imPROMPTu

Reading at Saginaw's Magic Bean

2010-02-02T00:36:00.000-05:00

This Friday, February 5, I'll be reading my work along with my friend and colleague, novelist Jeff Vande Zande, at the Magic Bean in Saginaw. The reading starts at 7 which will be followed by music and an open mic.

You can follow it on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/#/event.php?eid=275747234574&index=1

Hope to see you there.

Call for Prompts

2010-02-02T00:32:00.000-05:00

If anyone has a writing prompt which you feel has worked well for you, please feel free to send it along to me (perhaps with the writing or a portion of the writing you produced from it) and I'll be happy to post it under a new series of posts called "Share the Wealth".

You can e-mail me the prompt, your writing, along with your name (real or not...) to blog@timkenyon.com

Until next time keep writing, no matter what.

Writing Prompt #15

2010-02-02T00:27:00.000-05:00

Start this writing exercise by making a list of as many inanimate objects as you can think of in five minutes. Repeat this by making another list of as many animate objects as you can think of in five minutes. Create five unlikely pairs from these lists, one from each list. (e.g. a monkey and an ice cream cone) Use this list as a jumping off point for either a poem in which you create vivid imagery based on these pairs, or use them as the basis for a prose piece in which two characters are forced to interact with each other because of the pairs.

For Starters

2010-01-12T23:34:00.000-05:00

No doubt about it--the thing was dead, and no thanks to her.

(For Starters is a series of posts to the blog which provide writers with a first line for a new story. Take this line and go with it...)

What excuse do I have?

2010-01-12T23:32:00.000-05:00

None.

Now that the holidays are over I decide to take a look at my last blog onto to find out that I haven't posted since October 8. Now I wish I could say that I've been soooo busy working on my novel, but that isn't the case. Grading stacks and stacks of student essays is more like it.

But now that the new year is here, I can start anew, and here is my resolution: I will post without going three months in between.

Hopefully the prompts I've given you have been keeping you writing in the interim. So here goes... enjoy. And send along some feedback about the blog. I'd love to hear what you think. Suggestions for improvements or different writing ideas are always welcomed.

Writing Prompt #14

2009-10-08T11:03:00.000-04:00

According to the Gallup Organization, more than one million American dogs have been named as beneficiaries in a will.

Write a story about one of their owners.

For Starters

2009-09-24T12:13:00.001-04:00

The moment she awoke, she knew it was the day to finally do it.

(For Starters is a series of posts to the blog which provide writers with a first line for a new story. Take this line and go with it...)

Writing Prompt #13

2009-09-22T22:16:00.002-04:00

Begin a story from the point of view of a con artist who realizes he or she has just met his or her latest victim.

Begin another story from the victim's point of view using the same scenario.

It's been too long

2009-09-22T22:11:00.003-04:00

How the summer gets away from you when you're writing every day in a place like New York City. Well, I'm back in Michigan for what that's worth (not much, I'll tell you what) and it's time to get the blog rolling again. My apologies to those who've been waiting patiently for new prompts. You can count on them rolling in at a more consistent rate (until NYC drags me back into the fold, then who knows what'll happen...)

Enjoy.

For Starters

2009-07-10T22:10:00.002-04:00

It wasn't until after he'd turned over the picture to the police when he realized the photograph revealed a little more than he'd bargained for.

(For Starters is a series of posts to the blog which provide writers with a first line for a new story. Take this line and go with it...)

Writing Prompt #12

2009-07-10T22:07:00.002-04:00

Write about a trying moment in the life of a character who has lost the use of one or more of his or her senses.

In Draft - scene from Endtime

2009-07-10T21:58:00.004-04:00

Endtime is currently in the development stage as a serial graphic novel.

INT. TREVOR'S CAR - NIGHT

Trevor is driving. He is white-knuckling the steering
wheel and sitting bolt upright, eyes glued to the road
ahead. The well-worn wiperblades squeak as they pass back
and forth barely removing any of the rain water. Trevor
takes his eyes from the road for a moment to look over
his shoulder. Jack is slumped in the back seat, his head
lying over the top of the seat. He is barely conscious.

TREVOR
Say something.

JACK
You're drunk.

TREVOR
You've still got a sense of humor. That
means you'll be fine.

