We’re nearing the end of June. Summer officially begins tomorrow. I don’t know what it’s like where you are, but where I live, temperatures are growing uncomfortably warm. But I am from Oregon, and what is uncomfortable to me is time-to-put-the-sweaters-away perfect for someone else.
Inspire
Your writing prompt for this week is:
Characterization check: Take a central character from your latest story, and jot down attributes, physical features, mannerisms, goals, fears, secrets and any other relevant characteristics. Take this list and compare it to your story, do you spot any places where he or she is acting “out of character”?
Encourage
Fiction comes from a variety of sources – history, observation, experience, pure imagination. From The 3 A.M. Epiphany, by Brian Kiteley:
Fiction need not be the least bit autobiographical, or it may be nearly pure autobiography. Nevertheless, the exploration of your own history can be very useful in the search for subject matter for your fiction. Even the most experimental, objective, or distanced story usually has an element of autobiography in it, something analogous to the author’s experience.
Explore your personal history. Write down your memories, experiences, observations. Keep a journal and play around with the ideas, see where they take you.
Equip
It’s vocabulary week! I haven’t been especially inspired by a specific word lately. So let’s take a look at a potentially dangerous word:
pro·cras·ti·na·tion
Noun
1. The action of delaying or postponing something.
It also has some fun and interesting synonyms: dithering, stalling, hesitation, vacillation, dilly-dallying, shilly-shallying.
The word procrastination is derived from the Latin verb procrastinare, combining the prefix pro- “forward” with crastinus “of tomorrow” – hence, moving something forward from one day until the next. Here is a fun article on the history of the word procrastination from slate.com.
Happy writing!
Please consider sharing your response to the writing exercise. Got a question? Just ask!