Writing By Laura

Since I finished my April story so late, I’ve actually decided to do something a little different for May. As I’ve mentioned before I’m dedicated months to people (or pets or both) in my life when it’s their Birthday month. Since June is actually my birthday month I’m going to do something different for June as well and focus my writing time on working on my memoir. Since my accident and TBI I’ve been writing sporadically in a Google Document my memoir. So in June I would like to focus my short story writing time on writing my memoir. Because of that I want to make sure I start writing right on June 1 and don’t let myself get behind. So I’m going to do a little speed writing challenge for my May story to catch up. I think I will try to finish it in 2 days. That way I can have a nice break before I start up on my June story/memoir.

As I mentioned earlier, my person I’m dedicating May to is my teenage niece. She loves playing soccer and is into geography. So I’m taking those topics as inspiration. (My little homemade graphic I made above is supposed to signify “no time,” plus “a typewriter,” plus “the world” equals “a masterpiece.”) The globe in my little graphic is because I’m using geography as a topic since my niece loves it. May’s story has a working title of “Where in the World.” It’s going to be about a high school senior trying to win a college scholarship by competing in a national geography bee. A mystery might take place. I haven’t quite decided.

One thing I’ve learned about writing quickly like that is that stories take on a life of their own. I’ve done Short Story Competitions (like NYC Midnight) before and written some things I really liked but they weren’t what I originally had in mind when I began (usually). Competitions like that usually have timing and other perimeters (like genre, etc.) that are meant to challenge and focus you. In this instance I’m only limiting myself by time. Maybe later in the year I’ll try something else like this.

I’ll let you know when the clock officially starts for my May Speed Writing challenge so you can follow along.