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Strange Company: Newspaper Clipping of the Day: It

Seed Stories

                Came across another interesting writing exercise, from a book called Writing in the House of Dreams by JennyAlexander. It is about what creating what she calls Seed Stories, that is, memories which can provide material for future writing. She says:

                …three random incidents you can remember from your childhood can contain the seeds of all your stories in later life.

                They have to be private memories, things which no one has ever talked about, so you can be certain they are authentically yours. They can’t be the sort of anecdotes people in the family remember and share, because those have a kind of group ownership.

You write about each seed story for no longer than ten minutes.

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An interesting writing exercise

Found in Natalie Goldberg's Wild Mind:

                'Do a timed writing for ten minutes. Begin with “I remember” and keep going.  Every time you get stuck and feel you have nothing to say, write “I remember” again and keep going. To begin with “I remember” does not mean you have to write only about your past. Once you get going, you can follow your own mind where it takes you. You can fall into a memory of your mother’s teeth for ten minutes of writing or you can list lots of short memories. The memory can be something that happened five seconds ago. When you write a memory, it isn’t in the past anyway. It’s alive right now.

                Okay, after the ten minutes, stop. Walk around your kitchen table or get a piece of leftover fish from last night’s dinner to nibble on, but don’t talk. Now go for another ten minutes. This time, begin with “I don’t remember” and keep going. This is good. It gets to the underbelly of your mind, the blank, dark spaces of your thoughts.

Sometimes we write along one highway of “I remember,” seat-belt ourselves in and drive. Using the negative, “I don’t remember,” allows us to make a U-turn and see how things look in the night. What are the things you don’t care to remember, have repressed, but remember underneath all the same?

Now try “I’m thinking of” for ten minutes. Then, “I’m not thinking of” for ten minutes. Write, beginning with “I know,” then “I don’t know,” for ten minutes. The list is endless: “I am, I’m not”; “I want, I don’t want”; “I feel, I don’t feel.”

I use these for warm-ups. It stretches my mind in positive and negative directions, in obvious and in hidden places, in the conscious and the unconscious. It is also a chance to survey my mind and limber me up before I direct my thoughts to whatever I am working on.'

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Come Closer

Microhorror have published another of my flash fiction stories:

http://www.microhorror.com/microhorror/author/paul-chown/come-closer/

Looking for an idea for a novel?

From How To Write Your First Novel by Sophie King, an exercise to help you find ideas for a novel: Write down five different ‘canvases’ for a novel. For example, an amateur dramatic group; a garden centre; a school. Now write down five different characters. For example, a headmistress; a down and out; a retired banker. Then write down five different problems or difficulties in life. For example, moving house; losing something important; falling out with an aunt. Cut out each idea so that you have a total of fifteen strips of paper. Put the ‘canvas’ ideas into one jam jar. The ‘character’ ideas into a second jam jar. And the ‘problems’ in a third. Take one strip of paper out of each jam jar and see what you come up with. For instance, you might have a headmistress who loses something important when she is in a play. If that doesn’t grab you, take another three pieces of paper and move them around so you come up with an idea that makes you think of a possible story for a novel.

Real life

A piece of advice I read recently (I can't remember where) about using real people as the models for your fictional characters: don't use only one person as a model. But, if you know of two people with things in common, create a composite from them.

Cash In Hand, and Hargreaves

Rather belatedly, I am pleased to announce that Microhorror have published two more of my flash fiction horror stories: http://www.microhorror.com/microhorror/author/paul-chown/cash-in-hand and http://www.microhorror.com/microhorror/author/paul-chown/hargreaves .