Help Me Write a Story

A fellow I know mentioned on his blog a while ago that he'd like to try beginning a story on his blog and letting his "followers" each take a shot at writing a continuation of the story.  Since Bill Kirton hasn't followed up on that suggestion, I'm stealing his idea.

Here are the rules:

• Each of us will take a turn writing a segment of the story
• Since it's now my idea, I'm beginning
• No more than two paragraphs per person, per shot
• You can write an additional segment after at least two other people have written between your entries

Let's see where this takes us...

They look like a happy couple, a couple in love, as they smile at the other people on the bus.

In reality, the assassin is holding a gun at the blue-eyed man's back.  She slips her free hand into his jacket pocket and...

Clustering - What is it and How Does it Work?

I recently read a blog post by Bill Kirton on his blog and it got me thinking about the wonderful technique called Clustering. Bill shared the story about how he recently encouraged several women, none of whom were writers, to create some fictional characters and how they met with resounding success.

Free-association allows the unconscious, creative part of our brain the freedom to access possibilities our conscious mind can't always access. Gabriele Rico wrote a book titled Writing the Natural Way. I've lent it to several people, some of whom never returned it--necessitating the purchase of a replacement copy. (More than once!) One of the creative writing techniques she teaches is called Clustering.

This is how her website describes it: "A non-linear brainstorming process, clustering makes the Design mind’s interior, invisible associations visible on a page. Clustering becomes a self-organizing process as words and phrases are spilled onto the page around a center. The Sign mind begins to see pattern and meaning, and the writing flows naturally into a vignette."

This is how she, herself, describes it: "A cluster is like an expanding universe, and each word is a potential galaxy: each galaxy in turn may throw out its own universe."

Even if you have no problems dreaming up plots and characters, even if your prose flows smoothly and swiftly at will, you'll benefit from this book. She also talks about many other creative processes and has written several books. Check her out at http://www.gabrielerico.com/.