Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each Sunday, 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 language class for aliens

(Prompt courtesy of eadeverell.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!

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each Sunday, 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 visual:

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 language class for aliens (courtesy of eadeverell.com)

May the Fourth be with you!  Welcome to this week’s update of stories from our writers.  Our prompt was:

The color of her blood was the least of my worries.

Today we have three stories to share from this inspiration, with a range of genres: fantasy to romance to horror.

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Cheryl Mahoney:

Between an Elf and a Dragon

The color of her blood was the least of my worries, and yet I couldn’t stop myself from yelling, “Why is your blood blue?”

She just shrugged, wiped blue blood from her forehead with the back of one hand, and blocked a blast of dragon fire with the shield on her other arm.  “It’s a royalty thing.”

“You’re kidding me!” I protested, ducking another blast of superhot flame.  It scorched the tavern wall, and I could feel my hair crackle.

“All right, it’s an elvish royalty thing,” she amended.  “Humans just mean it metaphorically.  Based on the ones I’ve stabbed.”

I couldn’t tell if she was kidding, and I didn’t like to ask.  Besides, I was in the middle of rolling behind an overturned table as the green scaly spat another fireball at us.  It set the table ablaze, but that was better than setting me ablaze.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: The Color of Blood (Results)”

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each Sunday, 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: The color of her blood was the least of my worries.”

(Prompt courtesy of eadeverell.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!

 

Welcome back to our blog!  We hope you’ll enjoy this week’s story results. Our prompt was:

I never thought I’d see a sunrise that looked like that.

Two of our writers provided stories to this prompt.

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Karen Blakely:

I never thought I’d see a sunrise that looked like that. Though to be honest, I’d never expected to see a sunrise at all.

None of this will make much sense if you don’t know something important about me. I’ve always been a complete and total night owl. Going to bed before 3:00 a.m. was early for me these days. And even though my friends insisted that I was missing something beautiful, I would never voluntarily see a sunrise.

Which made my current predicament particularly bizarre.

My house backed onto a busy street. Day or night, there was plenty of traffic: cars, ambulances, eighteen wheelers, motorcycles. I always wore earbuds to bed and listened to soothing music to keep all that noise out. I also had black-out drapes on my windows since I was never awake before 11:00 a.m. and hated waking with the sun in my eyes.

It was 2:34 a.m. when I went to bed.  I’d checked the weather on my phone; the wind gusts outside were rising, and I was grateful we didn’t have hurricanes or tornados in Sacramento. The throaty roar outside my window was already shockingly loud, and according to the Weather Channel, the storm would continue to intensify until it reached its peak around 7:30 a.m.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: Sunrise (Results)”

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each Sunday, 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: I never thought I’d see a sunrise that looked like that.

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 color of her blood was the least of my worries.” (courtesy of eadeverell.com)

 

Welcome back to read this week’s stories.  Our prompt was:

On vacation for the first time in years, an out of work writer wakes up in a strange house.

Two of our writers tackled this prompt, putting it into two different genres.

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Cheryl Mahoney:

“It’s just that no one wants half-orc stories this season,” Harold the Suave explained, sitting behind his desk made of living wood.  A small human, he unquestionably had a living wood desk so that the chair component could raise the height of his seat based on the size of his visitors.  Right now, it had raised him a good six feet from the floor.  “Stories about people bashing their enemies and drinking great quaffs of ale are unquestionably out.”

“So what’s in?” Bashdag rumbled.  He always felt uncomfortable in Harold’s office, even when the conversation was pleasanter.  The low chair Harold reserved for visitors was much too small for Bashdag, his knees rising up at an almost forty-five degree angle in front of him.  And he knew his head would hit the ceiling if he stood up too carelessly.

“The in thing this season…well, I don’t think you need to worry about that,” Harold said.  As he spoke, his gaze drifted over to the enormous display on one wall.  Several rows of books, all one book, with a giant, blown-up poster of the cover in the center.

The entire thing was pink and sparkly and had been screaming the title The Passionate Perils of Pineapple Poplarcreek into Bashdag’s yellow eyes ever since he came in.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: Writer Shenanigans (Results)”

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each Sunday, 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: On vacation for the first time in years, an out of work writer wakes up in a strange house.

(Prompt courtesy of The Amazing Story Generator)

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: “I never thought I’d see a sunrise that looked like that.”

Happy Saturday!  Today we have a special collaborative story, in response to this week’s prompt:

An undercover alien and an intelligent animal are caught in a bank robbery.

We have something a bit different this week, as a group of our writers collaborated to write a joint story.  Each person took a different point of view.

Our Bank Robbery Victims:

Veteran with a prosthetic leg – R. A. Gates
Little Girl- Karen Blakely
Teen – Mattias Bergman
Cranky old woman – Cheryl Mahoney
Someone expecting an important call – Magnus Victor
Intelligent Cat – Ingrid Victoria
Undercover Alien – Kelly Haworth

************

Why isn’t this line moving? There would seem to be enough tellers to process everyone through in a sufficient manner. You would think banking transactions would be pretty easy. I mean, you’re either depositing money or withdrawing. Maybe the occasional transfer of funds but that shouldn’t take that long. Ah, finally, we get to move up a foot. Whoopee.

Ugh, I hope that kid in front of me doesn’t touch me with those sticky fingers. And why is she staring at me so much? Hasn’t she ever seen a woman with a prosthetic leg before? Maybe if I glare at her she’ll leave me alone. That got her to look away. Yeah, clutch your mom’s leg and get your chocolaty mess on her jeans. At least she still has a—

Why is someone yelling? A gun! Shit, I don’t have mine on me. Get down kid. Stop crying and listen to your mom and lay on the floor. There’s three of them. At least they seem like they know what they’re doing. Very coordinated. Impressive. This must not be their first robbery. The blond teller looks scared. She should be. Just do what the man says. The police will be here shortly. They better be. I don’t really want to stop them myself. I haven’t quite got the hang of this new leg yet.

****************

Mommy told me to hide and not let the bad men know I was there. I tried to argue with Mommy; I was wearing my Wonder Woman dress, after all. But she gave me her ‘do it or you won’t get dessert’ look, so I hid. But I didn’t like it.

The men didn’t look very bad to me. They were all wearing silly masks and were waving around pretend guns. At least, I was pretty sure they were pretend. They looked just like the guns on Daddy’s favorite TV shows.

Continue reading “Stonehenge Story Starts: Strange Encounters in a Robbery… (Results)”

Welcome to Stonehenge Story Starts, a weekly writing prompt and story sharing opportunity.  Each Sunday, 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: An undercover alien and an intelligent animal are caught in a bank robbery.

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: On vacation for the first time in years, an out of work writer wakes up in a strange house. (courtesy of The Amazing Story Generator)