Diary Challenge: 20th-26th June 2011

Yikes, it’s Sunday again already! How the heck did that happen?
It’s a busy time for me, but right now I think all times are busy :). I’ve got a report due in on Tuesday that I need to finish tonight because I’ve got no other time to work on it, I’m a few days behind on last week’s challenge, I had a wedding to attend yesterday and we had guests staying for the weekend, I’ve started typing up the genre challenge to post it but it’s going slowly, I’ve got a very important meeting at work next week that involves a lot of prep, and I’m typing this on my iPad at my son’s crib side while he refuses to go to sleep because he knows I’ve still got to tidy up all that mess he made today when I finally get to go back downstairs before I can start of my course work. Poor hubby isn’t faring much better as he’s working through his first father’s day. I think we’ll have to give him a do over when things are a bit less mad.

But despite all that I’m sure I can still come up with a challenge for this week. Still no new news on Camp NaNoWriMo, though it is supposed to be staring next month, but I think it’s safe to say something will be happening so let’s think about what we might like to write.

This week the challenge is to go back through the diary and pick one of these rough novel outlines I’ve been making you do throughout the year. You should have at least a couple. We’ll take one of them and spend the week really fleshing it out into something that’s ready to write.
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday
People like to do planning in different was so I’m not going to set the order here, but you’ll probably want to spend at least two days on characters, a day describing the major conflict/bad guys, and depending on genre a day on your setting. This should give you plenty to be getting on with up to the last three days.
Friday, Saturday & Sunday
Personally, I like to go with the old Three Act format of plot outlining. Act I sets things up and ends with a major event or turning point that drives the rest of the story. Act II is basicially everyone trying to deal with what happened at the end of Act I, and just when you think things are finally going to work out another big event launches you into Act III. Act III deals with the fallout from the latest disaster and eventually everything is sorted out and the main character has grown or changed somehow from his experiences. The end. Or they all die, it depends how you like your stories. Anyway, that’s a long way of saying ‘three days, three acts, you do the maths’ :).

And now the baby is asleep. Yay! On with other work now. Until next time!

Diary Challenge: 6th-12th June 2011

Another week, another diary challenge. Last week I had the renovation of a very strange pub, someone escaping the kitchen at a giant’s party where they were part of the buffet, and an unexpected conversation between the MCs of my NaNo novel Pixies in Space, which mostly involved Fable trying to convince
Jayce not to try and do his own improvements on the ship. He didn’t listen.

This week we have a guest challenge from Markie. Now, how to explain this…

Remember ‘Whose line is it anyway?’ when they would start a scene and after a minute Clive Anderson would give them a genre and they had switch? Same scene, same characters, just inexplicably transported into a new genre and no one seems to notice. Well that’s the challenge. The scene/story is called ‘The Chase’ and each day you must write the next part in a totally different genre. Should be interesting. Good luck!

Diary Challenge: 30th May – 5th June 2011

Sorry last week’s post was a bit short. I was running behind on an OU assignment so got a bit rushed. It has also resulted in me being behind in my rapture stories, but I’ve been behind before and managed to claw it back so I’m not too worried. My rapture stories are based on the premise that a spaceship has arrived to rescue as many people as they can from the planet which will imminently be invaded by extra-dimensional forces that may or may not look a bit demonic and may or may not rain fire and brimstone down. Ahem. I’m not finished yet, but that’s not important right now. The challenges must go on!

Next week we’re having our kitchen done, so I’ve taken some inspiration from that for this week’s batch of writing prompts.

Monday 30th May – Description challenge

Write 2 short scenes describing a place both before and after it has undergone a dramatic transformation.

Tuesday 31st May – Dialogue challenge

Write a conversation between two or more people who are trying to do DIY, either successfully or not :).

Wednesday 1st June – Scene Challenge

Write a scene that is set in a kitchen. It can be about anything at all.

Thursday 2nd June – Dream Challenge

Write something based on a dream you’ve had recently. Again.

Friday 3rd June – Stream of Consciousness

Do some free writing around the theme ‘help’.

