November is a special month for many reasons. The holidays are around the corner, the semester is winding down, leaves are releasing their inner demons. Most importantly it is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)! Every year a group of my friends adds on the difficult task of writing a 50,000-word novel along with all their other homework and social events. Honestly, I admire them. Fiction has never been my strong suit. This month I’m writing a poem every day so that I could at least feel like part of the group. Yet coming up with ideas for characters and the wacky shenanigans they get into can start getting more taxing as the month goes on. Please feel free to use any of these ideas in order to start a new story or spice up the one you are currently working on. I wish you the best of luck with NaNoWriMo and any other writing projects you are doing. Believe in yourself!
1. Your main character walks into a record store after a really difficult conversation with their significant other. What is the album they gravitate to? What album do they actually buy?
2. A stranger approaches a minor character and hands them a book of spells. Most of the pages seem to be blank yet appear while dancing. What type of gloves was the stranger wearing?
3. The devil appears in your main character’s home bathroom. He is reading Cosmopolitan. What score does the devil get on the kiss-o-meter quiz on page 76?
4. A minor character dies in a freak pancake contest accident. Their tombstone reads: “Once a flower, always growing.”
5. The significant other of your main character is visiting their apartment for the first time. What are the books they find on the night stand next to a bag of loose tea?
6. Buy a sky chart. Where are we? When will we get there?
7. Two famous authors who were not alive at the same time find themselves at a café together. They criticize each other’s taste coffee/tea. One of them has a gun hidden in a hardback novel.
8. Write a chapter/short story in the second person about a trip to the dentist.
9. Your main character wakes up to a slow drip of water the morning after a heavy night of shenanigans. Why does the water taste like iron?
10. A Godzilla film is playing on television. Who is the hero? Are there any?
11. A minor character gets into the world championship of yo-yoing. Do they receive the big scholarship to Yale? Why does Yale have a yo-yo scholarship?
12. Your main character accidentally walks into an audition for a musical and gets the leading role. They thought they were in line for free tacos and are greatly disappointed.
13. Buy a grapefruit. Eat it while showering. Very easy cleanup.
14. Your main character’s significant other is at a concert. A particular song that reminds them of an ex starts so they step outside for a smoke. They pat themselves and find that their cigarettes have fallen out of their pocket. A small child comes up to them and asks them a question about their existence. They ponder. They collapse.
15. Your hands are writing the novel. Not your brain. What are they trying to tell you?
16. In a 24-hour period, the same couch is sat upon by a waiter, a rock star, three lost tourists and a cat. What’s happening?
17. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.’s ghost is haunting you. Stop him from getting into the cookie jar.
18. How many times does your main character go to the bathroom in your novel? Make it a realistic amount. A major plot point must occur while they are in there.
19. Play David Bowie’s “Blackstar” album backward. Write down three reasons you never call your mother anymore.
20. Your main character sips on their tea/coffee. They burn the tip of their tongue.
