptly story in our pages. I agree, and rather than attempting to sleight-of-hand a piece in last minute when the editor is at the copy machine, I’ve got a solution: Your Story.
Essentially, Your Story is a recurring column in which we run a new prompt and, alongside it, a piece inspired by the previous issue’s prompt. WD editors read through the stories every magazine cycle, and then we post the top 5 on our forum so readers can select the winner.
Thus, in 750 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring, I invite you to post your stories in the comments section of this post, and they’ll be entered in the contest. (There’s only one entry allowed per person, and you have until the Oct. 10 deadline.) Should your story win, I’ll contact you for your name and mailing address when the time comes.
That said, we’re off, pizza in hand, to judge last month’s batch.
Looking forward to your stories, and hoping you had an excellent weekend,
Zachary
Also, if Promptly isn’t fulfilling all your insatiable prompt needs and you’re interested in The Writer’s Book of Matches (source of the prompt above), I gave it a peep, and it’s currently on sale in our online shop.
Traditional Prompts | Your Story Prompts
Monday, September 14, 2009 3:43:56 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Friday, September 11, 2009
Weekend Prompt: Your Ultimate Quote (Win swag!)
Write a conversation in which you utter what will be your—or your character’s—most memorable quote. The one that will be repeated for some time—for better or worse.
--
Hey writers,
In the world of authors, you’ve probably heard them, or some form of them, before.
“[Writing is] like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” –E.L. Doctorow
“If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.” –Elmore Leonard
“The road to hell is paved with adverbs.” –Stephen King
“Know your literary tradition, savor it, steal from it, but when you sit down to write, forget about worshiping greatness and fetishizing masterpieces.” –Allegra Goodman
What is it that instills a quote with fire and importance, that element that burns it into someone’s mind? Or, alternatively, what is it that deflates a quote and leaves you gnawing your tongue, wondering what, exactly, will go down in the history books?
In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring, I invite you to explore the prompt here or offline, and I'm also curious about your thoughts on the nature of quotes. And as always, feel free to post your stories in the comments section of the blog to automatically enter our monthly favorite-story swag giveaway.
Happy Friday,
Zachary
--
Also, to tap into the inner punctuation nerd in us all, check out the hilarious "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks for some weekend reading.
Traditional Prompts
Friday, September 11, 2009 2:54:46 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Mid-Week Prompt: A Game of Confession
Hey writers,
Hope you had a refreshing Labor Day. I spent the weekend in Goshen, Ind., in the upper reaches of the great Midwest, tooling around on boats and board games (after all, as the local TV commercials boast, there’s more than corn in Indiana—which you’re pleased to discover after five hours of driving through husk country).
Even though I went down in flames on several games (I recall storming out on Pictureka! and proclaiming some rather unfair judgments upon the board featuring odd monsters and fantastical shapes), spending some time with old friends was excellent.
Here’s to hoping you had a pleasant weekend with old faces, free of any game-related confessions that go beyond mere Pictureka! slander (see below), and the clever, prompt-nailing trauma inherent in Jason Dougherty’s “A Decision, a Laugh, a Howl” post, which is this week’s Notable Story Pick.
Yours in writing,
Zachary
--
PROMPT: A Game of Confession
In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring:
Old friends have gathered, and are passing the time with a card game.
“Ante up,” you say.
“I have a confession,” your old roommate replies.
Everyone widens their eyes, but then lowers their heads.
They know something you don’t.
--
Also, anyone interested in a writerly jaunt to NYC? Registration is still open for the WD Conference: The Business of Getting Published that’s coming up next week, Sept. 18-20. Check it out if you’re interested in the future of the industry, or want to take in some editor meetings, marketing and promotion sessions, and more. Update: Got ahold of a coupon code for us. If you register by Sept. 14, paste in "PC109" to get $50 off the registration.
Notable Story Picks | Traditional Prompts
Wednesday, September 09, 2009 4:14:48 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Friday, September 04, 2009
Holiday Prompt: A Decision, a Laugh, a Howl
Hey writers,
I’m jetting off to the lakes of exotic Indiana for the weekend. I wish you the best of Labor Days, free of any of the prompt-story trauma below.
Also, on the WD Forum, I started up a new poll for the January issue of Writer’s Digest magazine: Which is your favorite type of writing prompt—an open-ended question or scenario, a specific challenge, a photo or art prompt, or no prompt at all? Feel free to weigh in and offer your comments, which may wind up in the next issue of WD.
Yours in writing and Labor Days,
Zachary
--
PROMPT: A Decision, a Laugh, a Howl
In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring:
It’s a holiday, and you make a decision that makes something go very awry—or, very right—depending on how you look at it. Meanwhile, it’s cold but it’s supposed to be hot, someone is laughing and a dog is howling.
Traditional Prompts
Friday, September 04, 2009 3:53:40 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
Wednesday, September 02, 2009
Mid-Week Prompt: Selling Out/Buying In
Hey writers,
Promptly and some of the other WD blogs had a bit of a blackout earlier, but it appears we’re back online (I write as I compose into a Word file, cringing while optimistically eying the “Post” button). Sorry for the radio silence!
Assuming all of our technical difficulties have shown mercy on us, if you’re interested in writing programs or life therein, we just launched a new blog, MFA Confidential, with Kate Monahan. Check it out—her post today shares some first-year lessons. And she’s also down with A.M. Homes.
Finally, a tip of the prompt hat to Mark James, whose “Tragically, Hero” piece is this week’s Notable Story Pick.
Here’s to hoping you have a glitch-free Wednesday,
Zachary
--
PROMPT: Selling Out/Buying In
In 500 words or fewer, funny, sad or stirring:
You have done what you swore you would never do: You have written a book solely to pay the bills. Now, write the back-cover promo copy.
(From the newest issue of Writer's Digest magazine, which hits newsstands Sept. 15.)
InkWell Prompts | Traditional Prompts
Wednesday, September 02, 2009 6:58:00 PM (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)
|
|
|