Creative Writing: Openings.
Answer these questions in your jotters.
1. Imagine you are inside your house looking out of a
window. Which window?
2. Looking outside, what three things can you see?
3. What can you hear as you stand looking out of the
window? Write more than one thing.
4. Someone walks past the window. Who is it? What do
you think as they walk past?
5. You have something in your hand. What is it? How
does it feel? Why are you holding it?
6. You sniff. What can you smell?
7. Imagine it is not you looking out of the window, but a
character from a story you are about to make up.
What is this person’s name, how old are they, and
why are they looking out of the window?
8. This person has some kind of problem or a secret.
What is it?
Now you have enough information to start writing a
short story. Start the story with your character at the
window. You may use some of the information you’ve
noted down, but probably not all.
Some basic tips for short story writing.
The opening of you story should “hook” the reader. If
your opening is dull, badly written or doesn’t make
sense, your audience won’t read on. You can start your
story at any point in the narrative: remember the
power of flashback and foreshadowing.
The best short stories have a limited number of
locations, which are described quite clearly but not in a
huge amount of detail.
Moreover, you should try to stick to having only one or
two key characters in the story, who should seem like
real people.
A short story may be told in 3rd person (he/she) or 1st
person (I). Stick to the one narrative voice throughout!
A short story should always be in the past tense, unless
there’s a bit at the end, with the present situation of
the character. E.g. “Now Carla sits in a prison cell for
twenty hours out of every twenty four. Why did she do
it? She asks herself that question every day. Why? No
one will ever know now.”
Write about what you know and the type of people you
know. Don’t write about New York if you’ve never been
further away from home than Peterhead! Don’t write
about a character who is a Texan millionaire if
everyone you know lives in Fishie and gets £5.00
pocket money a week! Using your imagination is great,
but a successful story has to seem realistic!
Your ending doesn’t have to see everything tied up
neatly. You could leave the ending of the story open:
“Jemima swung the door open fiercely and strode off
down the street, her heels click-clicking on the
pavement. No one ever saw her again.”
Or you could have the ending of the story at the
beginning…you could tell the story as a memory or as a
flashback.
Some important DON’Ts.
DON’T have “It was all a dream” as a conclusion!!!!!
DON’T skip weeks, months or years in your last few
paragraphs to tell the character’s life story.
DON’T have mass death/destruction anywhere in your
story and certainly not at the end (unless it’s a war
story, and even then, no blood or guts. It adds nothing
to your story and it makes Mrs Donald feel sick!)
Tension and suspense are much more effective than
brutal carnage; a sense or a hint of danger and fear is
much better than a pile of bodies in your story!
DON’T just launch into a story. A bit of planning and an
idea of where your story is going, and how it’s going to
end makes for a better story overall.
Ideas! Ideas!
Draw a skyscraper with 8 windows like this:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Imagine the people who live behind all the windows.
Eg. In flat number 1 lives an old man called Fred. He’s
been widowed for five years and he’s really grumpy. He
has arthritis and doesn’t get out much because the lift
in the block is often broken.
In flat number 2 lives a single mum called Ellie with her
toddler son, Marcus. She doesn’t work, has no money
and Marcus is very badly behaved. Fred hears Marcus
screaming through the walls all hours of the day and
night, and when he complains, Ellie screams at him.
Now:
Write a poem about the people in the flat.
Eg.
In flat number one, Fred, all alone.
Hears the screams from next door but dares not moan.
Stuck in his prison at the top of the block
Arthritis plays up, wife dead, his bad luck.
OR
Choose one of the characters you’ve created and write a short story
about him/her, which may or may not have anything to do with the fact
they live in a block of flats.
Eg, Ellie hated her life. Nineteen, and she felt it was all over. Saddled
with a toddler son she couldn’t control, alienated from her parents, no
boyfriend and friends who were only interested in make up, music and
going out, things she had no money for, she felt like she had nothing to
live for and nothing to give to life. She could see no silver lining to her
cloud. But all that was to change, the day she met a handsome stranger on
the stairs, her irritable neighbour’s long lost nephew.
OR
Write a play, involving several of the characters from the block after, eg.
Fred has been found dead in his flat.
Outside the block, mid afternoon. Ellie pushing Marcus in his buggy stops
beside a grey haired lady, Mrs Imrie, and watches as two paramedics
carry a stretcher with a dead body on it out of the building.
Ellie: What’s going on?
Mrs Imrie pats Ellie’s arm: It’s terrible, isn’t it? They think he’s been
dead a week>
Ellie (in shock): Who? Who is it? Who’s dead?
Mrs Imrie: Poor old Mr Cook. You know, Fred. Your neighbour.
Ellie (sharp intake of breath): My goodness! Fred! I though it was strange
he hadn’t been banging on the walls recently….I thought maybe he’d gone
on holiday with that nice nephew of his.
Descriptive Writing
Think of one interesting place e.g. the seaside
Create a spider diagram, with at least ten descriptive
phrases to do with this place.
rock pools
ice cream cones
shells
paddling
beach
seaside
sandcastles
blue sea
bucket and spade
beach towels
seaweed
Expand these ten phrases with ten more, descriptive
phrases
e.g. ice cream cones: crunchy, crispy wafer that melts
on your tongue.
Once you have all your phrases, now you can try to
write your descriptive writing. Remember, it’s not a
story – nothing should happen and you shouldn’t even
have a character in it.
Autobiographical Writing
Can you write about youself or your family in a lighthearted, humorous way?
Is your family so bizarre you can imagine other people
being amused by them (instead of just embarrassed,
like you probably are!)?
Try a piece of autobiographical writing:
My mum was quite small and round, and as she seemed
to be permanently washing and hanging out clothes, I
often thought of her as a kind of Mrs Tiggiwinkle,
except without the spikes. She shuffled, a bit like a
hedgehog, in her fluffy carpet slippers, and she had a
pointed inquisitive nose, a bit like a snout that would
enjoy a snuffle amongst the autumn leaves. In the
winter, she liked to sleep, and could often be found on
a chilly afternoon in mid January in her favourite
armchair, beside the fire, mouth open and dribbling
slightly, eyes tightly closed, knitting precariously close
to slipping off her knee. Her equivalent of hibernating!