Jack only coughs and labors for breath. Trevor refocuses
on the road blinking his eyes and shaking his head as if
he's trying to maintain his attention and focus. It's
becoming clear to him that he certainly has had a little
too much to drink. He has to shield his face from the
lights of the oncoming traffic. He looks at Jack in the
rearview.

TREVOR (CONT'D)
Keep you hand on that wound. Pressure.
(Beat.) Hey! Wake up! Don't you die back
there!

Jack wheezes and coughs again, obviously in a lot of
pain. A beat while Jack attempts to prop himself up and
shake some life back into himself.

JACK
That's not gonna happen.

TREVOR
Just stay with me.

Trevor turns on the radio. Pop country music begins to
play.

TREVOR (CONT'D)
Music? That'll help keep you alert.

JACK
(wincing)
I don't think so.

Trevor turns off the radio.

TREVOR
What's your name?

JACK
Jack.

Trevor raises his hand.

TREVOR
Trevor. (Beat.) Please don't die in my
car, Jack.

JACK
Where are we going?

TREVOR
(hesitating)
You really need a doctor. There's a
hospital on this side of town. They're
really good. See this scar right here?

Trevor holds up his right forearm.

JACK
I said no hospitals.

TREVOR
I'm open to ideas. I shouldn't be driving
anyway. (Beat.) What about this someone
you're looking for? I'll take you to
them. Maybe they can help you.

JACK
I don't know where she is.

TREVOR
Well, she's gotta be pretty special—-

Trevor turns again and sees the mess Jack is leaving in
the back seat.

TREVOR (CONT'D)
Man, look at the seat. Jesus, I'm gonna
get pinched for sure, I know it. (Beat.)
I can't afford this right now.
Just remember my name, when you tell them
who shot you. Make sure you tell them
Trevor Haley had nothing to do with it.

Jack gives a sign of recognition, realizing he recognizes
Trevor's name.

JACK
Trevor Haley. You're from Connecticut?

TREVOR
Well, actually I was born in New
Hampshire, but for the last few years
I've been—-

JACK
I know your name. You're one of mine.

TREVOR
Your what?

JACK
You're supposed to get in a fight. A bad
one. There's a guy with a knife.

TREVOR
A fight? I've never been in a fight in my
life.

JACK
It happens outside a bar. You have a
dispute over an unpaid bill with the
owner. You can't pay. He becomes enraged
and stabs you.

TREVOR
That's quite a story, Jack.

JACK
You never paid the man for your drinks.

TREVOR
Don't remind me.

JACK
What'd I do? They told me not to
interfere. Shit, this wasn't supposed to
happen.

The passenger seat, vacant this whole time, is now
occupied by a faint silhouette visible from Jack's
vantage point. It is an nondescript young woman.
The passing lights reveal she is wearing a vintage-style
white uniform with a nurses' cap on her head. She is
facing forward. Jack stares. Trevor takes no notice.

JACK (CONT'D)
Trevor, pull over. Stop the car. Stop the
car.

TREVOR
What?

JACK
(his excitement escalating)
Let me out! Stop the car! Let me out now!

The vintage nurse girl gives Jack a sidelong glance. We
get a glimpse of her face which is ghostly pale, her eyes
darkened, completely black. She turns to Trevor and her
hand reaches up for the steering wheel.

TREVOR
Hey, calm down! We're almost there.

Jack struggles with the door handle. The door pops open
but Jack is in so much pain that he can't open it. He
falls over on the seat. Outside the window the hospital
emergency entrance passes by the camera's view.

JACK
No! Let me go! Leave me alone!

TREVOR
(insistently)
We're moving! I can't let you out!

Trevor reaches over the seat with one hand trying to
close the back door.

TREVOR (CONT'D)
You're gonna kill us both!

JACK
You're supposed to be dead!

imPROMPTu is back

2009-07-10T21:55:00.001-04:00

...after a short hiatus while I settled into summer life in Brooklyn. Thanks for your patience. I'll try to make it worth the wait.

Writing Prompt #11

2009-05-22T23:14:00.001-04:00

Complete a 20-minute freewrite about what your life would be like if you could be your favorite television character. Use part or all of what you generate to begin a new story.

For Starters

2009-05-22T23:11:00.002-04:00

With all the planning, with all the preparation, only to find he couldn't get the lighter to work.

