Guest Author - Debbie Striker
When you’re stuck for ideas or just want to play around with something new, create these cards to help move you along. The internet is filled with sentence starters and other prompts, but here is a way to use your own words and personalize your starters.
What you’ll need:
Blank business card stock from your local office supply store, or cut up pieces of paper. I prefer the cards because they are all the same size and will hold up to being used over and over again.
5 plastic bags or small boxes. When you first start out with these, individual plastic bags will be fine, as you accumulate more cards, you will probably be better off finding small boxes to keep them in.
A Pen
Your imagination!
Start out with at least five cards for each category: who, what, when, where and why. The more cards you have in each group, the more variety you’ll have to choose from. Here are some examples of what you might write:
Who - Include individual names or descriptions of people. If you prefer to write single names, make them names that bring a certain person or personality traits to mind.
That older gentleman
That cute, freckle faced little girl
Sefira
Lisa
Arianna
What - These are the objects your characters may come in contact with or need to use.
The shimmering quartz crystal
The candlestick
Keys
The book of secrets
The sunset
When - when is the action taking place?
Early one morning
Late one night
Dawn was rising
In the midst of a heavy storm
Thursday
Where - where are your characters or the action located?
In the garden
Under the bridge
On top of the mountain
Beside the sea
In the quite place
Why - why is your character doing this?
She had to complete the task
Because he needed to
She had too many
It was almost dark
Tomorrow would be too late
Shuffle your cards around a bit and then put them in their bags. Be sure to mark the category on the bag so you can keep them straight. Pull one card from each bag and then play around with them to create new sentences and then write away!
By pulling one card from each group above, I could come up with something like:
Early one morning, Arianna found herself beside the sea, clinging to the book of secrets. She knew she had to complete the task…
OR
The book of secrets laid beside the sea waiting for Arianna to come early one morning and complete the task…
OR
Beside the sea, Arianna held the book of secrets. Early one morning she would complete the task…
As you can see, you’ll probably need to adjust the phrases a little and add some additional words to make the sentences make sense, but that’s all part of the fun. You may also want to pull two “who” cards and see how your characters interact.
Have a stack of blank cards somewhere convenient so you can add to your collection anything you’re inspired. You don’t need to wait until you’re blocked to play with these cards either. Whenever the mood strikes, pull out your cards and see what great adventure they lead you towards.
This is just one suggestion for getting yourself unblocked. For other ideas, you may enjoy reading the following books:
