As Sarah moved across the room to help with arranging Anaria’s hair, someone knocked at the door. Gwen went to answer it, standing to one side as her little brother slipped through the door, wide-eyed. “Mum, you look like a princess.” He flushed at the smiles and chuckles this brought and Sarah gave him a …
An exercise from Steering the Craft by Ursula Le Guinn that looks at the same scene from a bunch of different points of view... Rose bent for one final check in the dressing table mirror, adjusted an earring that had somehow twisted, then joined her godmother, Mariana, at the door. Mariana gave her a fond …
It was another three days before Captain Saros's ship, and its passengers, left port. Leila spent the days helping in the kitchen and getting to know the curious locals brought in by Timon and Marya's excursions. Her lap loom was past repair she'd heard, but a master carpenter was willing to try creating a new …
A very silly story based on a randomly drawn Storyteller card and three picture dice. The image on the card determines the character and some of the setting. The images on the dice are supposed to be incorporated into the story at some point but I got a bit carried away after the crab and …
Another exercise from Ursula Le Guinn's Steering the Craft book. This time, to write something gorgeous. To play with the language and not worry about getting too ornate. Calypso arrived at Bondi as the early morning exercise crowds left for work, while the backpackers were still in their bunks after another night of beers and …
Leila waved Marya off on her errands from behind a small mountain of assorted vegetables. She settled into a rhythm of chopping and scooping, from pile, to board, to pot; soothed by the easy repetition and the quiet, comfortable noises of the kitchen, punctuated by bursts of conversation from the public eating room as the …
Isobel smiled sweetly at the maid holding her morning dress out for approval, “No.” The maid darted a scared look between the princess and her disapproving governess. “Your Highness, you must be suitably outfitted for your first meeting with your fiancé.” “And I will be, but since he’s not arriving until mid-afternoon and I’m not …
Anaria thought she’d never sleep the night before her wedding, but older heads conferred and had her busy enough in the days before that she fell straight into her bed in the lovely blue room and knew nothing more until the sun peeked in on her the next morning. She lay for a minute, simply …
This is an exercise taken from Ursula Le Guin's Steering the Craft. To write a piece with no punctuation. It's a terrifying thing to do, but the result is unexpectedly interesting... The air is filled with the sounds of people calling to each other and calling to get out of the way and berating those …
I woke to unexpected heat. The weather had decided to take a turn back to mid-summer and I had to dig out something cooler to wear to visit one of my forest neighbours as planned. The unseasonal weather was not something she’d welcome. As a mushroom sprite, Amanita prefers the darker, cooler weather we’d been …
The DNA of Stories 