Write Ideas 101 Creative Prompts to Set Your Writing Free by The Write Turn Copyright 2012 The

Write Turn Illustrations from www.openclipart.org Cover image Open Door Classics 3 by svilen001 Cover Degisn and book layout by Kate Krake This is a free eBook. If you enjoy it, please tell all of your friends, family and random strangers and encourage them to download their own copy from The Write Turn. I would love to hear what you thought of the book, or any of the prompts, and share some stories with you. Comments about Write Ideas can be made on the Download Page. Email is also welcome. All comments and questions are welcome. The Write Turn Turning Your Writing Around

How to Use This Book

There are a quite a few different ways to use writing prompts and quite a few different ways a writing prompt might use you. A writing prompt can be like a seed - it lands in the fertile ground of your mind and nourished by your imagination, a story emerges slowly and carefully like a plant. A writing prompt can also be like a tiny spark in a room full of gas. One little point of ignition and then BOOM! Your story explodes in your mind and the only thing stopping it coming out is how fast you can write it down. The prompts in this book might work either way. They might work in a completely different way unique to you. You might use one, or you might join ten together, or the entire 101 to make for something really special! Whichever way you youse these prompts, or whichever way they use you, there are stories in all of them.

Perhaps a prompt will be the start of your new story. Perhaps it will be the push you need to get you over a hump in your current work in progress. How you use this book, as with most things in creative writing, is entirely up to you!

Try choosing one at random and free writing for five minutes. Choose another at random and let it stew in your mind for 24 hours and see what comes out. Choose one prompt and write three stories from different genres. Go through the book, reading everyone and at the end, write your story based on the one that made you laugh. The one that made your squirm. The one that made you sad, or confused. Or just pick the one that brought a story with it the easiest. When you're done choosing your own direction, turn to the Random Writing Tables at the end of this book, take a dice and let the roll of chance decide some parameters for your story. Absolute fun and maximum creativity guaranteed!

Happy Writing!

It was just a pair of old tennis shoes, but I couldnt look away.

The first time I saw that dead cat...

The Internet suddenly stops working, everywhere on earth, and is completely down for two weeks.

Android girlfriends are all well and good, but this is going too far.

couldnt believe she was asking me to do this? She knew what Id been through!

Strangers eyes meet across a bar. These people dont know each other but have something major in common and its about to kill one of them.

Call me old fashioned, but pizza just should not contain.

ss ib av ith w le

That was the last thing anyone expected to find in a bubble gum machine.

Dont be ridiculous, that fish is not looking at you.

an

is

gi

fte

fu

tu

re

isi

on

of

tw o

po

and thats why Ill never eat

vegetables again

So I never want to hear you say you dont believe in magic ever again.

Growing up with eight brothers will do that to a girl.

A man finds international fame after success on a game show only to discover a secret

What youre smelling right now hold the answer to al of the mysteries of the universe, but only for one person.

No, Im not saying Im telepathic, but yeah, I can read your mind.
That has to be the most romantic thing a woman has ever done.

Do

you er

ou seri

sly

th

I ink

bel

yo ieve

uv

nev

hi met

m?

A man finds naked images of himself on the internet that he has no recollection of.

Yes, Madam. This is indeed the last Rolls Royce in existence.

A human baby is born with scales and horns and the ability to breathe out flames.

Hes just far too young to know what real love is.

He had never felt so free, so alive but it was nothing compared to the misery he felt at knowing it was not going to last.

An anorexic man takes a secret late night visit to an all you can eat Chinese restaurant

Through a clerical error to do with his own graduation, a high school teacher finds himself back in high school.

A woman is recruited through a secretarial agency and discovers something mysterious and intriguing about her new boss and coworkers.

s s e k r s c e d o h ar Cl w ry kw e c ev ba g in o g

r ta

A rich lawyer decides shes going to move to the country and farm goats.

Hes just WRONG in every way!

A man receives a phone call telling him he has only 24 hours to live unless he does exactly as hes told.

I swear to you, this is the first time I have ever picked up a violin.

All A.I beings, humanoid or not, are given the right to vote.

A ca

d e t s e r t is ar

r. e d r u for m

She had never hoped to find romance again, and she was right.

I never realised how many scars I had until I started looking closely at my skin.

A woman and her dog live a life of troubled fame and for tune after becoming a multimillion dollar Internet sensation twenty years earlier.

A government agent finds his own name on a Most Wanted List and knows who put it there.

A small boy witnesses a womans murder, and recognises his teacher as one of the killers.

I should never have taught him to play the piano

On the night of a record jackpot draw, a national lottery machine explodes killing all of the lottery officials in the room. The explosion was not an accident.

No one really liked my brother, but to me, he was a hero.

One shoe, small like a childs, its leather worn and cracked was the only thing left.

A young mans boyfriend confesses to having fantasised about murdering him. A young married couple quit their jobs and buy a campervan.

Mums new boyfriend would be perfect if he wasnt a vegetarian.

