Previous Weeks Writing Assignments

These assignments are in order from most recent to oldest.

• Write a story that begins with: Deftly, his practiced fingers unhinged the lock on the large, wooden chest that held the secrets of ...
• You are watching a home makeover show on television, and the homeowners are going in to horrid detail describing the loathsome appearance of one of the rooms of their house. You realize that this house used to be yours, and the design they are tearing apart was your crowning achievement in home improvement! How do you react?
• Use this sentence and a half to start your story: Belinda Budge was as stubborn as her last name implied, and on this particular day she was resolute in refusing to ...
• Use this sentence and a half to start your story:
  When Max spoke, people listened. The problem was that Max ...

• Write a page from a travelogue of a space adventurer.

• Write a synopsis of the perfect summer blockbuster. (not an EXISTING movie, mind you, but a short story of mashing all the elements of what makes a blockbuster great, like Titanic meets LOTR or something.)

• Write a story set during your most recent vacation.
  
• What is life like in a fish tank?
  
• You have been given the power to change one thing in the world. What is it, and what are the ramifications?
• It's Friday, two hours before you get to leave work. You look out the office windows and (insert phenomenon here.) How does this affect your plans for the evening?
  
• You are the leader of your own nation, and your top aide as just told you of a huge crisis. What is the crisis, and what do you do?
  
• Write a story backwards. Start with the ending paragraph and go back to the beginning. And NO CHEATING: you can't write a story and cut and paste the paragraphs.
• Write something based on the title of a book, movie, song, whatever - that has nothing to do with the oritinal premise. (paraphrased from original assignment wording.)
  
• Write the opening scene of a movie with the development premise of "JAWS meets BAMBI."
  
• You awake one morning to find yourself a prisoner in the Bastille during the French Revolution. Things don't look good for you. Find some way to escape or talk your way out of prison.
  
• Write an epic (multi-stanza) Haiku about the day Pirates stole your lunch.
  
• You are leaving for work in the morning and you run into your neighbor, who has ... (insert phenomenon here)
  
• Plausibly explain how a mythical creature, such as a unicorn, could be responsible for your car accident.
  
• You are a/an: Demon/Angel. Describe your earliest memory.
  
• You just woke up on a hillside above your town. You look over the edge and your town is ... (insert phenomenon here)
  
• Write a letter of complaint to a (futuristic) company who sold you a fautly teleporter and you are furious.
  
• You are 16, the prom is this weekend, and (insert crisis here.)
  
• Write a story from the POV of a literal fly on the wall.
  
• Write a story using these 5 words: Illuminated, Gristle, Matrix, Sandpiper, Ankle.
  
• Write a story from the POV of your most recent Halloween Costume

Creativity

By MATT

It's not easy to find time to write. Whether its because of work, school, volunteering, or hanging out with friends, sometimes the hardest thing to do is to sit down and start typing, writing, dictating, making cuneiform tablets, etching in stone - or whatever method you use to express yourself.

Yet it's important to find the time. I don't do it enough and sometimes I think I'm poorer for it. Whenever I do sit down and start typing, I'm amazed at what happens. I never know what direction my fingers are going to take me. It's always a journey. Sometimes it's deeply personal, expressing some long repressed emotion or reaction to an event. Writing can be quite cathartic. It's helped me over more than one hump in life.

The are times what you write is pretty cut and dried. News stories, for example, can often only go in one direction. Sometimes though you find them going in unexpected tangents. You get the best stories that way.

Often what I write stinks. I go back erase the whole darn thing and start over. Most of the time it's the third or fourth attempt at a story that sets me down the path. But whether your story is good or not is not the point of the exercise. Discovery is.

Sometimes writing's funny. You sit back at the end of a story, laugh, and wonder just exactly what deep recess of your brain it came from.

No matter what type of writing I ultimately end up doing, all stories have one thing in common. I've learned something about myself. And that makes me richer.

Meet Your No-Talent Hacks!

BRYAN MAHONEY
Boston, MA
Good looks: Check.
Writing Skills: Check.
Creativity: Check.
Big Annoying Ego: Check.
Even Bigger Noggin: Check.
Check out Bryan's own blog here.





DAVE WHEELER
Canandaigua, NY
Dave is simply The Man. That's all that must be said. Well, no. In addition to being The Man, he's also a journalist, a conoisseur of fine earworms, a sci-fi/fantasy/filk geek in exelcis. And he's broke. Send him money. Lots and lots of money. Fund his existence so he can write. Or just buy him a Guinness and everything'll be cool. Oh, yeah.
Check out Dave's LiveJournal Here



MARCY MAHONEY
Boston, MA.
I'm random, rambling, and radioactive. I love Halloween, hate cube steak, and my favorite cartoon of all time is He-Man. I love stories that take you somewhere else and leave you there, then steal your lunch but leave you chocolate. Favorite authors include Neil Gaiman, Patricia A. McKillip, George R. R. Martin, Paulo Coelho & Phillipa Gregory.
Check out Marcy's own blog here

BRIAN ARNOLD
Los Angeles, CA
Got a job, a wife, a kid, a text book, a dry sense of humor and lots of student loans.
Check out Brian's blog HERE.








JILLIANNE REINSETH
Vancouver, Canada
Born of the Norsemen, Jillianne is a Viking Pirate Queen with boundless creativity and a California/London/Canadian accent. She is an animation and comic book guru who loves cute mighty cartoon characters and all things Bruce Campbell. Jillianne joins the Hacks from Vancouver, Canada, and as such has made the Hacks an international organization!







MATT RIED
Fairport, NY (for now)
Geek: Always
Cook: Sometimes
Writer: Sometimes
I love anything (mechanical) that flies, hockey, Discovery HD Theater, Battlestar Galactica, and history. Books rock and so do computers (refer back to geek)








LAURA MAHONEY
Boston, MA
Laura has zip-lined through the jungles of Costa Rica, sailed with the Merchant Marines across the Arctic Circle, and lived in Seville, Spain. She played Jesus' mother in her school play and yelled at Joseph when he forgot his lines. By day, she's a travel agent and by night she's a super-hero travel writer.
Check out Laura's Facebook page here

KRIS DREESSEN
Rochester, NY
Kris is an adventurer and a rebel. She loves loud music, she hates grasshopper lollipops, and her guilty pleasures are the Jackass Movies.

Check out Kris's own blog here.

ALLISON COOPER
Canandaigua, NY
Allison is a newpaper editor, reporter, supermom, and philosopher. She has the soul of a poet and the prose of a goddess.







STEVE MAST
Los Angeles, CA
Steve Hacks from sunny So Cal and graduated (not recently) from UCR. Enjoys long walks on the beach, plasma TVs and HD movies.

NO-TALENT HACKS UNITE!!

Welcome to the official blog of the
No-Talent Hacks writers group!


(Yes, we are exclusive, you can read us but not play with us. We're not snobs, just insecure hacks.)


We, the No-Talent Hacks, will be comin' atcha with all of our creative fury.
We write it all ... travelogues, fiction, non-fiction, science fiction, fantasy, children's lit, spiritual journeys ... and once there was this story about a pink balloon registering under a false name while waiting for the four horsemen...

Sit back and enjoy the magic, as the No-Talent Hacks try to live up to their glorious name.

Yours Hackfully,
The No-Talent Hacks