(For Starters is a series of posts to the blog which provide writers with a first line for a new story. Take this line and go with it...)

In Draft - unused prologue from Ersatz Nation

2009-04-27T20:56:00.001-04:00

Prologue

On the edge of what was soon to be the first of many tarred streets, in a town that was growing quite slowly and indiscernibly, almost as if under its own accord, sat piles of gravel and stone and fresh loam in exquisitely stacked cones. Small, wooden crates were scattered around filled with nails still damp from the rain the night before which were already beginning to turn shades of light brown - the rust eating away at them. Thick, tan planks of lumber in various dimensions, some stacked to near geometric perfection, others thrown in more random piles, lined the edge of the soon-to-be-placed stone curbing. The stones, which were laid parallel to the edge of the dirt roadway, resembled common, polished granite except for the peculiar sparkle of shiny, jagged, blue-gray metal chips that had spread themselves, over time, through the molten rock long ago. Thick pools of black rain water had collected in several areas where holes had been dug for foundation posts, or tree plots, or where seeds were to be sewn. Other puddles formed where sections of the landscape were purposely leveled just slightly lower than the area surrounding it. That was where the water that seemed the most unnatural. Stringy, oblong pools reached out in all different directions creating fantastic black shapes on the ground reflecting partial pictures of the sky. And these waters ran: flowing like a river.

But, the rain had since stopped and with the clouds dissipating for the most part, the blistering, red sun was allowed to return and the day would continue. That which brought the rain had moved on.

However, that which was brought on by the rain had yet to arrive.

Adjacent to the abandoned site where the wood and rocks near the road lay unattended was an area that had been cordoned off with fine, yellow twine. It was arranged in the shape of a square and at each corner, hammered into the ground, was a thin, metal rod with the yellow rope tied around it. Hanging from top of these four rods and along the rope at intervals of a half a yard were small twisted strips of sheet metal. With a mixture of gold and copper colors, they each possessed an odd, indiscernible, yet quite nonrandom, shape different from the other.

It was quite a small area of land; No more than a quarter of an acre. Almost too small to comfortably occupy the number of shelters that had been constructed there. The wind that preceded the rain, which had brought with it the sweet, strange odor of the musk weed and carpel root growing just over the west knoll, had peeled off several of the roofs and knocked down the merely makeshift walls. The small, greenish, leaf-stripped were used as twine, but were still not strong enough to hold the structures in place. They had pulled and stretched under the pressure of the blowing wind and once they snapped, bled out their sticky sap onto the ground or whatever laid below them.

The stray rain drops trickled from the rough edges of the partially completed structures that were scattered around the area and aside from the soft, plopping echoes marking the end of each rain drop’s descent, there was not a single, solitary sound except for the unnatural, stream-like humming that the silence produced.

The rain, in its own vicious way, had come to cleanse the land. To sweep away the minute particles in the air and in the ground - the curse that was threatening to stifle it. Through the sand and the dirt and the mud were tracks, overlapping and disorderly, which had led into the wooded area toward the east. Washed away now, like the intentional destruction of incriminating evidence, there was no way to follow their makers.

The trees to the east stretched out for what could been seen as miles in either direction. Each tree reached out beseechingly toward the clearing with long, green, crooked branches. Along the edge of the sandy, desert-like earth in a particularly straight line is where the trees and the forest stopped, or had been stopped. They stretched off toward the horizon in both directions until each one appeared to be nothing but a minute speck shadowed against the hot, nightmarish sky which hung silently over the dead land.

After a time that was as much a minute as it was a millennium, the world, waiting as impatiently as it could for death, became darkened with a sickly gray. The elongating shadows disappeared leaving everything on the ground standing helpless and alone. The blue-black haze in front of the sun slithered by and reached out occasionally with what could have been (should have been) limbs to mar and gouge the land as it passed. It toppled anything that stood within its reach. Arms, or what could have been (should have been) arms, some two or four or eight feet wide, stretched down in funnel-like protrusions and lifted whatever it found on the ground and dragging it up inside itself.

Soon after, everything that had been on the land was not any longer...

...except the sand and the wind.

On the back of the wind rode the silence.

