Newbie

I’ll come back tomorrow

I’ll come back tomorrow to look at the clear space between the Co-op and the Santander Bank. The fresh morning sun will light the glistening concrete and the unexpected birds taking baths in puddles where carpets have been carried off. Men in hard hats and hi-vis vests will bundle drills about and smoke their cigarettes a…[Read more]

UNTITLED – 350 words

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Lumpy pillows in torn, unidentifiable protective fabric, stuffed into too-small pillow cases. A saggy, foam mattress, plastic-coated and marinated in dilute bleach. A side-room with a window looking onto the whitewashed wall on the other side of the hospital and a door that opens d…[Read more]

impromptu

you’ll come to a bad end, said my dad in our hallway, in his pyjamas, hands at his sides, knuckles curled, though – as far as I know – he never raised his fists, and what’s more he was too clever for cliché most of the time, but that evening when I came home from the gig with a scent of sweat and beer, I was grinning, shifting from foo…[Read more]

I asked it for a 200-word synopsis for my 2,200-word Den Challenge story (which I haven’t posted on the Den yet). The result was mostly a true reflection of the story – about 90% right I’d say. It had the minor character’s motivations wrong; they went in the opposite direction to what I’d written, unless of course I haven’t described them clearly…[Read more]

I asked it about limits and it recommended breaking text into chunks, so I divided the input into blocks of chapters, but as I was about to do the final block I hit an error, which I think was the limit of my free access: there was a message about that soon afterwards. Annoyingly inconclusive! Some chapters were summarised in full, others were…[Read more]

I tried a 500 word synopsis. It was curiously like a “bad” synopsis that an inexperienced writer might try, too much detail at the outset and then broad generalisations for the middle and end. It always concludes by asking whether you want any refinements, so I asked for more detail about the conclusion and it invented a character and several plot…[Read more]

This is very interesting, Ath. Have you tried giving it a word count, e.g. to produce a 300-word synopsis?

ODDS AND ENDINGS IN MY LIFE, INCLUDING THE STICKY ONES. .

For me the phrase ‘the end’ invokes a variety of feelings.

Some, such as the end of a candle or bit of soap are not memorable. Those endings flash out of existence in a blink of thoughtlessness, never to be recalled again.

However, dancing along the polar opposite to that, there are…[Read more]

As we are in imminent peril of being swamped with things-AI if Mr Starmer and our present government are to be believed, I thought I’d bite the bullet and give ChatGPT a whirl. As an experiment, I thought I’d try for a summary of my WIP. Since that’s something I will have to wrestle with when I come to submit, I wondered whether it might be…[Read more]

Regrettably late to this – and non-participant – but what a joy to catch up with those that did make the effort- thank you @ Richard and @Terrie

My offering was much  the same  Richard.

I thought about all the things  that cause me difficulty  – didn’t know how to start  writing about it  and  ended up  making myself smile with a bit of  fun.

Thanks, Ath. I should maybe point out that ‘the protagonist’ is in fact me. The brief didn’t say it had to be fiction, and my effort isn’t. I really am building, slowly and very carefully, a huge model car.

Oh Lord. Two entries. Both very different from what I expected. Not that I expected anything in particular, but I know what I mean. Both excellent. Richard’s engrossed me, as the protagonist was engrossed in the model. Terrie’s made me laugh out loud. There’s no winner or loser here, because it was a virtual toss of the coin. Richard, choose us a…[Read more]

Thank you for posting this, Ath. Christmas has been so busy I’ve only just read it. It’s a touching story.

<p style=”text-align: center;”>DEGREES OF DIFFICULTY IN MY LIFE</p>
<p style=”text-align: center;”>(when it gets difficult  – make it  rhyme )</p>
I find it difficult to hide the truth, or say things that are untrue.

I can’t fit inside a kayak, or paddle a canoe.

I can’t crochet anything or mend my pushbike brake

and bouncing on a tramp…[Read more]