Saturday 4th June – Flash Fiction

Write a short story about anything, but the story must feature a tool. It can be any tool and can be used for any purpose. I wish I could say the first thing that came to mind was ‘sonic screwdriver’, but sadly it was ‘Saw’ :(. That movie warped my fragile little mind! But anyway, as you can see there’s a lot of scope for tool related creativity…

Sunday 5th June – Pot Luck: Script

I’ve not done a script for a few weeks, and I enjoyed them so much I think we’ll have one now. Write a short script for any medium with the title ‘Locked Out’. This one wasn’t inspired by my new kitchen, but anyone who follows my twitter will know what this one is about :).

That’s all for this week, folks. Next week we have a guest challenge from Markie again. This one is going to be freaky, I just know it!

Diary challenge: 23rd-29th May 2011

Sorry, it’s late, so I’ll keep it short this week. Obviously I expected to be raptured away this weekend, so I didn’t finish my essay or prepare any writing challenges ;P. Ok, seriously, I have been very busy with my essay and am going to spend my remaining lunch hour working on it after this blog post. Well, after I’ve tweeted about posting this blog post. But I thought that since this weekend was a real world Rapture fail we could have a fictional rapture win, so for this week’s challenge:

It’s Judgement Day, people! Either the biblical version or a variation of your own creation, but the world as your characters know it is coming to an end and seven of them have stories to tell about how it’s going down. 7 days, 7 characters, 7 short stories, 1 end of the world. Bonus points if one of the characters is an angel, if you’re keeping score.

Good luck!

Diary Challenge: 16th-22nd May 2011

Last week was a good week for me in the diary challenge. A little mad, but good. On Monday I described a mermaid and her pet killer whale. OK, I’m pretty sure that was done on The Little Mermaid but I’m not at my best on Mondays. On Tuesday things started to get surreal. After eliminating the poetry portion of the challenge, somehow my dialogue presented itself as a poem in my head. I had this Dr Seussian image of two people boasting about their nonsense creature pets, and thus the following poem was born. Please forgive the shocking scan in places. At some point I’ll edit it and put it on my DeviantART page with a picture of the mythical ‘zazu'[1]:

“My zazu’s the best, he’s as cute as can be.

He’s won hundreds of cuteness awards on TV.”

“Well my zazu’s smarter, she’s smart as a fox.

She can do algebra, tight-rope walk and pick locks.”

“That’s nothing, my zazu runs rings around yours.

He does the tune of Beethoven’s fifth when he purrs.”

“My zazu’s got spots she can change into stripes.”

“Mine glows in the dark when you turn out the lights!”

“Mine knows twelve languages, and has x-ray eyes.”

“My precious just picked up the Nobel Peace Prize.”

“Well mine just completed her third PhD.

Theoretical Maths, Physics and Chemisty.”

“My zazu discovered a new life on Mars.”

“My zazu invented pollution free cars.”

My zazu’s been on fifteen time travel trips.”

My zazu averted the Apocalypse.”

“MY zazu is better. MY zazu’s done more!”

“Your zazu has just had a wee on the floor.”

Last week we also had a whimsical little scene with a young lady trying to tame a wild unicorn, a surprising long short story in which a talking cow gets into No. 10 and demands equal rights for farm animals from the Prime Minister (I kid you not!), and finally today an interesting plot plan derived from the haunting lyrics of Slipknot’s Snuff. I originally intended to do some flash fiction for the song challenge, but the song really suggested a more complicated relationship than a short story can explore, so I’ve done a book idea instead. Another contender for NaNoWriMo perhaps? We shall see. Now let’s see what this week has in store!

This week I’m taking my inspiration from this article: http://io9.com/5791925/10-most-awesome-married-couples-in-science-fiction-and-fantasy

Let’s face it, an awful lot of subplots revolve around the main character eventually winning their love interest. This isn’t a criticism, most of my subplots revolve around that too. But, as I discussed with Markie at length once when I asked him if I could have a married RPG character one night when walking back to our hotel in Pisa, couples have lots of different conflicts and challenges to overcome which can be just as interesting for a narrative as the old ‘will they/won’t they’ thing. So this week I want to write about established couples. If you’re playing along at home you can create one couple and build them up throughout the week, or you can do a different one for each challenge. It’s up to you!