From The New Hampshire Union Leader, April 15, 199-

CENTER STRAFFORD - This quiet, eastern New Hampshire town was rocked last night when three unidentified bodies were discovered inside a burning vehicle near the town’s reservoir. The fire department and local police responded to Edenborough Road, a small, unmaintained tote road which is the reservoir’s sole access, after area residents reported hearing gunshots and smelling smoke just shortly after 8:30 p.m. The commotion attracted several on-lookers as fire fighters battled the blaze for over an hour. Acting fire chief, Stu Redmond who was one of the men that doused the vehicle with hundreds of gallons of water, was baffled as to the cause of why the vehicle continued to burn so long. The fire chief wouldn’t comment if a chemical agent or something entirely different was responsible for the odd behavior of the flames. It was not until the fire department was able to control the flames when the bodies were discovered inside. State police and the state fire marshall’s office were called in shortly after.

Upon the discovery of the bodies, the crowd was immediately asked to clear away as the area was cordoned off with yellow crime scene tape. What happened next can only be described as a freakish, unexplained occurrence. As authorities approached the vehicle, the driver’s side door swung open and one of the charred, but intact bodies seemed not to fall, but to beginning stepping out. As it did it burst into flames and fell to the ground. As the state police troopers arrived, several of them assisted Center Strafford police in driving on-lookers back out of view of the vehicle. Two people who refused to leave were placed under arrest by state police, but later released. Authorities said this morning that they are still denying access to any part of the reservoir or Edenborough Road.

The bodies, believed by some witnesses to be all adult males because of their apparently enormous size, were transported to the state Coroner’s Office for autopsy, but according to Center Strafford Police Chief Frank Yount, no information about their identities would be revealed until the next of kin were notified and a full investigation was completed into the possibility of foul play. “The State Police will be handling this case and we will be giving them our full cooperation.” Yount said. “We will be investigating this as a possible homicide.” Chief Yount would not comment whether the victims were still alive after the fire had been extinguished.

Area residents say that several vehicles, mostly pickup trucks and utility vehicles, use the dirt road on a daily basis which is off Route 202A just miles from the Barrington town line. “The reservoir is well known as a party spot for the teenagers.” said one Center Strafford resident who wished to remain unnamed, but has lived in the area for several years. “They come and go all night, every night. I’m not surprised something like this has happened. It was bound to.” Another resident who frequently walks his dog down Edenborough Road said, “Can’t abide them people using that road for their business. My poor dog don’t dare go that way no more. Neither do I for that matter. Especially after the rain.” When asked to elaborate, the man refused to comment further.

This is the first homicide investigation in thirty years for the town of Center Strafford which has a population of just under 1,500 year-round residents. During the summer months the population swells to nearly 3,000 with most of those residents occupying the seasonal cottages around Bow Lake which was the site of Center Strafford’s first and only homicide.

In 1968, Jason Lemkey, a seasonal resident from Taunton, Massachusetts, was killed when his cousin, Sonny Deitrick, and a friend, Herbert Welton, held him against the grating of the Bow Lake dam which controlled the water flow into the Isinglass River. Lemkey fought vigorously to escape the strong current while, at the same time, struggled to fend off Deitrick and Welton. Lemkey’s legs became snagged in the grate near the base and were broken by the twisting force of the current. Lemkey was left by the two boys to drown. Deitrick and Welton were later arrested and after an investigation and several hearings were remanded to the state boys’ facility until their nineteenth birthday which, for both youths, came less than three years later.

It has been said that none of the residents will sleep well after this incident, but Chief Yount assures the townspeople that the safety of Center Strafford has not been compromised by this incident and he considers it “isolated”. Yount did emphasize that police patrols will be doubled beginning immediately and he will be petitioning the selectmen on Monday morning for a mandatory 24-hour patrol referendum which will be presented for a vote at an emergency town meeting scheduled for sometime late next week. “I wish to stress right now,” Yount said at a press release meeting this morning, “that there is nothing unnatural or extraordinary about this case. The rumors about what drove this fire to burn so long or the bodies inside still being alive afterward are completely untrue. I want to assure you all that nothing strange or out of the ordinary occurred while this fire was being fought.” Yount would not comment on the condition of the bodies or how it got out of the vehicle other than saying it must have “fallen out”.

For Starters

2009-04-08T21:45:00.001-04:00

What often sticks to memory are those odd little fragments that have no beginning and no end.

