Is your setting set in nature? Do you walk in the woods or is it in town with noise? Let’s pretend that your primary character is walking in the woods and is unused to all the sights and sounds of the rustling and riffling of the leaves or crunching from smaller animals. Has this person ever come straight up with a deer? What will they feel like? What are they seeing? Do they fear the sounds of cracking of the trees? Let’s write about it, shall we?
Let’s begin by choosing a character that needs to be shaken up! If you’re in the middle of a project and don’t quite know where to go—you know what I’m talking about. Let’s take a fish out of water and see what this person will do. They are people, right!
Once you’ve chosen your person or character, set the timer for 20 minutes and begin to write. Here’s some of what I wrote:
I woke early in the morning and looked out across the back yard and wondered where the devil I was. The early morning sun helped clear my head as I sat up and listened. I wasn’t used to living in town with traffic and voices. I found it interesting and bothersome. At home where there was silence and only a loud muffler once in a while is all the noise I heard. How am I going to manage here, by myself, in search of my lost childhood friend?
Okay! Stop the timer if you haven’t already. Above is a portion of what I wrote. I started with a paragraph from one of my books and then changed the whole book in one sweep of a few words. ‘where the devil I was’. The whole perspective and story itself is completely different from the published book. Wow! I could write a new book with that paragraph.
Go ahead and write-write-write! Enjoy the day!
Barb
