Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each week, we post a writing prompt: an opening line, a concept, a plot hook, maybe an image.  The following Saturday, we’ll post again with the writing the prompt inspired.

This week’s prompt is: You got on a bus and woke up in a strange town where things seem a little wrong

(Prompt courtesy of Reedsy.com)

Our writers will be writing for the prompts, but anyone is welcome to participate!  Just come by on Sunday to see the week’s prompt, write during the week, and send any writing you’d like to share to StonehengeCircleWriters@gmail.com by the following Friday at 8 pm.  On Saturday we’ll post participants’ writing (with credit to the author, of course).

Write as much or as little as you choose: a paragraph, a flash fiction piece (less than 1,000 words) or a short story.  (Note, for long writing, we may choose to post only a selection.)  You are encouraged to be as creative as possible with the writing prompts.  Try to do something unexpected, or explore a particular genre like science fiction or historical fiction.  Take the prompt literally, or decide it’s a metaphor.  Your only limit is your own imagination.

Happy writing!

 

If you like to plan ahead, next week’s prompt will be: “The floor tasted like…” (Courtesy of eadeverrell.com)

Happy Saturday!  Our writers have provided some fun, sometimes creepy, reading for your Saturday morning.

This week’s prompt was: You open your neighbor’s mail.  What do you find?

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Karen Blakely:

 

I’d known there was something not quite right about my next-door neighbor. Oh, she was always perfectly polite. She waved when we saw each other in our neighborhood. Maybe that was part of it. She was always perfectly polite. Like she was following some script for being a good neighbor. But that, by itself, wouldn’t have been enough to make me suspicious.

And it wasn’t just that she came and went at odd hours, disappearing sometimes for days at a time. Never for too long. She never asked the post office to stop her mail, and she always made sure to get back before her mailbox became too full.

It wasn’t really the fact that no one ever came to her house. Though I did think it was strange that she apparently had no family or friends whatsoever. And when I tried to offer her my friendship, she politely but firmly rejected it.

It wasn’t even that she lived alone but drove a huge SUV with extremely dark windows in the back. I’d tried to glance inside once, wondering what she could possibly need such a large vehicle for, but the darkness of the interior was impenetrable.

It was all of those things, and none of them. There was just something off about her.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: Tampering with the Mail (Results)”

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each week, we post a writing prompt: an opening line, a concept, a plot hook, maybe an image.  The following Saturday, we’ll post again with the writing the prompt inspired.

This week’s prompt is: You open your neighbor’s mail–what do you find?

(Prompt courtesy of @tabloprompts)

Our writers will be writing for the prompts, but anyone is welcome to participate!  Just come by on Sunday to see the week’s prompt, write during the week, and send any writing you’d like to share to StonehengeCircleWriters@gmail.com by the following Friday at 8 pm.  On Saturday we’ll post participants’ writing (with credit to the author, of course).

Write as much or as little as you choose: a paragraph, a flash fiction piece (less than 1,000 words) or a short story.  (Note, for long writing, we may choose to post only a selection.)  You are encouraged to be as creative as possible with the writing prompts.  Try to do something unexpected, or explore a particular genre like science fiction or historical fiction.  Take the prompt literally, or decide it’s a metaphor.  Your only limit is your own imagination.

Happy writing!

 

If you like to plan ahead, next week’s prompt will be: You got on a bus and woke up in a strange town where things seem a little wrong (Prompt courtesy of Reedsy.com)

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each week, we post a writing prompt: an opening line, a concept, a plot hook, maybe an image.  The following Saturday, we’ll post again with the writing the prompt inspired.

This week’s prompt is: Retell the story of Little Red Riding Hood from a new angle–try any genre you like, such as science fiction, romance or horror.

Our writers will be writing for the prompts, but anyone is welcome to participate!  Just come by on Sunday to see the week’s prompt, write during the week, and send any writing you’d like to share to StonehengeCircleWriters@gmail.com by the following Friday at 8 pm.  On Saturday we’ll post participants’ writing (with credit to the author, of course).

Write as much or as little as you choose: a paragraph, a flash fiction piece (less than 1,000 words) or a short story.  (Note, for long writing, we may choose to post only a selection.)  You are encouraged to be as creative as possible with the writing prompts.  Try to do something unexpected, or explore a particular genre like science fiction or historical fiction.  Take the prompt literally, or decide it’s a metaphor.  Your only limit is your own imagination.

Happy writing!

 

If you like to plan ahead, next week’s prompt will be: You open your neighbor’s mail–what do you find? (Prompt courtesy of @tabloprompts)

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each week, we post a writing prompt: an opening line, a concept, a plot hook, maybe an image.  The following Saturday, we’ll post again with the writing the prompt inspired.