Monday 16th May – description challenge

Describe 2 characters who are in a long term relationship. They may or may not be married, they may or may not be the same gender, and they may or may not be the same species! Any pairings are fine as long as they love each other.

Tuesday 17th May – dialogue challenge

Write a conversation between between a couple in which they are having an argument about something. It could be about what colour to paint the dining room, or it could be about which of them is going to traverse the lava lake to get the fabled Blood Stone, depending on what kind of thing this couple usually get up to :).

Wednesday 18th May – Scene Challenge

A couple are enjoying a typical day, until one of them has an ex-lover show up unexpectedly. Write the scene.

Thursday 19th May – Dream Challenge

Write something based on a dream you’ve had recently.

Friday 20th May – Stream of Consciousness

Do some free writing around the theme ‘commitment’.

Saturday 21st May – Flash Fiction

Write a short story which features a couple. It can be about anything, but must include a ring. It does not have to be the kind of ring that goes on a finger. Could be an earring, a boxing ring, a phone ring, any kind of ring at all.

Sunday 22nd May – Pot Luck

Plan out a longer piece of fiction which features a couple as the main characters.

That’s all for this week!

[1] FYI, do you have any idea how hard it is to find a name for a nonsense animal that doesn’t already mean something rude on the internet? Finally settled on ‘zazu’ which is a character from the Lion King, but since they borrowed him from Pauly Parrot in Kimba the White Lion anyway I don’t feel too bad about borrowing the name.

Diary Challenge: 9th-15th May 2011

Did you enjoy Royal Wedding Special week? I wrote a series of radio scripts about a fairy tale wedding. An actual one with a fairy godmother and a witch and a rival for the fair maiden’s affections who isn’t willing to give up just because it’s her wedding day. I’ve done all seven dialogues as required but there has been a story running through them and it’s not quite done yet so I’m hoping to finish it next week, if I can find the time in between this week’s challenges and my university essay. Then maybe I’ll bribe some friends to record some of it for me just for fun :).

But now it’s time to move on to the next set of challenges! I’ve worked out with Script Frenzy and all the prep before hand I’ve written nothing but scripts for the last 2 months, so it’s time to get back to a bit of prose and the regular challenge format.

Monday 9th May – description challenge

Describe a pet of some kind and its owner. It can be a made up animal if you like.

Tuesday 10th May – dialogue challenge

Write a conversation between anyone you like, but a pet must feature in the discussion. It doesn’t have to be the same pet as Monday’s challenge. And the pet isn’t allowed to join in the conversation :p

Wednesday 11th May – Scene Challenge

Write a scene in which involves someone attempting to train an animal. It doesn’t have to be a pet this time. It could be a wild animal :).

Thursday 12th May – Dream Challenge

Write something based on a dream you’ve had recently.

Friday 13th May – stream of consciousness

Do some free writing around the theme of ‘luck’ or ‘unlucky’ depending on how superstitious you are 🙂

Saturday 14th May – Flash Fiction

Write a short story which features an animal as one of the main characters.

Sunday 15th May – Pot Luck

Write something based on a song. If you don’t know which song put your mp3 player on to random and pick the first thing that sounds inspirational. My Script Frenzy story was inspired by Green Day’s ‘The Static Age’ :).

That’s all for now. TTFN folks!

Diary Challenge: 1st-8th May 2011

Well, first thing’s first:

Script Frenzy Winner BadgerI am a Winner!

Yes, I successfully completed 100 pages in 30 days, and I even finished the story. My first thought was ‘Yay!’. My second thought was ‘Yikes, I need something else to write tomorrow!’. So I have only moments to bask in the euphoria of victory before I must press on with the year long writing challenge. I wonder if this it what being a proper writer is like?

Since it’s the last day of the week I think it’s ok to spend one more day on Script Frenzy before starting fresh next week for the new month, so today you may carry on with your script if you haven’t finished, or spend some time reflecting on what you did if you have. You can make some notes on what you would change when you edit, note anything that’s unresolved, or write down some ideas for a sequel. Then tomorrow it’s the start of a new week of challenges :).

