There are no words. (Photo credit: Aaron & Alli)
I am busy today. New story in the works. It needs attention lest it wither and die on the keys.
But I have not forgotten you. Today’s challenge will simply be presented without my erratic, sweary preamble*. All the swears are going into the story. I may need to edit.
Couple of weeks ago, I did a series of posts on outlining a story, in which I took something from initial idea to giant list of questions to finished outline. This was the in-depth sort of outline which I generally favour.
But there are other views as well, and this is one I’m a big fan of for getting focus on ideas. It’s the Pixar Story Formula, and god damn if it doesn’t work surprisingly well. The internet tells me it was tweeted by then-Pixar story artist Emma Coats as part of a series of Pixar story-telling rules. All the rules are here, but this is the one that concerns us.
Once upon a time there was ___.
Every day, ___.
One day ___.
Because of that, ___.
Because of that, ___.
Until finally ___.
Today’s Monday Challenge: fill in those blanks. You can use a story idea you’re working on or something you’ve already got written and want some clarification on. Or, if you just feel like doing mad-libs, you need a noun/occupation/person, activity, event, event, event, ending.
Have fun. I’ll be back when I finish this story.
*Well, less of my erratic, sweary preamble.
Bare Knuckle Writer 