This week’s prompt is: A story using the words “traitor” and “sky”

(Courtesy of @writingprompts)

Our writers will be writing for the prompts, but anyone is welcome to participate!  Just come by on Sunday to see the week’s prompt, write during the week, and send any writing you’d like to share to StonehengeCircleWriters@gmail.com by the following Friday at 8 pm.  On Saturday we’ll post participants’ writing (with credit to the author, of course).

Write as much or as little as you choose: a paragraph, a flash fiction piece (less than 1,000 words) or a short story.  (Note, for long writing, we may choose to post only a selection.)  You are encouraged to be as creative as possible with the writing prompts.  Try to do something unexpected, or explore a particular genre like science fiction or historical fiction.  Take the prompt literally, or decide it’s a metaphor.  Your only limit is your own imagination.

Happy writing!

 

If you like to plan ahead, next week’s prompt will be: Retell the story of Little Red Riding Hood from a new angle–try any genre you like, such as science fiction, romance or horror.

Welcome back for today’s stories!

This week’s prompt was: “You had one job to do…”

Today we have one flash fiction story from R. A. Gates, and, perhaps appropriately, the beginning of a short story that didn’t get finished from Cheryl Mahoney.  We hope you’ll enjoy reading!

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R. A. Gates:

“You had one job to do,” Mrs. Renfield told Laney as she pinched the bridge of her nose. “The simplest job I could find. The one job I thought couldn’t end in disaster. But leave it to you to find a way to mess it up.”

Laney stared at the ground below her feet, waiting for her high school Charms teacher’s rant to end. She was totally overreacting. Laney did exactly what she was told to do. She just added a little extra pizazz, that’s all. It was the school’s biggest fall event after all; the Autumn Carnival. Her booth had to compete with the big rides and games. No one was stopping by her booth.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: Failed Endeavor (Results)”

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each week, we post a writing prompt: an opening line, a concept, a plot hook, maybe an image.  The following Saturday, we’ll post again with the writing the prompt inspired.

This week’s prompt is: “You had one job to do…”

Our writers will be writing for the prompts, but anyone is welcome to participate!  Just come by on Sunday to see the week’s prompt, write during the week, and send any writing you’d like to share to StonehengeCircleWriters@gmail.com by the following Friday at 8 pm.  On Saturday we’ll post participants’ writing (with credit to the author, of course).

Write as much or as little as you choose: a paragraph, a flash fiction piece (less than 1,000 words) or a short story.  (Note, for long writing, we may choose to post only a selection.)  You are encouraged to be as creative as possible with the writing prompts.  Try to do something unexpected, or explore a particular genre like science fiction or historical fiction.  Take the prompt literally, or decide it’s a metaphor.  Your only limit is your own imagination.

Happy writing!

 

If you like to plan ahead, next week’s prompt will be: A story using the words “traitor” and “sky” (Courtesy of @writingprompts)

 

Happy Saturday!  We hope you’re having a nice day with only pleasant decisions to be made.  The characters in this week’s stories may be having a harder time of it.

This week’s prompt was: Write a story about making a difficult choice

Enjoy reading!

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Cheryl Mahoney:

I looked at the two books on the table in front of me.  Everyone said they were just two possible paths.  Everyone official said that.  The whispers said something else.

It wasn’t obvious looking at them.  They were much the same, in fact.  Two big leather tomes, each with a locked clasp holding them shut.  Each with swirling gold lettering on the front.

“Could I, maybe, look at the table of contents?” I asked.

The Mentor across the table from me blinked once, so I knew this wasn’t a usual question.  And it was true, I had a pretty good idea what was in each one.  I knew the lore.  I’d already been learning for three years.  No one was ever offered the Choice until their fourth year of study.  The Choice that would determine their future study.

But then she nodded, and drew a ring of tiny keys out of her pocket, so apparently the question wasn’t completely unheard of.  She unlocked each book, turned each one to the contents page.

I looked at the right hand one first.  It was more or less what I had expected.  Spells to grow flowers, to mend tears in cloth, to heal mild ailments.  All the things a simple village witch would need, to take care of a simple village like the one I’d grown up in.  My mother took it for granted I’d choose this one, and always had.  She had always said how the Choice was no real choice.  It hadn’t been for her.

And yet—it all seemed so small.

I looked at the left hand book.  There was nothing small about these spells.  Spells for raising up walls, for blasting fireballs, for uprooting trees.  And other spells.  Darker spells.  All the things a warrior witch would need, to spread conquest and destruction.

But I didn’t really want to do that either.

“I don’t suppose, maybe, there’s a third book?” I said weakly.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: Decisions, Decisions (Results)”