A Poem (following a Robert Burns rhyme scheme)

2009-04-08T21:42:00.001-04:00

To the Mars Polar Lander

Thy metal breth’ren, with success, to space.
A nine figure tab we all did embrace
for us to win the cold war race
and take the giant leap.
So off you go with quickened pace,
a’red planet peep.

Gone off to spy some proof of telling
that we are not alone in dwelling,
but skinflints cinched thy crash befelling
with tawdry parts wrought.
Now on thy death the truth is swelling—
From a Wal-Mart bought.

Writing Prompt #10

2009-04-08T21:40:00.001-04:00

Your character is down to the very last $20 he or she will ever have, ever. Start the story of that character spending it.

American Melancholy - my novel

2009-03-30T22:01:00.004-04:00

I'm excited to say that my second novel, American Melancholy, was chosen as a quarter-finalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award.

Follow this link to Amazon's site where you can download the published excerpt, read and post reviews.

Any reviews and/or comments on the excerpt will be much appreciated. Thank you to those who have already posted.

For Starters

2009-03-30T21:57:00.004-04:00

There was no blood soaking through which meant it was healing.

(For Starters is a new series of posts to the blog which provide writers with a first line for a new story. Take this line and go with it...)

Creative Burst - Samuel and the Killer Worm

2009-03-02T20:22:00.001-05:00

Samuel stopped struggling and stared at the ground. The ripples of soft sand rolled away in concentric circles like a dropped pebble’s signature in a pool of water. He had seen this before, too many times. But this time was different. It was coming for him. The sand beneath his feet began to pulse and vibrate; he could feel it through the soles of his shoes. Lifting them off the ground was no option. His weight would only tighten the noose around his neck. And even if he could keep himself from passing out, the few seconds he’d spare himself would be no consolation for the pain that would follow once his feet inevitably touched the ground again. The thing coming for him was a burrower, and it did not discriminate. It would find its way inside him. One way or another.

(From the prompt: Start a scene with a character in imminent danger of death.)

Writing Prompt #9

2009-03-02T20:18:00.001-05:00

Begin a story where your character’s simple attempt of going to the store to buy a gallon of milk goes horribly wrong. Start off from the point when your character realizes the milk container in his or her fridge is empty.

Creative Burst - I Have a Photo of a Man

2009-02-26T22:58:00.002-05:00

I have a photo of a man whose name I don't know. I came across it one day while I was in a used bookstore in Ann Arbor. The Dawn Treader. A nice place, comfortable, big. Lots of books. The fiction section takes up one half the store so one could spend the entire afternoon without having to go back to the same shelf and re-scan “in case you missed something”. It was in the “Am to At” shelf where I found a curious book lying spine down. It stuck out, not only because it was hardcover and an odd size—about three times as tall as wide—but also because the dust jacket was bright pink. I thought at first that it was a home made book, maybe something self-published, and I was about to skip over it when I noticed that in the center of the pages a thick piece of paper was sticking out just slightly. I took the book down and opened it up to the page that held the piece of paper expecting to find an old postcard written to a distant relative by some grandparent who hadn't heard from him in ages or from one lover to another who loved what they were seeing as they traveled, but couldn't stand to be away from the other for another day. But it was from neither of these two people. In fact, it wasn't a postcard at all. It was a photograph.

The photograph that has brought me down to this dark place. And now I'm trapped here, waiting, considering a world going on above me, without me. Trains, taxis, people walking about giving little regard to other places that exist beyond what can be seen between the front door to the car to the office and back home again. They have no idea that a man lives and walks among them who has the power to change lives, the power to tempt, to incarcerate. But I do, because I found the photo. And the one who finds the photo is the one who will find the owner of the half-smiling, bearded face.

Now I suspect that the only was to escape is to find his name. But how can I discover anything about him when I'm locked inside this prison, captive to my own desire to solve a mystery that I never wanted to pursue in the first place. A dare led me here, and a name is all I need to return to the place where I came from. But for now all I can do is close my eyes and picture the world going on without me.

Writing Prompt #8

2009-02-26T22:51:00.002-05:00

Begin a new story where your main character has woken up one morning to discover he or she has a special ability. Write about what the ability is and what he or she does with it on the first day. Remember to focus as much on the character’s emotions as the plot.