It was as though, from the very moment of her birth, a curse of sadness had settled on her life and she knew now it could never be lifted.

A woman discovers her boss is tampering with the company books and shes about to get the blame.

A chef sees an exact likeness of his own face when he cuts through a side of bacon.

This was all there was, this very moment, all there would ever need to be. A perfect instance of happiness.

I just dont like science fiction! Why is that a crime?

She had always wanted to see the plains of Africa. Soon it would be too late.

A man has been pretending to go to work everyday rather than tell his wife he was fired. One day, a stranger offers him a new job.

The only thing he recognised about her were her eyes, those hadnt changed a bit.

The village will be lost by nightfall.

What gives you the right to treat your family like this? Now? Of all times we should be sticking together more than ever!

So I forgot the password! Like youve never forgotten anything in your life?

A woman who has lived alone for years, in a house that was built just for her, finds a gun and a small, locked metal box concealed in the back of her drawer.

A famous jazz guitarist has his hand shattered in a freak accident and will never be able to play his guitar again.

A woman is concerned by how much her wife has started drinking after work.

I cant help it, I love her. You think love is a choice?

After a major car accident, a woman starts to believe her family and everyone around her are imposters spying for some secret operative.

And there it was, his heart, right there beside his foot.

The only truth is that everyone lies, all of the time.

Imagine that you could only say one last thing and then have to be silent for the rest of your life.

You wake up one morning and your senses are all muddled around - smell is sight, touch is hearing, et cetera

Hes no ordinary valentine, thats for sure.

After everything that happened, everything hed lost, hed always be thankful for

Who knew marzipan and bowling would prove such a fateful combination?
Thats taking the phrase bleeding heart just a little too literally

How did we get so far from the sun?

I had to look twice, but I was certain it was him. What was he doing here? In our little town?

There was no denying it. she was undoubtedly flying.

I blame that mixed tape for everything!

His life was a complete replay of

She hadnt seen another living thing for weeks, and yet there it was, that same bull, staring at her from the hotel across the street.

One day, God decided to allow everyone on earth to choose one single improvement or addition to make to their body.

You wake up writing. What have you written?

It was sure fire way to get the popularity hed always known he was meant to have!

Oh my god? I cannot believe you are seriously going to marry her?

A middle aged woman discovers a terrible secret in her elderly mothers garage.

The United States gets split into four separate nations.

...and then she just admitted to the murder, like it was any casual conversation.

Of course I did! Though I was drunk at the time. I guess that helped.

Ive always wanted a little brother, but this is certainly not what I had in mind.

It was going to take a lot of work, but if she could just undo that knot

That has to be at least 50 kilograms of bananas!

Are you saying you only think you love me?

An old man receives a postcard from a man claiming to be his father. The card is dated twenty years before.

There was just something awful about the site of those roses in the trash.

A 50 year old man has worked at a fruit stall for forty years and one day decides to go to university and study physics.

No! Those arent the words! How many times do we have to go through this?

A woman comes home with a new car she hasnt consulted her husband about buying.

A littl

eve boy d s.

lops

bia o h p a

of

clock

I dont know what got into her, shes never had a problem with the dog before

Youre not invisible. You just dont exist anymore If that dog could talk, I reckon hed have a voice like Columbo. Yeah, but what would he say?

Can you believe, I made it to fifty? After all thats happened?

iably

n unde t u b ly ental d i c c a ts is s o h of g case. e t c r n u co xiste reme p The e u s ing a r u d n prove

Strange as it felt to admit, all he needed was a cuddle.

I cant be sure, but doesnt it sorta look like pink marshmallow to you?

A woman swears never to listen to music again.

Random Writing Tables

Instructions 1. Roll a dice and select a table according to the number you rolled. 2. Roll again and select the condition within the table you have chosen 3. Write!

Table 1 - Number Rolled 1 2 3 4 5 6 Table 2 - Number Rolled 1 2 3 4 5 6

Table 1 - Genre Horror Drama Science Fiction/Fantasy Comedy Romance Action/Adventure Table 2 - Setting Tropical rainforest New York City Small, isolated desert town Arctic wilderness Urban industrial estate Rich suburb

Table 3 - Number Rolled 1 2 3 4 5 6

Table 3 - Time Present 1700-1800s 2680 410 AD 2000 BC An invented time period not from this earth

Table 4 - Number Rolled 1 2 3 4 5 6 * anoyone who sucessfully achieves either of these, Id really like to read your story!

Table 4 - Point of View First Second Third Split between first and third Split between first and second * Split between second and third *

Table 5 - Number Rolled 1 2 3 4 5 6

Table 5 - You Must Include A Sheep A Navy Officer The Number Eleven David Attenborough Motor Racing Insatiable Thirst

Table 6 - Number Rolled 1 2 3 4 5 6

Table 6 - Your Story Must Be Happy Sad Emotionally mixed Entirely populated by women Exactly 2012 words long For Children