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Story Ideas for Writers Now that life has settled down a bit; I’m trying to get the weekly Provocative Phrase Friday posts off the ground again. Finally, I have more time to focus on CT4W and provide some solid content for the site overall. This week’s writing prompts are a good set. All of them…

Story Starter Ideas I’m sort of in a slump right now… no truer words have been written on this blog so far this year. I’m plenty busy, like everyone else on the planet, writing for everyone else. But I don’t seem to find the time to write for myself. I put it off and put…

Sensory Lists – Part 2 — Sound Sound also bombards us. We seldom experience a moment of absolute silence. There are always conversations, coughing, rustling, music, background noise going on all of the time. Again, our brain filters the excess noise out to keep us sane. But each environment has its own sound signature. Conversation…

Sensory Lists – Part 1 — Sight We are visual beings. We rely on, and are often fooled by, our eyes. We are also bombarded by visual input on an hourly basis. A writer must see what is there and seek out comparisons and show the reader what’s going on in a memorable way. To…

Story Starter Ideas We are two days away from Valentine’s Day, and there is no better time to talk about the influence of love and relationships on books and literature. Love has always been at the center of the creative process. Whether you are talking about the love sonnets of Shakespeare, the tremendous popularity of…

Story Starters for Writers Arguments happen. It is just a fact of life. People are born with different worldviews, temperaments, and motivations and these inevitably lead to conflict. That is one of the things you should always look for in a writing prompt for fiction. Does the topic scream conflict to you? Or is it…

Story Ideas for Writers Parties are great places to get story ideas. From the party itself, the people who attend it, the actions that occur there, and (of course) the stories that people tell at the party and after the party. Next time you go to a party pay attention and you just might find…

There is more to lists than just using them as simple idea generation machines. Lists such as sensory lists can improve your description writing as well as help you generate more story ideas. Using Sensory Lists as Creative Writing Tools We use our senses to experience the world. The input we receive is unique and colored by…

Story Ideas for Writers Start with a short phrase. Any short phrase is better than a blank page. Random story starters work because everyone’s life experiences are different, and you never know where your imagination might lead. Sometimes this takes the pressure off of you a bit. Starting something new with little or no expectations…

You Can Still Do Better with Your Writing Goals According to an article by Jeff Haden at Inc.com, January 19th is when most people give up on their New Year’s Resolutions. The fitness app Strava polled over 800 million people to come up with this date, which they have named “Quitters Day.” You don’t have to…

Story Ideas for Writers It seems like these posts have been too serious for too long, so let’s lighten it up a bit, shall we? We all have made those impulse purchases (and many times regret doing so) but most of the time these purchases are silly: rainbow-colored crocs, a red Flash hat–complete with lightning…

Story Ideas for Writers This last month–especially in the last week–has been one of loss, chaos, and uncertainty. A couple of weeks ago we lost my father-in-law. He collapsed while working in the yard, and by the time a neighbor found him and dialed 911, he was gone. The rescue squad and the hospital staff…

Story Ideas for Writers According to the Collins Dictionary to leave your/a mark’s definition is: If someone or something leaves their mark or leaves a mark, they have a lasting effect on another person or thing. This is the goal of most human beings it seems. To make your mark on the world, yet so…

Story Ideas for Writers Almost everyone has experienced this at some point in their lives. Maybe it was serious such as choking on food that plugged up your airway or having the “wind knocked out of you” after a fall. Or maybe there was a moment when you were really sick, and every breath felt…

Story Ideas for Writers Do you ever feel like you are living in an episode of the X-Files? Another week of complete mayhem in the world, full of conspiracy theories run amuck where that girl who sat across from you in study hall in high school has decided that her ability to surf Google trumps…

Random Lists – Using Synchronicity as a Creative Thinking Tool Random thoughts and stimuli can supercharge your creativity on a project or problem you are struggling with. This is common knowledge. There is a word for this: syn·chro·nic·i·ty (noun) 1. The simultaneous occurrence of events that appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection.As…

Story Ideas for Writers Another crazy week. Just when you think it can’t get any crazier… it does. Kim-Jong-Un either dead or in a vegetative state, Mike Pence ignoring the mandatory masking rules at the MAYO CLINIC, and POTUS suggesting that disinfectants be taken internally and that blasting COVID-19 with light will fix all of…

Story Ideas for Writers This has been a crazy week by any objective measure. You have had the following happen this week: Mass protests of heavily-armed people who don’t want to be quarantined any longer. (And the memes making fun of the preppers who have been buying ammo and rations for years waiting for the…

Plus 11 Other Creative Fiction Writing Prompts Welcome to the first Provocative Phrase Friday. The concept is very simple. I provide 12 random phrases or short sentences that you can use as creative writing exercises or story starters if you happen to be suffering from a slight case writer’s block. This also includes a Provocative…

The Greatest Creative Thinking & Writing Tool Ever: The List I’d like to go out on a limb here and declare the List to be the greatest creative thinking tool at any writers’ command. It is simple, elegant and efficient. All you need is a few minutes and a blank sheet of paper and you…

This little quote by Anne Tyler says it all: The COVID-19 outbreak has pushed a lot of people who are not in “essential” jobs into a means of social distancing where they either find themselves unemployed, laid-off or otherwise living within a state of limbo until the worst of this outbreak passes. Nothing is really…

More Creative Thinking Definitions to Consider There are a lot of myths surrounding creative thinking processes and famous creative people. It is easy to assume that creativity is a scarce, limited resource that is doled out to only a few gifted visionaries, but time and time again, there are examples that break the rule.  Everyday…

Creativity in the Time of Quarantine The last few days have been extraordinary, to say the least. The Coronavirus (AKA – COVID-19) has completely re-written the script of everyday life, at least for the next 4 to 6 weeks at a minimum. The best way to slow the spread of this deadly virus is to…

“Anti” Creative Thinking Definitions–What Thinking Creatively is NOT In art, there is a concept known as “negative space” where the artist doesn’t focus on drawing the object in front of her, but the space surrounding that object creates a silhouette of the object itself. Sometimes the best way to see something is to identify what…

Struggling Through the Writing Process I’ve been flipping through my bullet journal the last couple of days. And this is what I see: a long list of “Professional” Tasks — all relating to my freelance client work that needs to be done, and then I look at my “Personal” Tasks — those that relate to…

It seems like everyone has their own definition of creativity.  Let’s start with a definition from Dictionary.com as a baseline: cre·a·tiv·i·ty [kree-ey-tiv-i-tee, kree-uh-]  noun 1.  the state or quality of being creative. 2.  the ability to transcend traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, or the like, and to create meaningful new ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, etc.;…

I’m catching up on my backlog of 848 podcasts, consuming almost 38GB of the storage on my 64GB iPhone SE. Let’s be realistic here, I will never catch up. But I do go through the list every so often, painfully eliminating a few podcasts at a time after asking myself, “Are you going to listen…

As you will learn about me in the coming months, I am obsessed with superheroes. I’ve loved them all of my life, and one of the most interesting things about a new superhero (or villain) is their origin story.  A good origin story is not only memorable, but also gives you an inside peek at…