A word prompt to get your creativity flowing this weekend. How you use the prompt is up to you. Write a piece of flash fiction, a poem, a chapter for your novel…anything you like. Or take the challenge below – there are no prizes – it’s not a competition but rather a fun writing exercise. If you want to share what you come up with, please leave a link to it in Sammi’s Comment Section.
AMERICAN LEGACY
Nineteen years ago, I experienced southern hospitality in Selma, Alabama with friends
A restaurant we went to served wonderful food with a side of grisly history. A pit beside the front door had been a holding cell for slave auctions. I lost my appetite.
As we drove over the Edmund Pettis bridge my heart swelled. I imagined the hundreds of American citizens who marched across it, tenaciously fighting for what was rightfully theirs.
No fiction in this story. Guess it’s the time of year. Martin Luther King Jr. day is tomorrow in the States. He was a true American Hero who leaves behind a legacy…for all Americans. (At least that’s how I see it.)
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
This week marks my 8th anniversary as Friday Fictioneers facilitator and my 5th anniversary as a retired sign maker/cake decorator. So I’m taking the liberty of sharing a twofer.
Genre: Hysterical Faction
Word Count: 100
HONCHO DORI
My coworker and best friend was fired for saying, of all things, “Hunky Dory.” Her flippant reply to my “How’s your day going?” at her register. I kid you not. The charge was “sarcasm to a customer and, therefore, misconduct.” Seriously?
The company’s plan to purge the “old folks” put a target on my back, too.
At an emotional low I joined Friday Fictioneers. I tried it. I loved it. By October 24, I inherited the blog challenge.
Eight years later, my friend’s victorious lawsuit is a story we retell with glee. Friday Fictioneers? Yep, I’m still steering the bus.
It’s still hunky dory with us.
YEE-HAW!!!
I ran out words to tell you my friend was fired March 7, 2012 and I joined Friday Fictioneers a month later on April 12.
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Now for the second go around as promised. 😉 I posted this 24 October 2012, after inheriting Friday Fictioneers from creator Madison Woods. This was the only time I didn’t title my post with the date. I was told by a fictioneer that it was too confusing for me to post my title because it gave the impression that my title was part of the prompt. I complied and never saw her again. Go figure. There are some fictioneers who stuck with me, even though they were here before me. You know who you are. 😉 If I list them I’m bound to leave someone out. At any rate here’s my first story as facilitator. Same photo prompt.
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100
OF SIGHT AND SOUND
A stunning contradiction of cropped black hair, bronzed skin and sea foam blue eyes, Aggie McKewen’s face reflected her Inuit and Scottish parentage.
Keith, who worked at his uncle’s café in Seward County, Alaska, longed to speak to her but didn’t know sign language and she was fencepost deaf. Every Saturday he served her grilled salmon in shy silence.
After six weeks of night classes he felt ready to declare himself and asked her out.
With a voiceless giggle she snatched his pen and order pad. There she wrote, “I’d love to but why did you call me a tampon?”
A word prompt to get your creativity flowing this weekend. How you use the prompt is up to you. Write a piece of flash fiction, a poem, a chapter for your novel…anything you like. Or take the challenge below – there are no prizes – it’s not a competition but rather a fun writing exercise. If you want to share what you come up with, please leave a link to it Sammi’s Comment Section.
It’s funny how word prompts take me to an altogether different place than a photo prompt. 😉
Nope. Not telling you how long ago this was.
SLEEPWALKER
Sleep like a baby? What baby actually sleeps “like a baby”? Most mothers of infants will tell you, “Taint so.”
To be fair, it depends on the child. My first one slept through the night at six weeks.
Between my second and third babies, the term “nightlife” took on a whole new meaning. It meant nursing every two hours while watching MTV. Sing it Lionel. “All Night Long.”
During the day, eyes glazed, I became the quintessential somnambulist.
