I am again turning to by helpful book, 642 Things to Write About. Today I picked "Go to a bookshelf and pick out a book that has a red spine. Flip to page 42. What's the first word? That's your first words, too. Go!"
First I have to digress and note that 42 was the mysterious number in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Coincidence?
Following the directions the first thing I realized was the first word on page 42 in many books is a boring word like "but," "what," or "their." I kept looking and assembled a list of first words from 14 books with red spines. So I'm going to make a sentence or two with those words. With a some extra words to create complete sentences that make some sense.
"Sunday, Dottie required a kerch. What had their books done to the younger royal daughter? Had books begun to affect her? But, this is a case for the inquisitive librarian."
I think this is the beginning of a light-hearted story for children. Perhaps Princess Dottie wants to sneak out of the castle in disguise (the kerch) after reading an adventure novel, perhaps The Prince and the Pauper? What adventures might she have?
Adventures would be determined by what time period we're in, as well as where the story takes place. If this is a children's story we don't want the adventure to be too scary. If the castle is in the country, she could go in the woods and maybe find a magical adventure to another place. If the castle is in the city, she could run away to a museum or a park. Hmm, The Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.
She also needs to find a friend or partner along the way. Maybe a young boy who has a very different life. Maybe a talking fox.
At some point she needs to have a purpose more than, "I want to see the world outside the castle." A magical quest? A rescue mission?
The possibilities are fun to think about! Maybe I should actually give it a try.
Your writing prompt lead to other writing ideas. That's really interesting. I wonder about starting an idea in a few different ways...and then determining which would be effective. Could be fun, as you say with children's books, to do with students.
ReplyDeleteYes, this could be fun with children and, I think, in writing group. The stakes are low because the words are so random, so I felt free to have fun.
DeleteAn interesting prompt. You approached boring words with inspirational creative thinking. I had to go and try to see what word I would get: gardener. :)
ReplyDeleteThat's a promising word! Lots of ways to go with that.
DeleteThis would be a fun activity to do at a writing workshop. Maybe just have a book for everyonewi9thout worrying about the spine color. A great way to spark creativity. arjeha
ReplyDeleteThere's definitely a lot you could do with this idea and it would be fun to do in a group and then share.
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