Writing prompts are not my cup of tea.
Not that I have a snobbish attitude toward them, anything that gets the creative juices flowing and entices a person to write is okay in my book. Hell, I’ve even participated in a few hashtag games on Twitter, but none of the suggested prompt words, sentences, paragraphs, or pictures ever truly inspired me.
Until I stumbled upon the Noriyoshi Orai artwork shown above.
Blindsided by an idea, I began scribbling notes of an alien invasion futuristic war that keeps pushing its way further and further into Earth’s past with the intention of creating a zugzwang (a situation in which the obligation to make a move in one’s turn is a serious, often decisive, disadvantage) story using a fairy tale twist.
Why a fairy tale?
Because the old ones are replete with heavy messages, drenched in the misfortunes of the world, and yet faith, perseverance, and sometimes sheer luck, can turn the tide in overcoming life’s trials. I wanted to present it as an old story, told in archaic language, laced with a subtle message still relevant to the modern world.
If you ever want to hear your muse laugh, tell her your lofty goals for a story before you’ve actually written it.
“Rise of the Fallen 722nd” began life as a story examining patriotism, loyalty, ingenuity, and the enduring human spirit in the face of the ultimate no-win scenario. The outline wasn’t difficult to put on paper. The story itself? That’s a different matter altogether. This little darling of mine went through the draft mill forty-nine times, each revision drastically different from the one before. Only one patch of dialogue survived from the original piece.
Futuristic war? Check. Progressing forward into the past? Check. Zugzwang? Double check. Fairy tale twist? Not so much. The fairy tale elements weakened the integrity of the overall structure and sadly had to be put down like Old Yeller. Still, it’s been fun (and frustrating) to write. And I’m not done with it. They say the fiftieth time’s the charm, right?
Wish me luck.
MADD FICTIONAL 
Nothing wrong with that. Sometimes prompts just don’t do it, heck most of the time just picture of something triggers a story idea or two or three.
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You’re correct, Marie, the damnedest things can trigger story ideas…for my money, it’s just never the things most people use as online prompts. Cheers for the read and the comment!
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Good luck. And GREAT picture you found. Kind of in love with it, actually.
Oh, yeah, back to the writing, certainly intrigued by the story you created! Good title, too.
Opening line, we want opening line!!!
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Thank you and thank you, as always. And since you asked so nicely, the opening line is:
“They invented a magnificent death for us, the enemy did, dishing it out with an unhurried grace as they pushed back our line in the battlefield and through time.”
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Wooo-hooo! I can see it’s going to be a light read! 😛
But seriously, good luck, my curiosity is piqued! Excellent opener! Can’t wait to see it in print.
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Cheers for that! Knock on wood that the story finds an editor with your talent and excellent taste in fiction (or your kind ability to lie to spare a writer’s feelings)!
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Why I do believe *fans self* that the devil has dipped your tongue in honey… ***southern accent***giggle, giggle***
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Congratulations! That just made its way to being the opening line for my next story regardless of subject matter.
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Oh boy. Ohboyohboyohboy. 😛
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Best of luck!
I like the ideas you used.
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Cheers for that! It’s much appreciated.
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Good luck to you, Rhyan! I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a killer story. You have the knack for punching the readers in their guts or massaging their frayed nerves and extracting cheers either way. Those are a lot of drafts. Phew! I’m definitely doing something wrong. Haha! (Nervous laughter)
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No, Terveen, you’re fine. Fifty drafts are too damn many. This is one of those impossible stories that seem wonderful and perfect in my mind and less so when on the page. It’s like applying real-world logic to a dream. Cheers for the vote of confidence, though.
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Good luck! You’ve got this! And I can’t wait to read it!
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Cheers, trE, much appreciated.
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👍🏾
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Well, okay, “Good luck.” But we know luck has little to do with it.
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Well, I’ve tried just about everything else, so I’m willing to give luck a try. Cheers!
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Well, I’m hooked already. Sounds exactly like something I can sink my teeth into. And that artwork! Great googly moogly! I’m going to look up more of Noriyoshi Orai’s work. I have to hand it to you for your stick-to-it-iveness. Fifty drafts…jeez, fifty of anything is a LOT (except for pizza–fifty pieces o’ pepperoni pie sounds just about right)! Wishing you a breezy 5oth draft (see what I did there?) and looking forward to experiencing this tale when its ready to unleash upon the world. 🙂
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Fifty is excessive, but this story nags at me, so even when I set it aside to work on something else, it keeps doing little things to get my attention. I just need to find a way to maneuver it into the Goldilocks position of being “just right” so that I can continue on my writer’s journey with some semblance of sanity intact.
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Visual art is the 50,000 words we can’t seem write. Which makes the brevity of poetry more enticing. Monet said that attempting to paint certain things in nature would drive one mad. Add the musicians, dancers, sculptors caught between the spiritual and the physical searching for that evanescent moment. Which begs the question of which expressive art is the most maddening? And where do the limitations of one artistic sense beg to be part of another? “I would like to paint the way a bird sings.” Claude Monet
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Well put, Phil. I think I’ve stated this somewhere else in the comment section, but my main difficulty in setting this story on the page is that it’s perfect in my mind’s eye, where it exists within a type of dream-like logic, but all its many flaws become apparent when I apply story logic to it. If only I had the soul of a poet, because my current skillset just isn’t up to the task of doing the story justice.
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Steinbeck said that about “Grapes of Wrath”.
Like Monet said, and it applies to writing – paint what you see.
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I’ve tried that forty-nine times in forty-nine different ways. Easier said than done, my friend.
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Ah, take it from a life in the music business – play what you hear, don’t judge. In fact, don’t try to write, get out of the way as an “author” and let it roll. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-GrRIgdmW8
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If that first line doesn’t get you hook line and sink I don’t know what does. Now we wait with baited breath!
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I can only hope the final draft lives up to your expectation, Gr8. Cheers for the compliment!
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Can’t wait to read the final story.
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And I can’t wait for it to be read, Drew (it’d mean I’m finally done with it).
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You got me interested, good luck! Love the artwork, it feels savage and futuristic. Pictures and music are inspirations for me and rarely do I get inspiration from prompts alone. Can’t wait to read more Rhyan!
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I’m totally with you regarding music inspiring writing, Kirsten (I even went through a phase blogging “Songs As Stories”). Cheers for the read and vote of confidence!
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Good luck, my man! Thanks for the new term – Zugzwang – I like this. At my BJJ Academy, we’ve been using an analogy that captures Zugzwang well: put your opponent in a bad “choose your own adventure book” where every choice is a bad one. Zugzwang. Man, I love German phrases!
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I appreciate it, Tom!
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