Saturday 17 February 2018

Over to you

Each month I'll be making a posting just like this one, so blog readers can share their success (or otherwise) ask  questions*, report any womag news, tips, advice they may have, or make womag related comments or observations. (If you have news or a question relating to a particular magazine, it's also fine to add it as a comment to the latest post for that magazine.)

*If you can answer these, please do.

I've decided to include a picture each month which you may, if you like, use as a story prompt. Do you like that idea? Have you ever written a story using a picture prompt?

10 comments:

Rosemary Gemmell said...

Great idea to include a picture prompt, Patsy - I like visual inspiration and have used art before.

Sue Johnson said...

I use picture prompts a lot. I loved this one and have already scribbled down the bones of a story.

Patsy said...

@ Rosemary, I've used paintings too. I do use my own photos, but usually because I took them to help me remember the view or whatever.

@ Sue That's excellent! Do let me know if it gets published.

Angela Barton said...

Hi Patsy
I don't use picture prompts very often, but occasionally a birthday card or photograph in a magazine will inspire something in me. I've used a photograph of a man in a magazine before and described him as the hero in my book. (no, he wasn't half naked!)

Penny A said...

I like picture prompts, although they don't always lead to successful stories. They may just result in a paragraph or two which only become useful at a later date.

But the story I have in PF Special ('With One Voice') this time was prompted, really, by the sound of bells!

Unknown said...

I have used picture prompts in the past but I also find story inspiration in music lyrics and have had a couple of stories published which were inspired by Pink Floyd and Chris Rea songs. x

Sally Zigmond said...

Picture prompts are great idea. I always used them back in the days when I used to run writing workshops writing groups. It was often an opening ice-breaker.

Patsy said...

@ Angela - Keeping an image to represent important characters sounds like a good idea.

@ Penny, if an image prompts anything from a detail to a whole story, I think they've been useful - congrats on the PF publication.

@ Lisa - I like song lyrics (and titles) too and have created several stories using them.

@ Sally - We've used them in my local writing group and had interesting results.

Patricia G said...

I don't know if this is the appropriate place to ask but I'd be interested to find out what other Womag writers feel about the use of the m-dash used as a punctuation mark.
I often use it for dramatic effect but most writers published in PF and WW seem to avoid it. Is its use seen as 'sloppy' writing?

Patsy said...

I don't think it's sloppy, Patricia. (I use them myself!)

Different magazines have different house styles, so it could be that some edit out any dashes, or maybe they just don't work so well in the narrow columns in magazines, as though do on a full page?

I too will be interested in anyone else's thoughts about this.