short story challenge – Page 2 – Self Publishing Advisor

October Writing Challenge #3

One of my favorite months is finally here — October! Witches, ghosts, and goblins! Oh my!

In honor of Halloween, each week in October I am sharing a Halloween inspired writing challenge. These challenges are designed to spark creative ideas, help you stick to your writing routine, and provide a little fun in your hectic week. (After all, writing is supposed to be fun, right?)

So far, we’ve done the Spiritual Poetry Challenge and the 15 Minute Challenge. (If you missed it, be sure to check it out.)

This week is the short story challenge. Here is how it works.

1) Get inspired. Did one of the challenges from the last two weeks spark some ideas for you? Use one of those ideas as a catalyst for a short story. If you are just starting the challenges, or you have an idea unrelated to the previous challenges, start a completely new story. It doesn’t have to be based off the previous challenges, but many of you probably already have ideas from working on the first two pieces.

2) Write a 500 word fiction piece that channels your inner Stephen King. Let the season inspire you to write a mystery or thriller story, even if you usually work in another genre. Stepping out of your comfort zone and writing something completely different can be invigorating and bring new life to all of your work.

Be sure to check back next Wednesday for the next writing challenge!

ABOUT KELLY SCHUKNECHT: Kelly Schuknecht is the Vice President of Outskirts Press. In addition to her contributions to the Outskirts Press blog at blog.outskirtspress.com, Kelly and a group of talented marketing experts offer book marketing services, support, and products to not only published Outskirts Press authors, but to all authors and professionals who are interested in marketing their books and/or careers. Learn more about Kelly on her blog at http://kellyschuknecht.com.

Kelly Speaks, Uncategorized

Back to Writing: Publishing Challenge

August is here and as summer is winding down, it’s time to get back to your writing and publishing goals. Each week this month I will present you with a writing challenge for the week. Come back every Wednesday to join the challenge and get back into the habit of writing on a regular basis. As Desiderius Erasmus once said, “The desire to write grows with writing.”

Over the past three weeks, I hope I’ve been able to help you get back into writing by completing the poetry challenge, short story challenge, and 15 minute challenge.

Now that you are feeling motivated and inspired to write, perhaps you have started thinking about publishing. Have you been working on a book you want to publish? Or have you always wanted to write and publish something, but haven’t started yet? This week, your challenge is to set mini writing goals to get you from where you are now to where you want to be: I call this the publishing challenge.

Let’s say you want to be a published author by the end of the year and you are about half finished with writing your book. Imagine what you have left to write and set goals for each week in September, October and November (if necessary). Give yourself some room the last couple of months as the publishing process can take several weeks.

The more you have left to write, the more aggressive your goals may need to be, but challenge yourself to write a chapter a week (or a certain number of pages or a certain number of words) to get you to your end goal of publishing a book by a reasonable date. Then, discipline yourself to meet your goal each week and be sure to review your goals often to be sure you’re on target.

Good luck and happy writing!

Kelly Speaks, Uncategorized

Back to Writing: 15 Minute Challenge

Over the past two weeks, I hope I’ve been able to help you get back into writing by completing the poetry challenge and short story challenge. Both of these tasks were designed to get you back into the routine of writing and to get the creative juices flowing. (If you missed the first two challenges, be sure to go back and check them out by clicking the links above.)

This week, I have yet another challenge for you: the 15 minute challenge. Your goal is to write a fiction story with one main character and a crime. Here’s the catch — you have 15 minutes. The “rules” are as follows:

1) Set your timer.

Once you are ready to start the challenge, set a timer for 15 minutes. No working on the story before or after your timer is set.

2) Focus on quantity, not quality.

For the 15 minutes, try not to stress about the details. Just write like the wind. Write whatever comes to mind. Don’t worry about fixing mistakes. Just write as much as you can for 15 minutes. You can always go back and “fix” the story later.

3) Keep going.

After completing the challenge you could do a couple of things. 1) You could be proud of yourself for completing the challenge and taking the time to write. You don’t ever have to look at the story again. You completed the goal. 2) You could let the challenge inspire a new project, such as a self-published crime novel. 3) You could decide you like the story and choose to go back and continue working on it.

No matter what you decide to do after completing the challenge, be proud of yourself for taking 15 minutes to write. The more you write, the more likely you are to find success as a writer.

After you complete the challenge, feel free to comment below. I’d love to hear about the story you wrote this week.

Kelly Speaks, Uncategorized

Back to Writing: Poetry Challenge

Last week I wrote about the short story challenge and asked you to write a 500 word story inspired by your summer. Hopefully, the challenge got you back in the routine of writing, and you are ready to take the next challenge. (If you missed last week’s post, check it by clicking here.)

This week, your challenge is to write a poem about summer. Start by brainstorming: Do you have memories from the summers of your youth? Does something about summer have a special meaning to you or inspire you in some way?

Feel free to play with different formats and poetry techniques. Perhaps, you could take the same topic and write about it in several different formats such as haiku, free verse, epic poem, and sonnet.

The key is to let your creative juices flow. Poetry is not about perfection; it is about expression. You never know, these poems may spark an idea for a larger project such as a poetry book, or you may decide poetry isn’t your thing but you’d love to turn the piece into a short story or novel. Just relax and be creative.

After you complete the challenge, feel free to comment below. I’d love to hear about the poem(s) you wrote this week.

Kelly Speaks, Uncategorized

Back to Writing: Short Story Challenge

If you have had a busy summer, it may have been awhile since you sat down to
write, so we’ll start with an easy challenge — write a short story this week based
on something you experienced this summer.

Start by brainstorming:

Did you travel somewhere new this summer? Did you have a scary, strange or funny experience while camping? Did you participate in an event that you don’t want to forget?

Now, write a 500 word short story about your experience. Don’t worry about perfecting the story. The goal of this week’s challenge is to get back in to writing. You never know, the short story may spark a larger project idea such as a self-published book of short stories or a novel based on your short story.

After completing the challenge, feel free to comment below. Tell us a little bit about the short story you wrote or how the challenge has helped you get back to your writing goals.

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