Writing Prompts

A compilation of the writing prompts that have appeared in Randawesome Prompt Fridays. Because writers need their exercise.

• Pick up the book that is nearest to you. Take the first name of the author and write it down. Picture a person with that name. (If you know what the author looks like, choose a different book.) For the next fifteen minutes, write a description of that person without using physical markers such as eye, hair, or skin color, height, weight, etc. 
• Write a short story/vignette/novel (hehe) containing this sentence: Whoever invented non-stick pans ought to be bludgeoned to death with one.
• Invent a character and give her a problem. It doesn't matter what, really, but it should be relatively challenging. Write a page or two of her dealing with that problem. Have her go through at least three strong emotions as she does so. Make them vivid. Bonus points if you make yourself laugh with what you wrote. Extra super bonus points if you make yourself cry.
• In order to develop character properly, it is important to be able to empathize. For this exercise, choose a viewpoint you strongly oppose, then argue that position without sarcasm or rhetoric. No straw arguments here, go deep and try to understand the other POV. Write it out.
• Write a five hundred word short story (and remember, short stories are like any stories, they need conflict and an arc) which includes the words: empire, vase, shell, and duck.
• Go to your favorite book site (Amazon, Goodreads, B&N, etc.), and click on the first genre that strikes your fancy. Zoom in on the cover art of the first selection on the list. Write a scene/story based on the art.
• Think of the person who's brought you the most joyous moment in your life. Bring that moment and that person to life in words. Don't forget sensory details, especially smell and taste.
• You arrive home from work to discover a bullet hole in your front door. Under it, someone has taped a note. 
• Write a scene/story which includes the words frigid, ice, scorch, humid, and brick.
• Write a short story that begins with the sentence: The collector arrived in August.
• You've just found out your best friend has been arrested for murder. As much as you find it hard to believe, the evidence says it's possible she did it. Go.
• Your significant other brings you a balloon bouquet for your birthday. Inside one of the balloons is an object you would never have expected to find in a balloon.
• Write a scene between a man and a woman where traditional gender roles are reversed. You can extend this to other traditionally disparate groups, as well (i.e. parent/child)
• Choose a building, any building. Describe it as if it were a person. Now do the reverse.
• Character discovery: Write a scene where your character does something (s)he is later ashamed of. Why did (s)he do it? Why is (s)he now ashamed?
• Write a scene where two people share their first romantic kiss. Include sensual detail without naming any specific body parts. Focus on emotion.
• It's your character's birthday. What does she do to celebrate (or not)? How does she react to aging? Write the scene.
• Stretch your writing muscles. Take a scene from one of your works and rewrite it as a different genre, preferably one you've never written.
• What is the thing your character wants the most? Give her the opposite and write the scene.