2nd-8th May

This week it’s a Royal Wedding special. Markie set me a guest challenge and it fitted with the big news of the week so I thought I’d use it now. The challenge is to write 7 different conversations at a wedding. Any people at all can be involved, but they are all at the same wedding. It could be a royal wedding. Markie is offering bonus points if it involves a prince who turns out to be gay. I’m not offering any points at all :P.

Next week we’ll go back to the usual challenge format for a while. Have fun!

100 Days!

Because of Script Frenzy I didn’t post any new challenges last week, and I’m not doing any this week either, but I did feel bad that I didn’t blog at all. I’m dutifully writing one page of script into my diary every day, and as fortune would have it one A5 written page is about 2-3 typed script pages so I’m just about keeping my head above water and I’m only 4 pages behind. I am however having to waste precious writing time typing up the diary pages, and getting ahead is a bit tricky since I can’t go onto the next page until I reach the right day.

But enough about that. Today is a big day. It’s April 11th, which means it’s Day 100 of my writing challenge! Yay! I’m feeling very proud of myself for still going strong 100 days in. Last time I tried to set myself a challenge like this I wrote 67 words before giving up. Yes, 67 whole words. I think it’s safe to say that this year is going better. Not that it isn’t a challenge. This is what an average day looks like for me at the moment:

6:30am: Markie and I get up and get Ben ready

8:00am: I leave for work

8:24am: I catch the bus and start writing

8:40am: I get to work and carry on writing

9:00am: I start work and hope I’ve finished writing because I’ve got no more time!

12:pm: Have lunch and do OU work

1:00pm: Back to work

5:00pm: Finish work and get Ben

7:00pm: Ben’s bath and bedtime

9:00pm: Time for OU work again

10:oopm: Fall asleep on the sofa

6:30am next morning: start all over again!

Sounds fun, right? It’s not always like that. We do fit in some RPG in the week, but in general we’re busy busy busy, and if not for my diary challenge I don’t think I’d get any writing done at all. So diary, I salute you! And in honour of 100 days I think I should post something from the diary. Hubby is taking some Zombie photos tomorrow night, so I give you the product of my free writing exercise from February 13th, unedited and exactly how it poured out of my subconscious. The theme was ‘Alternative’.

Warning: contains homeopathy, terminal illness and possibly zombies, but no bad language or nudity. Sorry about that :).

Alternative Therapy

Alternative Therapy. That was how it all started. There were too many diseases that conventional medicine just hadn’t been able to treat yet, and there was so little hope of it happening within the lifetime of many sufferers at the time. We thought they deserved some hope. Our studies showed that health declined slower in patients who took our course of treatment. Our critics said it was just a placebo effect, and maybe it was at first. It was standard homeopathic treatments, but patients wanted to feel like they were doing something to fight their illness, not just sitting around waiting to die.

I can’t remember which of us came up with the idea first, not that it makes much difference now, but somehow we came to the agreement to change the medicine. Having diluted particles of the virus might be more effective if it was introduced with infected human cells, then the patient’s body would learn what the other body knew about the disease. It then followed that if we included cells from all the patients they could all work together. Hundreds of immune systems combining their knowledge to defeat the disease.

At first the patients were concerned at the thought of consuming the flesh of each other, but we assured them that through the dilution process there wouldn’t actually be any human cells in the medicine, but of course the water would remember the information from all the immune systems and transmit it to theirs. Many of them agreed. They had nothing to lose. Or so we all thought.

I don’t know what went wrong, but after a week of the new treatments the patients started to act strangely. Lethargic, slowed responses, cravings for high protein foods and offal. We stopped the treatment but they kept getting worse. Then, on the fifteenth day, the first killing happened. They devoured the doctor who came to check on them. The nurse escaped with a bite, but within hours she started to show symptoms too. Now it’s out and spreading like wild fire. I was bitten an hour ago. I thought I should write this down so someone would know what happened, before I forget…

Diary Challenge: 28th March – 3rd April 2011

It’s going to be April next week, which means it’s going to be Script Frenzy! It also means I’ve got 4 days to fill up before I get there. And you know what? 4 days is just enough to plan one more idea before the madness starts :). This week I’ve been working on a little webseries called ‘The Captain’s Blog’, which I’m thinking is the one I’m going to write next month, but we’ll see. It’s about a ship captain called Tori Keller, who was inspired by an old RPG character of mine (Yes, Markie, it is Lexi), who’s passing the time on a long solo trip by making a video blog when a man (no, Markie, it’s not Grey :P) walks onto the bridge. Who is he and how did he get there? It’s a mystery that can only be solved in a mini webseries, obviously!

