Writing Exercise
Work With Children
Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter - What If? Writing Exercise for Fiction Writers prompts The Exercise - This exercise should be done with two or more people; one to read the instructions aloud while the others concentrate on recalling the experience. Red slowly and pause between sentences and paragraphs; the whole process should take at least five minutes. Shut your eyes. Go back in your mind to some summer or part-time job you had in the past. Look at the surroundings in which you were working. See the place in which you worked: factory, schoolroom, restaurant, hospital, store, library, whatever. Or perhaps it is an outdoor scene: beach, road, garden, construction project, ranch, cafe. Notice the shapes and colors of what is around you. Look at the materials with which you are working, note their shapes and colors. Now look at the other people who are present in this scene: coworkers, boss, customers in the restaurant or shop, children at camp, or a babysitting job. Choose one person and observe her closely; notice what she is wearing and the expression on her face. What is she doing as you watch? What gestures is she making? Now begin to hear the sounds that belong to this scene. The clank of machinery, the sizzle of hamburgers cooking on the grill, the splash of water in the pool, the ringing of phones, the thump and hum of music, whatever it may be. Listen to the voices: what are they saying? Perhaps you will hear a line or two of dialogue. What is the person you especially observed saying, and what do you or someone else say in reply? Now allow yourself to experience the smells that belong to this scene: food cooking, fresh-cut grass, motor oil, sweat, flowers, disinfectant, whatever. If you are working in a restaurant or bar, or eating on the job, you may want to become aware of taste too: the lukewarm bitterness of instant coffee in a plastic cup, the sugary chocolate slickness of a candy bar hidden in your desk drawer. Look around you at this point and become aware of the climate of your surroundings. Is it winter or summer? If you are working outdoors, what is the weather like? What time of day is it? If you are outdoors, is the air stuffy or fresh, smoky or clear? What can you see out the window? Next, become aware of the sense of touch, of the textures of the things you are working with: soft or rough, smooth or fuzzy, wet or dry. Notice heat and cold: the damp, icy feel of a glass of soda, the warm or silky texture of a child's hair, the hot, oily parts of a broken lawnmower. Now turn your sense of touch inward; become aware of the motions you are making and the sensations in your muscles; the strain off liftiing sacks of dirt or cement, the pleasure of stirring cake batter around a big stainless-steel bowl, the weight of a tray of drinks on your shoulder. Finally, notice your emotions. Do you like this job or hate it? Are you interested in what is going on around you, or are you bored? Are you tired and depressed or in good spirits? Where will you go when work is over for today? Do you like or dislike the people around you? What do you feel about the person you chose to observe? What do you think she feels about you? What would you like to say to her? If you said it, what would this person probably say or do? When all these things are clear in your mind, but not until then, open your eyes and record them as rapidly as possible. Write in the present tense. Don't bother about legible handwriting, complete sentences, or spelling words correctly: the point is to get this material down on paper while it is still fresh and vivid in your memory. You are not composing a story, only making notes. The Objective - To make some experience as vivid as possible, to recall it in full sensual and emotional detail before you begin to write.
By Denise E Lindquistabout a month ago in Writers
Surge of free AI photo editor: smart tools are revolutionizing visual creativity
Surge of free AI photo editor: smart tools are revolutionizing visual creativity In the past ten years photo editing has transformed from a professional skill into a daily chore that is now accessible to anyone with a phone or a computer. What used to take professional software, expertise, and hours of painstaking work can done now be in seconds powered by the exponential expansion of free AI photo editing tools. These solutions are rapidly changing the way individuals, businesses, and creators tell visual stories giving users the ability to create professional, high-quality images without paying a dime.
By Google Accountabout a month ago in Writers
Sky Diving
Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter — What If? Writing Exercise for Fiction Writers prompts The Exercise - Using the first person, describe an event or action you are fairly sure you will never experience firsthand. Be very specific - the more details you incorporate the more likely it is that your reader will believe you. Include your feelings and reactions. Limit: 550 words. The Objective - Writing what you know is all very well, but it certainly does restrict most of us within narrow confines. You must also be able to write what you don't know, but can imagine. This is what your imagination is for. Let it fly.
By Denise E Lindquist2 months ago in Writers
Harper Lewis. Content Warning.
I get a feeling that some of y’all are wondering, “Who is this Harper Lewis, and where did she come from?” I’m new here, so new that I have no idea who the “same old names” are. I know that I’m new and some of my pieces have been noticed. I’m very appreciative of that, and sometimes I post with genuine hope and confidence that I nailed it, that what I tried to convey resonated, that my weirdness doesn’t alienate me.
