Life currently consists of studying, worrying, procrastinating and sleeping–it’s exam season. Christmas seems like a very nice dream now that I’m back in student housing where the radiators either have no effect or they melt your face. Also the beds–did I mention the beds? They make my mattress at home feel like a cloud.
Choosing a prompt this week was hard! I found so many good pictures to use for future games of Snap Shot, but here’s what I picked this time:
Remember that writing prompt I did back in September which I didn’t share because I was considering submitting it to a contest? Well I did, and now it’s been published!
Short stories from 21 talented writers (including me!) make up the final instalment of an exploratory journey of the seven sins: Pride, Sloth, Envy, Gluttony, Wrath, Avarice, and Lust. Meant for a YA audience, Lust has stories involving first love and stolen kisses, but also ones about the lust for power or an addiction.
Here’s the blurb for my lgbtq+ short story:
Fire and Starlight Girl
Sixteen-year-old Cassie has been best friends with Ella forever. On a beach holiday with Ella’s family, the girls plan on exploring, swimming and watching the sunset over the ocean. It’s a perfect summer until Cassie realizes she has feelings for Ella. They’ve always been able to tell each other everything, but is it worth sharing this time if it means she could lose Ella completely?
Never pass up the opportunity to enter a contest or submit to a journal/anthology–the editors/judges may really like what you have to say and your writing could find a home!
Happy 2019!
My year started wonderfully with friends, champagne, and games. These included Pass the Parcel, a very British party game which seems to me like an excuse to throw things at family members (I promise I do actually enjoy it).
Of course, now it’s time for me to dive head first into revision in order to pass my exams, starting with evolutionary biology–timed-essay style–on the 14th. But before that, here’s a writing prompt!
Name of the game: Fire Starter. Continue reading
2019 is right around the corner and the time for the obligatory New Year’s resolution has come. Did you make your’s last year, will you do so this year? Who knows–I hope you succeed–but regardless, life will go on.
This is not true in stories, where resolutions perpetuate everything. Resolutions are the fuel, the driving force–they are the plot. Without them, readers will lose interest. Continue reading
I’m finally home for Christmas! We’ve got a cute tree and we just made cookies–everything would be perfect except that it’s super cold, I still have no idea what to get my dad, and the cat’s ill…
But ah well–everything will turn out fine. It’s the holidays after all, and time for a writing prompt!
Name of the game: Spelling Bee Continue reading
My favourite part of Christmas is the anticipation. Hoping for snowy days, smelling cookies in the oven, imagining people’s faces when they receive your gifts! In my opinion, traditions are key for this anticipation–remembering the events of the past and thinking about them continuing to occur, come what may. Traditions are our stories, and they make us feel grounded and safe.
In my family, stories are an important part of winter! From the much-loved picture books we’ve loved since I can remember, to some cute romcoms and wintery literature, here are a few of my favourite Christmas stories!
Please share your favourite festive stories with me in the comments! Continue reading
It’s December! NaNoWriMo is over, there are Christmas trees and fairy lights everywhere, and I feel very festive. Unfortunately for me, the festiveness also comes with a million end-of-term deadlines. Yay.
For a break, I did this Christmassy writing prompt and managed to rope in several people to do it with me. The results were hilarious. So, join in and then see what we wrote! Continue reading
I thought it would be fun to share some of the science I’ve been doing, especially because it involves words. When people think of biology, they tend to think of the experiments, not the hours spent trying to condense those projects into a legible and concise piece of art.
It may not be literary art, but writing good papers is still an art–you’re still telling a story. For this post, I’m going to attempt to break down a little bit of that story and also to talk about two of the fun behavioural studies I’ve been doing!
WARNING: contains big bugs, pretty graphs, some numbers, and twenty zebrafish. Continue reading
We’re nearly there.
As I’m writing this, it’s half a week before it’s posted, I’m behind, and I feel like I’ve only just scraped past the halfway point. Still technically in week 3, the end seems too close, but at the same time, I’m also looking forward to taking a break from words. I have too many essays with mid-December deadlines that I have not started and I just want it to be Christmas.
But.
I have a semi-formed blob of a novel and I’m proud of it. It’s not really going anywhere and I have yet to have any form of extreme conflict, but I have some really fun characters. You should be proud of what you’ve created too. We’ve done this–we made something amazing, and we can’t quit now that we’re so close to the end. I’ve compiled together some writing dares, some tips, and some sugar-filled baking recipes to help us through these last five days. We can do this!! Continue reading
In the grand scheme of things, 10 is a small number. It’s the number of our fingers. Two bags of custard doughnuts from Co-op (which are surprisingly vegan). And a perfectly acceptable number of zebrafish to own (I was going to say cats, but then I thought about it).
But still. TEN. It’s very exciting to have reached double digits. It also means I’ve been doing these regularly for fifteen weeks (every other Thursday). Writing prompt #1 was actually in May and wasn’t going to be a regular thing. But writing prompt #2 got such an unexpected amount of positive feedback I decided to do it that way! I’ve definitely enjoyed doing a writing prompt every other week, and I definitely think it’s helped my writing. I hope if you’ve tried any of them, that you’ve also found them fun and/or helpful!
So, for this lovely 10th prompt, here’s a new type of writing game! Continue reading