But what are we doing next week? Well, let’s just stick with what’s been working for now. We’re planning a new script and this one can be anything!

Monday 28th March: Description Challenge

Generate a character name using the Seventh Sanctum quick name generator, then we’re going to look up the meaning of the chosen name and use it for inspiration for some of the character. Describe them in whatever way is appropriate for your chosen script style.

Tuesday 29th March: Dialogue Challenge

This week the conversation must be between at least 3 people, and the topic of conversation is a character who is absent.

Wednesday 30th March: Scene/Flash Fiction Challenge

Since we only have 4 days this week you can do a scene or a stand alone story with your character/s. This scene must include a McGuffin!

Thursday 31st March: Planning

It’s the last day before Script Frenzy so you’ve got one day to do a plan for this script.

Friday 1st April: Script Frenzy!

What are you still looking at me for? I just spent the last 4 weeks helping you come up with 4 ideas. Go write one of them! Go write all of them if you like. Come back and see me in May :P.

Good Luck!

Diary Challenge: 21st-27th March 2011

Tomorrow is my first day back at work after maternity leave, so it will be interesting to see how I keep up with this and my college course, since I still plan to spend a few hours a night playing with my son :), but I’m starting out with good intentions.

Last week the name generator gave me Nona Saunders. Nona means ‘Ninth’ and is representative of the nine months of pregnancy, and Saunders comes from Alexander which means ‘defending men’, so my comic book heroine ended up being a pregnant woman trying to rescue her baby’s father. A tricky feat considering she doesn’t know where he is and she’s supposed to be pretending to be a boy so she can be apprenticed to a wizard who won’t train girls. Since one of last week’s challenges was to give the MC a buddy I tried the same thing with the name generator and got Sofia Byrd. Sofia means ‘Wisdom’ and Bryd is a family name for someone who hunts or raises birds, interestingly enough, so I made Sofia a more mature character who Nona goes to for help and confides in, and made her a sort of wilderness scout who has a falcon. Since the name generator thing still seems to be working we’re doing it again this week!

Monday 21st March: Description Challenge

Generate a character name using the Seventh Sanctum quick name generator, then we’re going to look up the meaning of the chosen name and use it for inspiration for some of the character. This week we’re going to be working on a motion script so what the description needs will depend on what you’re writing. If it’s a play or a film then costume and character traits are very important, but don’t focus too much on physical aspects that are not relevant to the plot as how they will look will really depend on the actor playing them in the end. So if it’s important that the character is blond because people are going to assume she’s a blond airhead throughout the story go ahead and mention it, but if not there’s probably not much point. On the other hand if you’re planning an animation then go into as much detail as possible on the physical characteristics so the artist will know how to draw them :).

Tuesday 22nd March: Dialogue Challenge

This week let’s give the character a monologue or a voice over.

Wednesday 23rd March: Scene Challenge

In this scene the character is going to make a shocking discovery! Maybe about another character, or an object, or themselves.

Thursday 24th March: Dream Challenge

Dreams again. OK, dreams usually look like a movie anyway so putting it back into script for should be a piece of cake.

Friday 25th March: Stream of Consciousness

Still on a poetry break so it’s free writing again today. The focus word is ‘Play’.

Saturday 26th March: Flash Fiction Challenge

Write a short script involving your character. It can be about anything that works for them.

Sunday 27th March: Pot Luck – series/story plan

If it’s a series, what are the first few episodes? If it’s a movie or play then do a more detailed plan for the one story your working on.

And we’re finished! Next week there will be a couple of exercises to refine the chosen Script Frenzy piece, then on April 1st it’s a break for script writing month!