Prompt #2

Seven Sentences

Note: Well, kind people. It’s clear I have no idea what I’m doing. I posted #2 yesterday (while sick with a fever) and when i checked this morning, realized there was no way to make comments on the post. Also, it had posted with the wrong date! So I deleted the post altogether and am trying again.

Apologies. Substack is both easy to figure out and impossible.

Okay, so here we go, hopefully without problems this time.

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First of all, thanks to everyone who responded to the six-word story prompt last week. That was so much fun. I loved your willingness to give it a try. And I must say, I was pleasantly surprised by the turnout! Thanks so much—if no one had responded I think I would have shrugged my shoulders and called it a day on my Substack. But—we live on to see another day! 

This next one is also simple, fun, and not terribly time-consuming. (No worries—there will be plenty of more complicated prompts later. But for now, let’s just get into the groove of this thing.) This one’s called THE SEVEN SENTENCE STORY. I have no idea where I first came across this prompt. Like the six-word story prompt, I’ve a feeling this one’s been around for a while. Thank you to whoever invented it.

The gist of it is……..WRITE A STORY IN SEVEN SENTENCES.

But not just any seven sentences. The seven-sentence story goes like this:

1.     First sentence: Introduce one character.

2.     Second sentence: introduce a second character and establish some kind of conflict, either between the characters or not. Just present a conflict/problem.

3.     Third sentence: the problem grows more complex, or the conflict gets worse.

4.     Fourth sentence: First character speaks (or makes an action)

5.     Fifth sentence: Second character speaks (or makes an action)

6.     Sixth sentence: The CLIMAX of the story

7.     Seventh sentence: Resolution

And there you have it. In seven sentences, you’ve created a story.

As you may have noticed, this little exercise pretty much forces you to put on paper the conventional elements of storytelling. We’ve got characters, we’ve got an inciting incident (Sentence #2), we’ve got rising action, we’ve got a crisis moment/climax, and then there’s the good old resolution. Now I know some people don’t like to think about conventional storytelling for fear that their stories will be too… conventional. But we are the NO FEAR PLACE around here. We are the PRACTICE WITHOUT JUDGMENT place. Give the exercise a whirl, even if you roll your eyes at story conventions. Just have fun with it and don’t bother with having any other thoughts. Just: fun. Just: why not? This is only an exercise, not your Opus Greatness. And you’ll end up with a story, which is always better than not writing anything at all.

Here are a few rules: There aren’t any. As always, you can do whatever you want with this one. If you need EIGHT sentences, then by all means write your story in eight sentences. If you don’t want to follow the outline, then don’t—write seven sentences that follow your own way into a story. You can do whatever you want as long as when you’re done, you have a little story on the page.

Do you want an example? Here’s one I wrote just moments ago for your reading pleasure:

1.     Dorothy wanted to go to the movies that night.

2.     Richard, tired, hungry, and already on his second beer of the evening, really did not want to go out.

3.     Dorothy put on her coat and headed for the door.

4.     “I wish, for once, you’d just do what I want to do,” she said to Richard.

5.     “Ditto,” Richard said.

6.     Dorothy looked at her husband, looked at the ceiling, sighed, buttoned her coat, and walked out the door.

7.     When she came home after the movie—it had been a love story, and watching it had made her feel love for Richard once more—all the locks had been changed.

Wow, kind of a depressing story! But I did it—I wrote a story in seven sentences. Is it a good story? It is not! But who cares? Before I wrote it, I had…no story. And now I’ve got this one. 

Your turn! Go ahead and post your story in the comments. (If you want. Up to you. No pressure!) But I’d love to see what you come up with. (And/or feel free to post a six-word story if you’d rather. They’re so much fun!) Also, feel free to post questions, comments, whatever in the comments. 

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ONE LAST THING: As this thing progresses, you should know that I’m not going to be commenting on everyone’s stories. Here’s the thing: if I comment on one person’s and not another person’s, then I’ll feel bad! Just know that if I DON’T comment on your piece, it doesn’t mean I didn’t love it or that I don’t love you. I love everything you post! When you join in here with me, it just plain makes me happy. So post away, and know that I saw it. And that I’m rooting for you to keep going. (Or don’t post. Your choice!)

Most of the time, I will just be writing something like “Great job! Keep going!” which is what my friend used to write me (at my request), week after week when I sent her pieces of my novel-in-progress. When the novel was finally published, she couldn’t believe it. 

“The stuff you were sending me was so bad!” she said. 

“But you kept telling me “Great job! Keep going!” I said. 

“That’s because you told me to!” 

And that, I am here to tell you, is how a novel gets written. Terribly, at first. And then, revised until cooked.

So, let’s all write terribly! BAD IS GOOD AROUND HERE.

(fingers crossed this one works correctly….)