A Cool Writing Exercise and A Little Bit More About Me

2 Comments

So I’m actually gonna do it the other way around: more about me first, then I’ll show you the cool writing exercise. Ha. So you have to read through all this extra stuff about me before you can get to the cool writing thing. Unless of course you skip down to the bottom of the post. But please don’t do that. You’ll make me cry cybertears.

Now, on to me. I realized I’d neglected to mention a couple of pretty important things in my first post, so I figured I’d better make another post and finish introducing myself.

I’m a Christian (as it says in my handy little blog header thingy), a teenager (but no parties here), and I’m homeschooled (no, I do not normally do school in my pajamas. I’ve gotta shower and stuff, too, you know. Sheesh). Fanfictions are a major passion of mine; I’ve been writing them since I was about 10 years old and daydreaming about them since long before that. A couple of years ago, I started posting my stories on fanfiction.net, so now people actually get to read about some of my crazy little ideas. ;)

As I mentioned above, both in the post and in the header, I’m a Christian and my favorite Bible verse is 1st Timothy 4:12: “Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but you can set the example for believers through your love, through your faith, through your speech, through your conduct, and through your purity.” I wrote that mostly from memory, so it might be slightly off, but that’s the gist of it.

OK, I think that’s all the important stuff. If I think of anything else, I’ll be sure to let you know in future blog posts.

Now on to the cool writing exercise!!!

I found this on the Go Teen Writers blog, and they got it from Donald Maass’ book, Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook. This exercise really helped me this past week in coming up with some new plotlines for the WIP I’m editing.

This exercise is really good if you feel like the pacing in your book is too fast or it just feels like something is missing. First, write down a bunch of character names, settings, and events you already have onto post-its or index cards. If the papers are small enough, put them all in a bowl, mix up the cards, and pick them out at random. Read over whatever cards you have (i.e. Jamie; Chrissa’s engagement party) and see if you can find a way to connect those two and come up with a whole new plotline! Does Jamie meet her future boyfriend at Chrissa’s party? Or could something happen that reminds her of terrible nightmares from her childhood?

If you’re using index cards, you could lay them face down like you’re playing Memory, and switch them around again till they’re all mixed up. Then, you pick them up, same as above, and see if this gets any new muses mulling around in your brain.

It worked pretty well for me; I came up with five new plotlines, at least four of which I’m definitely going to use. And I didn’t do the exercise alone either. I got my mom and my brother to pick some cards out, which was kind of interesting because they had no idea what any of the cards had to do with each other.

All that to say, if you’re feeling a bit stuck, I would definitely suggest trying this out. It was fun and helpful.

For the Go Teen Writers post see: http://goteenwriters.blogspot.com/2011/06/editing-big-stuff-plot.html

Cheerio!!!

2 comments:

UnknownFebruary 10, 2014 at 9:47 PM
I just read that post at GTW the other day!! I tried it too. I thought it was pretty fun. :)

Why do people just assume that we home-schoolers wake up at like twelve, work in our pjs, have our work done with-in an hour, then have the rest of the day to party?
We have lives too! I have never done my school work in my pjs.

Like your blog BTW!!

teenwordsofsteel.blogspot.com
Alexa MintahFebruary 10, 2014 at 9:55 PM
I have no idea why, but they do. :p And I don't think I've ever done schoolwork in my pajamas either.

Thanks!