By Harper Lewis2 months ago in Writers
Is There Anyone You Hate?
Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter — What If? Writing Exercise for Fiction Writers prompts The Exercise — Week one - write a scene that brings to fictional life someone you hate. Make the reader hate her. It might be someone who annoys you-- someone whose manner you can't stand, whose voice grates on you. Or it might be someone who has offended you or done you some harm, or someone to whom you have done some harm - there are many reasons to hate people. If you have the courage, take on someone who is evil on the grand scale. It can be someone you know, someone you know about, or best of all, invent a real nasty. The Objective: Story and only story is the peaceable kingdom where you and I and the next fellow can lie down on the same page with one another, not by wiping our differences out, but by creating our differences on the page. Only on the page of a story can I look out of your and my and the other fellow's eyes all at the same time.
By Denise E Lindquist2 months ago in Writers
Untitled . Top Story - December 2025.
I pat my brows with a handkerchief I fancy, and I think about the plight we are in today; it makes me squirm. In all my words you seek to find a formula, but your ledgers are filled with trending tabs (ephemeral tallies). You make me feel like I should be held in a box. It is impossible for someone to grow or be better than they were yesterday; simply by choice, they wish to step back and publish a little slower, less frequently.
By Caitlin Charlton2 months ago in Writers
Kwitcherbitchin. Content Warning.
I’m of Northern European and Native American roots, pretty sure the Germanic folk hailed from the small hamlet of Kwitcherbitchin, eventually breeding with travelers from Fixyerfuckingrammar and Punctuateyergoddamnsentences, on the other side of the mountains, leaving those lands after some time to marry in with inhabitants of Bespecific and Showdonttell. Eventually, their descendants got on a ship, and there were some illicit relations with Concretelanguage, resulting in the bastard births of Strongverbs, Subversion, and Sensorydetail before making landfall on Literaryallusion at the mouth of the River of Alliteration and settling in Citeyoursources, on the banks of Lake Threedimensionalcharacters, in the shadow of Realisticdialogue Mountain. I am all of my ancestors and carry the maps of their native lands in my blood.
By Harper Lewis2 months ago in Writers
Not Funny At The Time
Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter — What If? Writing Exercise for Fiction Writers prompts The Exercise — Write about something that happened to you that didn't seem at all funny at the time, for example, being stuck in a traffic jam and having a bee fly in through the car window or the time your tenant set your stove on fire and the firemen wrenched it from the wall and tossed it into the backyard. Bring the incident under the humor spotlight and transform it so as to emphasize things that will make your reader smile or laugh.Pacing is important, as are crucial details, and your own confidence that the story does not need analysis or authorial nudging. The last thing you want to do is tell the reader that you're about to lay a funny story on him. Limit: 550 words. The Objective - Because humor resides largely in what attitude you assume toward your material, you must be able to discover and exploit those elements that highlight the comic, the exaggerated, and the unlikely. Keep in mind that you could just as easily take the bee story and make it tragic (bee bites driver, driver crashes into another car, killing infant in back seat).
By Denise E Lindquist2 months ago in Writers
Happiness and Light Unofficial Challenge - The Results!
What’s a judge to do? We had so many happy, bouncy, flouncy, bibbidy boppy (Shout out to Cristal for that phrase that has remained in our grumpy brains since we read her original entry. Alas, we went with an older, more sincere one, but you should still check it out - Paul) entries that this pair of surly curmudgeons were flummoxed by Schmaltz, zest for life and woo woo so deep we had to don waders to work our way through it. And we are both stoked that 4 of you earned Top Stories (20% of entrants)! We received eighteen entries for the Optimistic phase of the challenge that were chock-a-block with rainbows, fluffy critters, and sprites. For the Sarcastic phase of the challenge, we had two entrants who gleefully brought cold hard reality down on the optimistic entries like a couple of kids playing two-fisted Wack-a-Mole.
By Paul Stewart2 months ago in Writers
Between Craft and Curiosity: A Portrait of a Modern Mind. AI-Generated.
Names sometimes arrive with a quiet resonance, carrying more suggestion than definition. Frédéric Péchier is one such name—evoking precision, patience, and a distinctly European sense of craft. Whether imagined as an artist, a thinker, or a meticulous professional shaping his field, the name invites reflection on what it means to build a life around mastery rather than noise.
By Ayesha Lashari2 months ago in Writers
