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Halloween nears, how about something to do with witches? Maybe your character is dressing up as a witch for Halloween? Maybe they are a real life witch? Maybe you want to snag the witches from the Wizard of Oz and have them all interact in a short story? Is there an old lady in your story that all the town calls ‘the old witch’?

Maybe your lead discovers an old witch’s book of spells? Or is it as simple as a kitchen witch doll hanging in an old lady’s apartment? How about a greeting card for Halloween?

This prompt is courtesy of the seemingly non-stop play fights between the dog and the cat that are racing up and down the hallway.

Come up with some sort of dog vs. cat scenery to work into your story.  Maybe the lead character is trying to pick out a pet at a pet store? Maybe someone asked them to pet set and the  pets are a dog and a cat that don’t get along?  Maybe start a story from the point of view of the dog or the cat as they battle against the other?  Maybe it is a pair of stuffed animals that keep falling against one another on a shelf making the child snicker about a dog and cat fighting for the shelf? Is an alien trying to determine if it is the dog or the cat, that the planet’s apparently dominant life form waits on hand and foot, that is the real world leader?

Have fun and get to writing.

Is there a point in your novel that would lend itself to a swift entrance and exit by one of the other characters?  Or even your lead?

Maybe you could create a memorable old patriarch type that sweeps into a scene every once in a while and then leaves just as quickly?  Why would they be in such a hurry?  Think of Alice in Wonderland and the White Rabbit, who is continually hurrying by checking his pocket watch and muttering “I’m late, I’m late!”.  This is a character that will enter the scene for a brief moment, then exit before the scene ends.  Maybe once, maybe multiple times.

Do not restrict yourself to human’s either.  What about a cat that meanders into the scene every once in a while?  Why would it do that? Perhaps the lead in your romance novel keeps seeing a parrot come and light on their balcony rail.  What would happen when they finally investigate where this lovely exotic bird comes from?  Did it once live there?  Does it belong to their neighbor?  Has someone been using it to gain their attention?

There are a lot of ways to play with this idea, as you can see, so go play and have fun writing.

Maybe this should be the weekly writing prompt?  Okay, so I still want to tough it out with daily prompts, and maybe one of these days I will actually get to offering up another prompt every day, who knows.

How about a prompt on speculations?  What could your hero be speculating about?  Maybe the villain is doing the speculating?  Could your antagonist be speculating about the likelihood that the protagonist will believe the false trail that they are laying down?  Could the detective in your mystery be speculating on just who could have had access to the victim’s will?

Okay, so the prompts are not exactly daily prompts at the moment, more like weekly ones.  This gives us our next prompt at least.

Come up with some way to show that your character is overworked or in some other way stretched too thin.  Perhaps they are feeling the burden that is upon them or they have taken on one too many projects at work?

Whatever the variation on being stretched thin is, it should be clearly reflected that the character is at that point where they are barely keeping things together.