Tear Down the Wall

One of the dreaded things writers face is writer’s block, also known as The Wall. Hell, I face it for a good 30 minutes to an hour each time I sit down to write a blog post! That’s why one of my awesome sisters and her husband gave me some great books with writing prompts for my blog and other stories.

The one you guys are probably more familiar with, since I credit it on here, is The Amazing Story Generator by Jay Sacher. It’s a great book of flip cards. There’s three stacks: an action causing the story, the main character, and the resulting event of the initial action. It’s quite fun to flip through and find different combinations, and it’s going to be great for future works.

The other book I have is 1000 Creative Writing Prompts, Volume 2: More Ideas for Blogs, Scripts, Stories and More by Bryan Cohen. A lot of the prompts in this book are more for stories, but some work really well for blog posts. I’ve used it a lot on here, and it’s been incredibly useful.

The thing that got me through last November and NaNoWriMo, though, was the official site’s Word Sprint tool. If you open it and click “dare me,” it’ll give you a prompt. For example, I just did it and it gave me “have a character recite a love ballad.” This did become slightly problematic at times though, especially when “your characters are now in a haunted house” prompt showed up. The first time it did, I was so wired and stressed from coffee and lack of sleep, I burst out laughing so hard I cried for a good five minutes, probably. My characters were already in a haunted house, and for some reason this was just hysterical to me.

And if none of that works, for whatever reason, you know I’m in a tight spot. That’s when it’s time to take a step back, get a cup of tea, maybe take a walk around the apartment complex, and come back to things. Chances are, I wasn’t in a great frame of mind, and I need an attitude adjustment.

Eh, who am I kidding? I’ll just write about the damn vampire instead.

What motivates you to get your work done? Have any topics, authors, or book series you want to challenge me with? Let me know by clicking Contact Me up above!