Friday Writing Prompt Holiday Edition

I am put this list together on Wednesday since the library is closed for Christmas. Merry Christmas!!! I put the list together a little differently. I searched in the catalog with Christmas as the search term and these are the 25 I chose for the prompts. Use five of the prompts to write a short story or poem.
     1. A Candid History
     2. The Gift
     3. Why We Celebrate it the Way We Do
     4. Trash to Treasure
     5. Lost December
     6. Living Everyday
     7. Take Me Home
     8. A Fool's Gold
     9. This Holiday Magick
     10. Baby, it's Cold Outside
     11. Sweet Revenge
     12. Mrs. Miracle
     13. Wallflower
     14. An Outlaw
     15. Twelfth Night Secrets
     16. Baby Cakes
     17. Cold Snap
     18. Angels at the Table
     19. Jingle Boy
     20. Mistletoe
     21. Ex-mas
     22. The Black Butterfly
     23. Let it Snow
     24. A Full House
     25. Captain's Command.

Feel free to share your creation in the comments. I would love to read it!

The Ghost Bride Review

I was searching the Lake County Overdrive database looking for an audiobook to download to listen to as I drive. When I came across The Ghost Bride the idea of ghost marriages piqued my curiosity. Check out the Wikipedia ghost marriage page. I checked out and downloaded the audiobook and was not disappointed. Yangsze Choo's debut book is a spell-binding mix of Chinese folklore, the supernatural and romance woven together within a murder mystery. It has been the most enjoyable audiobooks I have listened to not just in 2015 but ever! Before I had even finished the book I was recommending it! Super glad the ending went the way it did. Sometimes a narrator can make ruin an audiobook, cannot say that here. The narrator was a perfect choice and for days I would catch myself saying Li Lan (the main Character's name) in imitation of the narrator. Not only have I loved this book but those whom I've recommended it too have thoroughly enjoyed it as well, no matter if they read or listened.

Yangsze Choo’s stunning debut, The Ghost Bride, is a startlingly original novel infused with Chinese folklore, romantic intrigue, and unexpected supernatural twists.
Li Lan, the daughter of a respectable Chinese family in colonial Malaysia, hopes for a favorable marriage, but her father has lost his fortune, and she has few suitors. Instead, the wealthy Lim family urges her to become a “ghost bride” for their son, who has recently died under mysterious circumstances. Rarely practiced, a traditional ghost marriage is used to placate a restless spirit. Such a union would guarantee Li Lan a home for the rest of her days, but at what price?

Night after night, Li Lan is drawn into the shadowy parallel world of the Chinese afterlife, where she must uncover the Lim family’s darkest secrets—and the truth about her own family.

Reminiscent of Lisa See’s Peony in Love and Amy Tan’s The Bonesetter’s Daughter, The Ghost Bride is a wondrous coming-of-age story and from a remarkable new voice in fiction. - Amazon Description


The book is available for checkout through the Lake County Library System.

Friday Writing Prompt

The challenge is to use at least five of the titles in one short story or poem.

     1. The Song Catcher

     2. The Baytown Outlaws

     3. The Murder House

     4. Bridge to Happiness

     5. A Time to Die

     6. The Perfect Ghost

     7. Cold Hearted

     8. Prince of Fire

     9. The Rosary

    10. Illusions

    11. A Capital Holiday

    12. The Tourist

    13. Masquerade

    14. Deadly Assets

    15. Wicked Charms

    16. Ever After

    17. Out of Focus

    18. Happiness for Beginners

    19. A Banquet of Consequences

    20. Fire in the Night

    21. Weathered too Young

    22. The Wondrous and the Wicked

    23. The Lost Queen

    24. The Honor of the Queen

    25. The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter

and a bonus holiday title:

          Christmas with You

I quite like the titles in this list. I may write something short and post it next time. Have fun with it!

Introducing The Friday Writing Prompt

While checking in some books today, I noticed that the titles could make good writing prompts. So for the foreseeable future on Fridays I will be posting 25 titles of books that I have checked in over the week. The challenge is to use at least five of them in one short story or poem.

                                                           1. The thundering trail

                                                           2. Ice cold

                                                           3. Blue Heaven

                                                           4. The Jester

                                                           5. Splinters of Light

                                                           6. Cursed

                                                           7. I’ll Walk Alone

                                                           8. The Christmas Pearl

                                                           9. A Gun for Bragg’s Woman

                                                         10. The Valley of Vanishing Riders

                                                         11. The Gate House

                                                         12. Black Horizon

                                                         13. Sheriff of Hangtown

                                                         14. The Truth about Diamonds

                                                         15. Unhinged

                                                         16. Silent Partner

                                                         17. The Beloved Enemy

                                                         18. Esther’s Gift

                                                         19. Slow Burn

                                                         20. Desperate Hours

                                                         21. Out of Africa

                                                         22. The Sentry

                                                         23. Legend of a Bad Man

                                                         24. Under Northern Stars

                                                         25. First Claim

Here is an example of micro fiction using some of the titles:

He was still the Jester though it had been many years since he had juggled or made anyone laugh for that matter. He had been alone since the old king had cursed him and sent him out of Africa. Despite all the black horizons that he had faced he still had joy in his heart. He made his camp now under northern stars and was leaving behind him a legend of a bad man. 

Naming the old king and the addition of  another sentence and it could be the beginning of something larger:

He was still the Jester though it had been many years since he had juggled or made anyone laugh for that matter. He had been alone since the old king Bragg had cursed him and sent him out of Africa. Despite all the black horizons that he had faced he still had joy in his heart. He made his camp now under northern stars and was leaving behind him a legend of a bad man. He hoped she would soon take up the offer of a gun for Bragg’s woman and join him.

I had fun writing that little bit and hope you have fun playing around with the prompts. Feel free to post your creation in the comments!