Here’s one of those videos I enjoyed in the middle of the night. 😉
A word prompt to get your creativity flowing this weekend. How you use the prompt is up to you. Write a piece of flash fiction, a poem, a chapter for your novel…anything you like. Or take the challenge below – there are no prizes – it’s not a competition but rather a fun writing exercise. If you want to share what you come up with, please leave a link to it in Sammi’s Comment Section
I love the way these word prompts send me in very different directions. Usually straight down Memory Lane. 27 words, title not included.
THIS, THAT AND RECENTLY, THE OTHER
The day my anthology debuted was
overwhelming
epoch.
I write.
The publisher mysteriously vanished.
Still I write.
Four more books-in-print later,
I write.
I write.
I write.
On the verge of a new career in 2011.
Apologies to the inspirational Maya Angelou, may her memory be blessed.
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
A word prompt to get your creativity flowing this weekend. How you use the prompt is up to you. Write a piece of flash fiction, a poem, a chapter for your novel…anything you like. Or take the challenge below – there are no prizes – it’s not a competition but rather a fun writing exercise. If you want to share what you come up with, please leave a link to Sammi’s comment section.
Title is included in my 106 words.
OH, FOR THICKER SKIN
One morning I went to Amazon, as I do occasionally and found a new review on my first novel that has an average of 4.5 stars. Eagerly I read the latest. Despair riddled me as I skimmed the scathing comments.
“One-dimensional characters. Immature writing.”
By the time I finished reading three paragraphs of venom I couldn’t breathe. My head throbbed.
I quit. I’ll never write another word. I’m a failure.
The next day another review appeared on the same book.
Today, April 1st, Pegman takes us 225 million kilometers to Mars.
Feel free to stroll around the area using the Google street view and grab any picture you choose to include in your post. Be sure to wear your helmet, and watch out for storms!
To enjoy stories inspired by the What Pegman Saw prompt or to submit your own 150-word story, visit the inLinkz button:
For guidelines and rules for the What Pegman Saw weekly writing prompt, visit the home page.
Happy April One-eth. So it should surprise me that our host should choose a place like Mars? Below is my choice from the Pegman Prompt Buffet and my story, submitted for your approval.
Genre: Memoir and Musing
Word Count: 150
WHERE NO AUTHOR HAS GONE BEFORE
In the 1950’s, my parents, who owned a restaurant in downtown KC, would hand my brother a few dollars and say, “Jeff, take your sister to the movies.” This afforded them a couple of child-free hours.
Jeff chose the movies. I never minded. We saw them all—The Mysterians, Forbidden Planet, and so on—while munching popcorn and jujubes. I don’t remember being bothered by the fact that, in many of the flicks, the actors’ lips didn’t sync with the dubbed voices.
When I turned eleven, Jeff introduced me to “The Martian Chronicles.” I fell in love with Bradbury’s golden eyed, bronzed skinned Martians.
My love for sci-fi has continued over the years. Yet, my writing hasn’t bent much in that direction. Heinlein I’ll never be.
However, given the unprecedented popularity of “The Martian,” perhaps I’d attract a larger audience if I’d written, “Please Say Kaddish for Me on Mars.”
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In any event, if you do like historical fiction about the Jewish pogroms in Eastern Europe at the turn of the twentieth century you might enjoy my trilogy 😉 :
The next photo is the PROMPT. Remember, all photos are property of the photographer, donated for use in Friday Fictioneers only. They shouldn’t be used for any other purpose without express permission. It is proper etiquette to give the contributor credit.
Sunday was “Fan Tan” night when I was eight. My family played the card game for pennies.
“Where’s that seven of hearts?” Dad tossed a copper on the table with mock disgust. “Shelly? You only have one card left?”
“The little brat’s got it,” said my fourteen-year-old brother pitching his coin.
I batted my eyelashes. “Why, Jeffrey, whatever do you mean?” With a dramatic flourish, I laid down the seven. “I win!”
It’s not the victories I remember as much as the unprecedented peace between my parents, my father’s relentless teasing, and laughing so hard I nearly wet my pants.
Rochelle Wisoff-Fields-Addicted to Purple 