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Add A Line - another kind of writing prompt.

merej99Posted for Everyone to comment on, 5 years ago3 min read

Once upon a time, long, long ago, there was a wonderful site called iVillage where channels of message boards and chatrooms were categorized by things like Food, Parenting, Lifestyle, Health & Fitness, Relationships, Readers & Writers, etc.

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I probably don't have to tell you that I practically lived in Readers & Writers; it's where I met several authors, honed my writing, and learned new things. Conversely, I was embraced by the community and my ideas were valued as well.

Now, within the Readers & Writers channel, we had sub-categories for varying things: Book Reviews, Book Club, Authors, Writing Poetry, Writing Romance, Writing Technique... You get the picture.

Anyway... There was an amazing board where I spent the majority of my time. It was called "Add-A-Line" - and the idea behind it is one person starts off a story by adding a single sentence - that's it! Then the next person who felt the writing spirit added their line. Granted, we had over a hundred dedicated participants who checked in all day, every day. Those little stories developed rather quickly!

You never know what you're gonna get

What made it really interesting and fun was the fact that the story was at the mercy of the next person who came along. It didn't matter if you had a plot twist or perfect come back in the dialogue. You had to wait your turn - and you never knew where the story was going until it reached the end - the final resolution where everyone agreed it was a good ending.

The twists and turns, the conflicts and eventual resolution, in my opinion, made this particular writing exercise very fun. Just like my muse torturing me, I never know what's going to happen until it's time to sit down and write.

Shall we try it?

Being fully aware that we are nearing the end of the Community Engagement Challenge, I thought this would be a fun way to generate comments and create a story at the same time!

Will it be horror or romance; a dystopian tale or steampunk; history or science fiction?

Wouldn't you like to know!?


All you have to do is ADD A LINE


Here's the first line:

He heard the sirens off in the distance and stepped deeper into the shadows.

  • ONE LINE PER TURN
  • Don't forget to hit the refresh button!
  • Continue on with the story in your own thread.
  • If you see a story developing on a different thread, add-a-line.
  • As the story develops, try to be mindful of the developing characters and be in sync with things like names, location, point-of-view (ie. head-hopping)
  • Have fun!
    word count: 426

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